Embroidery Rose - 15 Rose Stitch Ideas

The rose, a symbol of romance, is a popular choice of design for embroidery. There are many designs for an embroidery rose available. Once your design is chosen, and you have transferred it onto your fabric, the difficulty most people face is how to fill in this design with embroidery stitches. This tutorial will show you how to do an embroidery rose in 15 different ways.

Embroidery Rose, How to Sew Embroidery Roses — Embroidery Rose

Embroidery Rose Techniques

A rose by any name will smell as sweet was the romantic sentiment penned by William Shakespeare in Romeo and Juliet. The same sentiment applies to the embroidery rose, as there are many different stitches to use. For rose embroidery, any stitch you choose will always make the rose look sweet.

Learn how to embroider and the best embroidery stitches with this easy beginner's guide.

Where to Find Rose Embroidery Designs

The internet is a wealth of clip art images of flowers that you can use for embroidery roses. Do a quick Google search for rose clip art, and you will find hundreds to choose from. For a paid option of stock photos of roses, Vector Stock is fairly cheap and has great images.

Search Results from Google for Rose Clip Art

How to Draw an Embroidery Rose

Now I'm not great at fine art, but here is how I drew my roses for the samples. For my abstract rose, I just started in the middle and drew a spiral that crossed over a few times.

For the rose with petals, I again started with a spiral in the middle and then added petals going outwards. You are welcome to copy these, but there are also lots of how-to-draw rose tutorials on Google and YouTube.

Rose Embroidery Kits

Amazon and many craft stores sell embroidery kits with preprinted fabric to sew rose embroidery. If you don't want to draw your own roses, then these can be an easy option. Most have instructions for sewing certain stitches for the roses, but you can change the original design to make it unique.

Colors for an Embroidery Rose

Roses come in red, pink, purple, and everything in between. The trick to embroidery roses to appear realistic is to use several shades in complementary colors. Even single-color roses have light and shaded areas. Unless you are looking to outline in black, monotone roses, look a little flat and lacking in detail.

Supplies for Embroidered Roses

Embroidery Floss - DMC is a popular embroidery floss brand that has a wide selection of colors and shades.
Hand Sewing Needle - Use an embroidery needle or sharp needle.
Fabric - Small square of cotton fabric or Aida
Scissors
Marker - Use a water-soluble marker or pencil.

How many strands for rose stitch? You can use all 6 strands or divide embroidery floss into smaller sections for fine work. My main sampler used 6 strands.

How to Embroidery a Rose Flower?

Insert your fabric into a hoop to keep a tight tension when you embroider.
Mark your design on the fabric with a removable pen or chalk.
Embroider your rose using some of the stitches below. You can use a single stitch or the stitches in combination.

In my finished flower sample below, I used a combination of chain stitch, satin stitch, split stitch, cross stitch, seed stitch, back stitch, and blanket stitch. You can mix and match stitches for something interesting and truly yours.

How to Do Embroidery Rose Stitches

Here are the top suggestions for stitches to use for an embroidered rose.

1. Cross Stitch Embroidery Rose

Cross stitch is one of the most popular embroidery techniques and is perfect for sewing an embroidery rose. Sew cross stitch on Aida fabric or linen so you can count the stitches more easily.

Here is how a cross stitch is done. The full article on cross stitch also has a quick method for filling larger areas. As you can see from the photos above, you will need at least two colors to define the roses. Further Reading: How to do Cross Stitch

2. Embroidery Roses with Outline Stitches

The simplest way to embroider a rose is to use an outline stitch. The outline stitch gives a rope-like appearance to your roses and can be used to define the edge of the petals as well as the stem.

3. Embroidery Roses Straight Stitch

Choose any straight stitch and outline the rose. You can combine this with a filling rose stitch or leave the rose open like my samples below.

*Embroidery Rose with Backstitch, Chain Stitch and Split Stitch*

4. Stem Stitch Embroidery Rose

Stem stitch is best for larger roses as it is harder to do on tight curves. It produces a thick twisted look that can be used for outlining the petals.

5. Running Stitch Embroidered Rose

Running stitch is a simple up and down stitch that is surprisingly effective for a larger embroidery rose. You can vary the spacing between the stitches to give different looks. Running stitch can also be done without an embroidery hoop and is very fast.

6. Back Stitch Rose Embroidery

Backstitch is one of my favorites for a simple outline. It can be used in conjunction with many other stitches like the satin stitch or seed stitch. You can see these examples further down the page.

7. Chain Stitch Roses

Chain stitch is a lovely stitch to create an outline and to use as a filler for any rose pattern. Once the outline is done the stitch can follow this line going closer and closer to the middle of the design.

8. Split Stitch Embroidery Rose

Split stitch gives a nice thick rope-like outline. It is easy to do without much concentration and was one of my favorites when doing these samples.

9. Satin stitch Embroidery Rose

Satin stitch is a beautiful stitch to use to fill in the petals of the rose. The area to fill in should be small or broken down into small sections. In larger areas, the stitch gets too long and does not lie evenly on the design. It is also prone to snagging if the stitches get too long. Create texture by breaking the rose into smaller parts and changing the direction of the satin stitches. Long and short stitch is a good alternative to satin stitch and has a similar look.

Further Reading: How to do Satin Stitch

*Embroidery Rose with Satin Stitch, Seed Stitch and Blanket Stitch*

10. Embroidery Rose Blanket stitch

The beauty of using this stitch is the natural edge or border that it makes. Once the outline of the design has been done in blanket stitch the remainder can be filled in with other stitches like the long and short stitch or satin stitch.

In the example above, I used the blanket stitch to fill in the rose petals. This works well for smaller roses. My sample was about 1.5 inches across (4cm).

Further Reading: How to do Blanket Stitch

11. Seed Stitch Rose

Seed stitch can be used as a filling stitch that adds texture and interest. It will usually be used in conjunction with an outline stitch. In my sample above, I used a backstitch to outline the embroidery rose and then filled in the petals with seed stitch. Use different shades of color to create an interesting effect.

Further Reading: How to do Seed Stitch

12. Web Stitch, Wheel Stitch Embroidery Rose

You can use a spider web stitch for an embroidery rose. These are also called a woven wheel or rose wheel. Create the web part of the design with a full strand of floss using the six threads and doubling the strand. Place a knot at the end and then create a web with 9 outgoing spokes coming from a center point.

*Web Stitch Embroidery Rose*, Woven Wheel Stitch

Bring a blunt needle with the thread up into the center of the spokes and then weave the needle and thread over and under the web of threads. This will create a rose bloom effect. When the web is filled in, end with a stitch at the back. Web stitch is particularly useful for an embroidery rose when you use variegated thread colors. The leaves above were done with a chain stitch.

Further Reading: How to do Spider Web Stitch

13. Embroidery Rose French Knot

The French knot looks like a tiny rose, and when clustered together with other French knots, a beautifully textured rose bush can be created. It can also be used in the center of a rose sewn in other methods. Put French knots in the center of web stitch or satin stitch roses.

14. Long and Short Stitch Roses

The needle-painted rose is the artistic embroidered version of the rose. The stitching is done using long and short stitch, which is also called a brick stitch. Added effects can be created with variegated threads and using complementary colors blended together.

See how you can create shading and texture by changing the thread colors. For really fine delicate roses, use a single strand of embroidery floss.

The example below has a backstitch around the outside and then has long and short stitches facing inwards. The trick is to carefully blend colors and use thinner threads. The example above would have been done with a single thread, while my petal sample below was done with 3 strands.

Further Reading: How to do Long and Short Stitch

*Long and Short Stitch Used for Embroidered Roses*

15. Bullion Knot Embroidery Rose

The bullion knot can also be used to make beautiful embroidery roses. Use variegated embroidery floss for realistic roses. Bullion stitches are made by wrapping the thread around the tip of the needle numerous times.

Embroidery Rose - In Conclusion

Stitched or painted, modern or old-fashioned, the embroidery rose is one of the best-loved sewing projects. Varieties of roses and their multitude of colors will always grace our gardens and our embroidery projects. The rose, a symbol of love and romance, can be found in the garden and as an icon in rose embroidery patterns.

Embroidery Rose - 15 Rose Stitch Ideas