We are excited to have Eileen Roche, Editor of Designs in Machine Embroidery share this content with you, which was originally posted on Eileen’s Machine Embroidery Blog :

We discussed five tips for expanding your embroidery expertise. One tip – Don’t Think Project – Think Technique – seemed to hit a nerve with many blog readers. We received lots of comments regarding trying new techniques and a quite a few of them mentioned lace. So here’s how I explored embroidering lace.

I selected a lace design and stitched it on four different types of material:

-heavy film-type water-soluble stabilizer

-mesh-like water soluble stabilizer

-tulle with regular weight film-type water soluble stabilizer

-stretch mesh fabric with regular weight film-type water soluble stabilizer

I used the same thread and lace design on each test. Of course, the lace design was professionally digitized and stitched out beautifully in each instance. I recorded how easy it was to remove the stabilizer and what steps were required. I stapled the stitch outs with a piece of the stabilizer and fabric (if included) to a piece of copy paper and made notes on the paper. Then I kept the samples in a binder for future reference.

From these samples, I could check the ‘hand’ of the lace, the translucency of the fabric and the ease of removal. The notes come in handy when I’m working on a new lace project. I used to think all lace projects are similar until I did this test. That’s when I learned that when the variables change, so does the outcome. All are acceptable but one or two preferred. So try it yourself and see what you find. You might just learn something new to an old or familiar task.

Designer’s Tip:
It is helpful to add fabric softener when rinsing the water soluble stabilizer away from the lace to create a soft touch to the lace.

Thanks for reading!

Reprinted with permission from Eileen's Blog.