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Usually ready-made lace designs are sewn onto an item or
garment once the lace design is embroidered. That's why Free-Standing
Lace Designs are so easy to use for people who don't know to embroider
exactly at the place they want. When a lace design is ready, it takes only
seconds to position it at the perfect spot on your project. Then you can attach
it to the item or garment, using matching thread.
We have, however, found another technique for sewing CERTAIN TYPES of lace
designs into garments. It's possible to do this automatically, while your
machine is still embroidering the lace design. We call this technique
"In-Hoop Lace Inserting."
"In-Hoop Lace Inserting" has its pros and cons, of course.
To use this technique, a design should be properly digitized, and you should
start to embroider it exactly at the spot where it's supposed to be located.
This requires some accuracy.
Also, this will work only with single lace designs that have a
"finished" look on their own and have a kind of frame around them. We
are talking about the type of designs that are supposed to be positioned in the
middle of the background fabric, NOT on its edge.
The most important advantage of this technique is that the design is sewn into
garment so well that the garment can be laundered many times. You may want to
use this technique when sewing lace into clothes or linens that must be
laundered from time to time.
Another great quality of this technique is that your machine can insert a lace
design into fabric in such a way that seams will be absolutely invisible, since
they will be located underneath the lace stitches.
Embroidery machine can do this very neatly, and can "overlock" the
fabric edges at the same time. It's a challenge to do it that well, manually.
Here's a Short Summary of How "In-Hoop Lace Inserting" Works:
1. Select an appropriately digitized Free-Standing
Lace Designs that supports in-hoop insertion, and print its 1:1 scale paper
template.
2. Hoop two layers of strong, water-soluble backing. Fabric-type
Water-Soluble Stabilizer is better than film-type WSB for this
purpose.
3. Take the garment onto which you want to insert your lace design, position it
over the hooped, water-soluble backing, and secure it over the backing. The
spot where the lace design will be inserted should be exactly in the middle of
your hoop.
4. When the garment is secured over the water-soluble backing, the first design
thread is embroidered. This should be a running stitch. Its purpose is to
outline the area of fabric where you should cut out a hole for the lace insert.
5. Once the first thread is embroidered, remove the hoop and carefully cut out
the inside of the outlined area of fabric, as close to the stitches as you can.
Cut away only the fabric. The backing
MUST remain undamaged, to support the lace design.
6. Insert the hoop back into the machine and embroider the rest of the design,
following the thread change list. Once the design is ready, just take the
garment out of the hoop, cut away the large edges of water-soluble fabric, and
wash the rest of it away.
Another thought...
Instead of water-soluble fabric, it's possible to use regular fabric in a
contrasting color. This can create a very beautiful effect. Although the design
will no longer be lace, it will look great
in many cases. This approach is especially useful when you want to embroider it
onto a piece of cloth where you don't want it to be translucent. Alternatively,
you can do it as lace and then insert a piece of contrasting fabric behind the
lace, after it has been washed.
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