Freezer-Paper-and-Starch Machine Appliqué Technique
My Supplies
Clover
mini iron (or other small craft iron)
Stuff-It
II tool or stiletto
Spray
or liquid starch*
Roxanne’s
Glue Baste-it**
Good
paper scissors
Small
scissors or snips with sharp point
Dark-colored
permanent marker
Freezer
paper
Lightbox
Stencil
brush or soft paint brush
* If using
spray starch, just spray it into the lid.
It will foam up, then shrink down into a liquid form.
** I bought this
relatively pricey glue because of the two sizes of handy-dandy needle tips that
came with the bottle. When I ran out, I
refilled it with the much cheaper Elmer’s washable school glue, watered down
just enough that it flows nicely through the tips. If the tips get clogged up, unscrew tip and
lid, hold it under running hot water, and poke a hat pin into one end and then
the other until the glue dissolves.
Preparing
the Appliqué Shapes
Trace
each appliqué shape onto the shiny side of your freezer paper, using a
dark permanent marker. I like the
fine-tipped ones. (Do not use washable markers; the starch
will make the ink run, it will get on your fabric, and the hot little iron is
liable to set it in permanently, ‘washable’ or not.) Mark with a dotted line those portions of the
template that will wind up underneath another piece. Don’t cut them apart yet.
Write
the number of each template on the matte side of the paper. (If you write it on the shiny side, it will
wind up backwards.) The pieces are
numbered in the order they will be glued onto the background.
With a
dry iron, press the sheet of traced templates on top of a second piece of
freezer paper, making sure both sheets are shiny
side down. Your tracing and numbers
will now be between the two layers of freezer paper, so no permanent ink will
get on your fabric. The freezer paper
will stick to your ironing board, but that won’t hurt anything. Gently pull it away.
The
double thickness of freezer paper is one of the essential parts of this method,
for this will ensure crisp edges to your appliqué.
Now
you are ready to cut the template shapes.
Use a good pair of paper scissors for this, as it is important
that the edges are neat and very precise.
Your appliqué pieces will not be tidier than your template pieces.
Next comes one of the parts I
especially enjoy: choosing the
fabric. It’s the perfect opportunity to
use up a lot of small scraps. I like to
use as many colors as possible. Iron the
shiny side of the double-thick freezer-paper templates to the wrong side of
your fabric. Be sure the fabrics that
will be next to each other have good contrast.
You don’t want to go to all this trouble, if they’re just going to blend
together in a mish-mash! (We will not
discuss how I know this.)
Turn on your mini iron (my Clover
mini takes longer to heat up than my big iron).
Using good fabric scissors (or snips, if the pieces are very small), cut
out the shapes, adding a scant ¼” seam allowance around the freezer paper
template. Leave the paper template in
place until you are ready to glue that particular piece onto the background.
Pour a small amount of starch into a
small container. Using a small stencil
or paint brush, dampen the seam allowance with the liquid starch. On curved edges, it usually works best to
start pressing in the middle of the side.
I do my appliqué pressing on a small board covered tight with pre-quilted
Teflon so as not to scorch the ironing board cover.
Use the stiletto or Stuff-It tool to
fold the seam allowance over the edge of the freezer-paper template, then press
with the mini iron, creating a smooth, crisp edge. (I’ve used a big iron in a pinch, but it sure
is a lot more awkward than the mini.) If
your iron gets sticky – and it will – Faultless Hot Iron Cleaner will shine it
up again in 15 seconds flat.
If your template has points, press
all the way to the end of the fabric on one side, then press the other side
completely down, creating a little ‘flag’ at the point. Trim it even or slightly narrower than the
opposite folded edge, just enough that it won’t show. If the fabric is prone to fraying, you might
wish to touch the points with June Tailor’s Fray Block. (Fray Block dries softer and more flexible
than Fray Check.)
Clip inside curves and inside points
fairly close to the freezer paper. There
is no need to turn under the fabric where there are dotted lines, as this edge
will be underneath another appliqué piece.
Cut your background oversized, as
the gluing down of all the little appliqué pieces might pull it up a bit. Place your complete pattern under the
background as a placement guide and lay both pattern and background on your
lightbox. I always use a copy rather
than the original pattern, because glue will seep through the background fabric
and get on the pattern. Even if you
don’t have a lightbox, you might be able to see the pattern through the
background fabric if your fabric is light enough. My husband made me a large 23” x 23” lightbox
by inserting a large piece of Plexiglas into a thick wooden frame, and I slide
a flat, square light under the glass. It has a much more even glow that it appears to in this picture.
Attaching Appliqué Pieces to
Background
Find appliqué #1 – you are ready to
begin! Remove the freezer-paper template now.
(Don’t throw it away; these templates can be reused at least 3 or 4
times, and it certainly saves a lot of time on future blocks to not have to
make new templates for each block.) The
edges of the fabric should remain crisply folded under. Put a thin line or dots of glue along the
folded-under seam allowance and set it into place on your background. If you like trapunto, now is the time to put
a piece of batting behind your appliqué piece (though sometimes there are
enough layers of appliqué to give the appearance of trapunto without any extra
batting at all). Continue in numerical
order until all the pieces are glued down.
If you don’t like the placement, you can easily reposition your pieces.
Stitch pieces to the
background. When I don’t want my
stitching to show, I match the thread to the appliqué piece and use a very
narrow and tight hem stitch, sewing right beside the appliqué and barely
catching the edge every fourth stitch.
But my favorite stitch is a narrow blanket stitch (widen or narrow the
stitch to correlate with the size of the appliqué). Try contrasting your thread for a less formal
look.
Add a bit of embroidery to your
appliqué to really dress it up, if you like.
Embroidery shows up best on fabric that isn’t too busy. Contrast the floss and the fabric, rather
than match it. Trim your block to size –
and you’re done!
Tips and Hints
Don’t forget to turn off your mini
iron and wash out starch cap, paintbrush, and the needle tip on your glue
bottle. Store glue with the plain lid so
glue doesn’t dry in the tip.
I have sometimes flipped a pattern
over, cut new templates, and made a block in reverse to have opposing blocks.
I don’t consider myself an expert artist
by any means, but I’m a crackerjack copycat!
I draw most of my appliqué designs while looking at pictures or
paintings. If that doesn’t work for you,
another option is to use pencil drawings or coloring pages. There’s an infinite variety of
appliqué-suitable drawings online. Numbering
the pieces in the correct order will be trickier than drawing them. The Electric Quilt program has numerous
appliqué patterns – but the numbering order is not always correct!
Try making an appliquéd wall hanging
or table runner with felted wool. You won’t
need to add a seam allowance when you cut your fabric, as the wool won’t ravel,
and you can do a raw-edge blanket stitch.
Someone once said, “The only
limitation is your imagination.” But
that’s not really accurate, because, after all, we all learn from each
other. Therefore, the saying should be, “The only limitation is our collective imaginations!”
-
⁂ The iris appliqué pattern has 37
pieces. Try a heart pattern such as this one, if you
want something simpler, or something to practice on before launching into the
iris design. I put the heart templates onto
some sewn-together strips that were left over from another project.
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