Embroidery is the handicraft of decorating fabric or other materials with needle and thread or yarn. Embroidery may also incorporate other materials such as metal strips, pearls, beads, quills, and sequins. Embroidery is most often used on caps, hats, coats, blankets, dress shirts, denim, stockings, and golf shirts. Embroidery is available with a wide variety of thread or yarn color.
An interesting characteristic of embroidery is that the basic techniques or stitches on surviving examples of the earliest embroidery—chain stitch, buttonhole or blanket stitch, running stitch, satin stitch, cross stitch—remain the fundamental techniques of hand embroidery today
Embroidered, custom apparel and accessories is a huge business that is easy to start with an embroidery machine and basic business skills. While it can be a little tricky to choose equipment and find the right customers to target, it's possible to start small in your spare time and build a full time embroidery business.
The embroidery business is one segment of the multibillion dollar apparel decorating industry, and may be started from a spare room in your home if necessary. Embroidery involves application of graphic designs to wearable goods and fabrics using a special sewing machine with multiple bobbins and needles for each thread color. Single-head machines allow a single garment to be printed at one time, while multi-head machines are used for larger production runs. Commercial machines are operated by computers with special design programs that guide the machines when embroidering patterns, and require some skill to set up, operate and maintain.
