Colorful embroidery is a cool, handcrafted way to embellish and elevate the common gym shoe. I had seen several Instagram posts where people hand embroidered Converse High Tops with elaborate designs. These shoes are literally the perfect canvas for expressing the personality and flair of the wearer.
I was busy making this sweet little cotton dress for my granddaughter Birdie, imagining the photo shoot for my Instagram reel ;-). What would be the perfect, toddler-sized footwear for this look? Then it struck me – yes! Colorful hand embroidered Converse high tops in classic black.
Keeping it simple
As this was my first foray into the world of shoe embroidery, I wanted to keep the design basic and executable. I decided brilliant colors and childlike simplicity was the best route to follow. Wanting to utilize what I had in my supply of #5 pearlized 100% cotton thread, I chose the five colors to best contrast against the black canvas shoe.
Where to begin?
Focusing first on the top of the shoe, I decided to stitch fun starbursts around each of the shoelace eyelets, alternating colors from top to bottom on either side of each shoe. The canvas structure in the eyelet area is interfaced with some kind of stiffener, lending strength to a vulnerable part of the shoe. I immediately encountered trouble getting the threaded needle through the thicker canvas.
They make it look so easy on Instagram
Not wanting to give up on the starburst idea, I used a thin awl to pre-pierce each thread hole to pass the needle through. Kind of like what you need to do when hand sewing with thick leather. Tip: Even with pre-piercing, this kind of work is hard on the finger tips. A leather thimble comes in handy to push the needle through and protect your fingers.
There was no avoiding it…
The problem with having a granddaughter named Birdie is going overboard with bird-themed stuff. I really, really do try to resist overdoing it on the bird stuff. (How many bird patterned fabrics and bird-themed toys, books about birds etc. I have taken out of shopping carts since she’s been born?) But in this case, I just couldn’t help myself. There was no way I could avoid including her Birdie sigil on these shoes. I drew a cute little “birdie on the go” in keeping with Birdie’s budding go-go-go personality.
Using a piece of white transfer paper, I traced the bird design onto the outer sides of each shoe. Although, in hindsight, I could have probably “winged” it with free handing the bird with a white fabric marking pencil or marker.
Unique hand embroidery to express uniqueness.
Again, in stitching the birds I used all five colors, and alternated the colors so that each little bird was unique to each shoe. This part of the shoe around the ankle was much thinner and easier to embroider and I didn’t need to prepierce the holes. These standard backstitches are much tinier and the birds are more detailed. An adult sized shoe has an even larger area upon which to be more creative with a design. Tip: When starting and ending each color, I sewed the thread ends into the embroidery to bury them on the wrong side of the canvas to avoid having any uncomfortable knots on the interior of the shoe.
Little kids wearing high tops is just so doggone cute…
…our Birdie toddling around in these colorful hand embroidered Converse high tops – bearing her personal sigil no less – is SUPER-CUTE! I love them. Birdie’s mom loves them, and little Birdie loves them, too!
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