Cutting Organza with soldering iron
 

I wonder if any members of the Board have any experience of decorative work with organza using a soldering iron? I am interested in embellishing blocks for a new project I am working on.

I would think an electric stencil cutter would give finer control.

Shari

I thought soldering irons were for sweating solder on copper pipes to join the fittings, so they don't leak.

Have not used a soldering iron to do this, but did use a stencil cutter. You need to keep the tip clean so it does not leave gunk on you organza.

mltquilt

Thank you for responding. I have purchased a specially fine pointed soldering iron which was manufactured for the purpose of cutting synthetic fabrics. What I really need now is an idea as to what use I can put it to. Yet another project for me to knuckle down to.

I would imagine it is similar to a fine pointed wood burning iron. Be careful as some fabrics melt and seal, some may burn.
I've used a wide flat wood burning iron for cutting and sealing ribbons and tent nylon, and camping garment fabrics. Yours should work well for cutting organza- just test a swatch first. You don't want scratchy melted blobs on the edges so keep the iron moving.

Check out Margaret Beal, a textile artist in the UK. She's been using soldering iron techniques for years.
http://www.thetextiledirectory.com/s...al-Embroidery/
She had an article in the Winter 2005 issue of Quilting Arts that was fascinating...all kinds of fused cut work using a fine-tipped soldering iron and organza. She also has a YouTube video ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uZkgXi13zQ ) and at least one book. An example of her work and her contact info can be found here. http://www.antex.co.uk/pages/stencil.htm

Clover Mini Iron
 

If you have one of those, they make a "hot knife" attachment for it...

if you have an embroidery machine, you can make organza flowers (with rayon thread that won't melt from the heat)... use a mirror as your cutting surface! I never finished the project I started so I don't have any pictures ...

I have done some work using a soldering iron. I put together several layers of organza, ribbons, threads etc and then used the iron to make patterns, flowers, etc. Depending on how heavily you apply the iron you will only go through so many layers so you can get lots of different effects. It does take some practise but looks great.