Brother Sewing UK

In my last blog, I mentioned how much I enjoyed making bags and purses of all sorts. I like to create with all sorts of materials, and that means – like most sewists – I have a lot of scraps to show for my work!  I'm a firm believer in using scraps, and above you can see some Abraham Moon tweed offcuts which I have made into a couple of little zip top coin purses with the aid of my trusty Brother XP1/Luminaire. I hope this brief tutorial inspires you to have a go too! Step one Select your scraps – for the purse on the right, I decided to use some of the one-inch pieces I had and applique them on to a five-inch square of tweed. The left-hand purse was another scrap of blue tweed which I decided to applique along the top using a heart design. Step two So, off to the Design Centre to select one of the built in shapes. I selected a simple circle but you could use a heart (as I did in the second purse) a leaf, a square – whatever you like. As I look at this picture n...

Building on the embroidery features of the Innovis XV machine, the Luminaire XP1 extends the number of sewing and character/decorative stitch patterns that can be used on the embroidery side of the machine. On the XP1 you can combine, mirror and resize different stitch patterns, using them to create all sorts of projects. One feature I particularly like is using button holes in the embroidery hoop so I can ensure I achieve perfect placement on my clothing (shirt plackets) and home decoration projects! You can find the character/decorative stitches in section 5 on the embroidery screen, as shown: The character/decorative stitch section is divided into 3 categories: ·          01 Buttonholes ·          02 Embellishments ·          03 Decorative Stitches As you will see, there are many styles of buttonhole available to use in your embro...

Have you ever thought about using your embroidery machine to mimic Hawaiian applique?  A Hawaiian quilt is a distinctive style of quilt originating in the Hawaiian Islands that uses large, radially symmetric applique patterns. Motifs often feature stylised botanical designs in bold colours on a white background, with the applique made from a single cut on folded fabric. Quilting stitches normally follow the contours of the applique design and therefore it can be a tricky technique to master. However, your Brother VR embroidery machine can make short work of this particular style. Figure 1 - Applique designs Figure 2 - Stitching out the applique design The VR comes with several built-in applique designs, identified by the fact that the first 3 stitch references are stitches rather than thread colours!  The first is a dotted line with a pair of scissors at one end, and that’s the giveaway, because they create the applique element and the placement lines f...