Applique & Doodle Applique - What's the difference?

Doodle Embroidery Design, Applique & Doodle Applique, what are the differences?

I often see questions in Facebook groups asking for help on how to identify designs. Especially beginners often wonder how they can tell the difference. In this article I'll try to clarify the differences. If you have any further questions, please send me a message, I am more then happy to answer as well as I can.

1. What is an Applique?

An applique is an embroidery design that is constructed to allow you to sew different fabric(s) onto a fabric base. It basically works like this:

  • a) stitching the outline of the applique part - after the outline is stitched you place the applique fabric on the outline, covering it completely.
  • b) sewing the fabric onto the base fabric by stitching this outline again - after that you trim away the excess of the fabric outside the outline close to the seam.
  • c) stitching the satin border/satin stitch (a wide flat stitch border) to cover the edge of the applique fabric.

This would be the process for a simple applique, let's say a coaster with a satin stitch border. However a design can also have multiple design elements, for example more than one applique part combined, or including filled stitch elements and so on. The following picture, an example of my 'woodland appliques', shows you a combination of applique with a satin stitch border and with filled stitch elements.

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2. What is a Doodle Applique?

A doodle applique embroidery design is also an applique but without the thick satin stitch border. A doodle is basically an embroidery design that looks like a sketched drawing and the final outline of a doodle applique therefore has only a single (or triple) stitch, which runs once or several times around the shape of the applique to secure the fabric. The steps to make a doodle applique are very similar to the steps for making a 'normal' applique - except for when and how the fabric is trimmed outside the seam. So with a doodle applique you basically follow these steps:

  • a) stitching the outline of the applique part - after the outline is stitched you place the applique fabric on the outline, covering it completely.
  • b) sewing the fabric onto the base fabric by stitching this outline again.
  • c) stitching the doodle outline to additionally secure the fabric edges. THEN you trim away the excess of the fabric BUT with a doodle applique you don't cut too close to the seam, you try to leave at least 2 or 3 mm seam allowance (even more if the fabric is more on the 'rough' side and tends to fray a lot). Often the fraying is then part of the final appearance of the design, giving the design a 'vintage' look. Jeans fabric, for example, is a great fabric to use if you wish to add that vintage touch to your project.

A doodle applique can also have other additional design elements such as filled stitch designs. 

The following picture shows my 'Dinosaur doodle applique designs', which are a great project for using fabric pens such as the DIME fabric markers.

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3. What is a Doodle Embroidery Design?

A doodle embroidery design - without the 'applique' being mentioned - is a simple machine embroidery design just like any other design you might have seen or used, such as a filled stitch design, a rippled stitch design etc. They are stitched directly onto the base fabric without using any additional fabrics to form the motif.

These designs often look as if they are hand-drawn or sketched with a pen(cil) and are sometimes also combined with other design elements, such as filled stitch elements.

This picture shows you two different versions of my 'Cavalier King Charles puppy designs', as an example.

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I hope my little excurse is helpful for you to learn the differences between applique, doodle applique and doodle embroidery designs.

If you have any questions I am happy to talk to you. Just send me a message here or via our Facebook page.