Adding Embroidery to Your Crochet Project

Have you ever wondered how to add detailed embroidery work to a crochet project? In this video, Brenda K.B. Anderson shares a wonderful technique that she discovered that makes it simple to add embroidery to your pieces. She demonstrates how to use lace fabric as a template!

Brenda loves to add embroidery to her crochet projects, but she noticed that the holes in the crochet fabric often made it difficult to add detailed motifs. She realized if she took lace fabric and placed it right on the crochet piece, she could use it as a template and embroider around it to create fantastically unique pieces!

To begin, Brenda takes a piece of lace fabric and cuts out motifs. She notes that it’s important to look for fabric that has individual motifs that can be cut out. In the demonstration, she is using a lace fabric that has flowers and leaves on it. She cuts out the motifs she wants to use with sharp scissors and places them onto the crochet project. Using straight pins, she pins the lace directly onto the crochet fabric.

In order to decide what colors to use, Brenda made a photocopy of her lace so that she could color in the details she wants to embroider onto her crochet piece. This is a fun way to play around with colors before starting to do the actual embroidery. Once her colors are chosen, she begins working on embroidering the flower motif, starting from the outside and working her way in. She uses satin stitches for the petals and French knots for the center. Once the flower is complete, she takes a contrasting color and works chain stitches all the way around in order to leave her embroidery looking crisp and complete.