Back Stitch

In the embroidery world, back stitch is the equivalent of a pair of well-fitting jeans.  It is comfortable, can be easily dressed up or down depending on what goes with it and most embroiderers already have it in their toolbox.  Although I don’t recommend wearing jeans alone with nothing else, back stitch can even stand alone.  You could embroider a nice design or picture using only back stitch.

When to use it:

• outlining
• lettering
• flower stems
• buildings
• stripes
• geometric shapes
• anywhere you want a solid line with no frills

You can see it used in my Motif Sampler and in my House Embroidery Series.

How to do it:

This stitch makes a line, and is usually worked from right to left.  Bring the needle up to the front, and then put it down to the right of where it came up.

Tip the needle over, and bring it up on the left side of where you started.

Pull through, leaving a stitch at the end.  For the next stitch, put the needle in right at the end of the first stitch.  Bring the needle up ahead of the starting point.

Continue in this way.  For each stitch, you go one step back then two steps forward.

It leaves a continuous line of stitches with no breaks.

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