backing for hand embroidery
 

You know those pre-printed white embroidery/cross stitch quilt squares? My question is this: do you back them with interfacing or cheap white fabric before you hand embroider them? The fabric on most of them is not good. (The front of my embroidery is pretty good, but my backs are a different story). And if you do, doesn't that make them hard to hand quilt? Thanks.

Oh.....and secondly, do you wash them/rinse them out by hand to remove that blue print that your embroidery didn't totally cover??.................Elizabeth

I don't back mine with anything. After I am done with the embroidery, I press the squares, attach sashing and cornerstones, then put on a border and prepare the quilt for quilting. Of course, I don't usually buy the pre stamped squares because of the quality of the fabric they are printed on. I usually just stamp my own on a good quality white muslin

I do alot of embroidery and I used to back mine with muslin but have since changed to a very thin flannel. I find it looks better and when carrying thread from one area to another, you cannot see the threads thru for fabric. Try it, I'm sure you will find you like it.

Our guild did a redwork block of the month and it was suggested to use a backing to hide traveling threads as mentioned above.

I had some lightweight woven cotton fusible ($6 range @ Joannes) from another project, liked it because it has a straight grain like regular fabric, so I used it on my blocks and liked the effect alot.

Some others used Thermore; some used thin white cotton batting from Quilters dream; others used muslin. Flannel has a shrink rate that might keep me from using it for this kind of project.

Jan in VA

I don't use anything as a backing, but I DON'T carry my theard.

I use muslin. Be sure to baste around design and edges to hold in place before embroidering.

I always use quilters dream batting behind mine.

I have been using a light to medium woven fusible interfacing on the back of my hand embroidery. The needle goes through easily and yes it hides the back from showing on the front. Check out Red Brolly site, this is the site I learned this from. Good luck.

when I did red work I always backed them with very thin batting....sometimes I even split the batting. it hids the knots and makes the front look so much better especially on cheaper fabric

There was a recent discussion on this. I'll try to search for it.

I don't know how to put a link here. Search for redwork question and you'll see many responses that may help you.