How to Appliqué

Hey Guys,

In preparation for the Missy Moo Halloween Dress tutorial, I feel I need to do a little post on appliqué.  So, let's go.

An appliqué is basically when you sew down a decorative piece of fabric over the top of another fabric.  According to my dictionary, appliquéing is when you "sew or stick pieces of fabric onto a large piece of fabric to form pictures or patterns".  Like I said.

To do this the easy peasy way, you're going to need some of this:

Heat n' Bond Lite.  Make sure to grab the purple package - NOT the red one.  The difference between the two is that you can sew through the purple one, but if you try to sew through the red one, you'll gum up your needle.  You can get this at fabric stores in the notions section.  I like to wait until I've got a 40% off coupon at JoAnn's and then I pick some up.  It comes in 1 yd and 5.25 yd denominations.  Since it's not like you're going to suddenly become appliqué crazy, the 1 yd package is probably all you'll need.

Now, you're also going to need two pieces of fabric - one you want the appliqué made out of and one to stick it on.  I leave size and color up to you.  Today I am going to make a cat.

Draw your design on a piece of paper.  Keep in mind that you should draw the inverse of what you want.  If you want your cat to face left, draw it facing to the right so that when you get it on where it's going it'll be in the direction you want.  (Sorry for the poor quality picture here.)

Take your design and trace it onto your Heat n' Bond paper.  Take a piece of the material you're making the appliqué from and cut out a piece roughly the same size as your piece of Heat n' Bond paper with design.

Place your design on top of the WRONG side of the appliqué fabric and use your iron to bond them together, as per the instructions on the Heat n' Bond packaging.  Let it cool and then cut your design out.

Remove the paper backing and place your cut out design, RIGHT side up, on the fabric you want the design on.  Bond again, as per the instructions on the Heat n' Bond packaging.  There you have it!  Your design is now on your piece.

Now you need to go around the perimeter of your design and stitch it down with your sewing machine.  You can choose to use a decorative stitch or a satin stitch.  You could also choose to sew it down by hand.  Once you're done with that, you're done with your appliqué.  Congratulations!

(On a side note: If you'd gotten the RED package, you wouldn't have to sew it down because the bond the gookie-mookie makes is supposed to be super strong.  However, I made some silhouettes with the red package a month or so ago and any pointy bits, like my brother's nose, just kept coming unstuck.  Just something to keep in mind.)

CIAO!