How to embroider towels: topping, placement and sizes

Terry cloth is made of loops that swallow stitches, so a towel needs a water-soluble topping on top and a backing underneath, usually tear-away, or cut-away for dense designs. Hoop the towel if it fits, or float it on hooped stabilizer or use a magnetic hoop if it is too thick. Choose bold, solid designs, and sit the bottom of the design about 1 to 4 in (25 to 100 mm) above the hem or woven border, depending on the towel.

Towels are easy to embroider once you deal with the loops. Terry cloth is a surface of tiny loops, and stitches fall between them and vanish. The fix is a water-soluble topping on the surface, a backing underneath, a bold design and a measured placement above the woven border. Hoop the towel if it fits. If it is too thick, float it or use a magnetic hoop.

Brother, OESD, Embroidery Library, AllStitch and Sewing Machine Fun are named below as examples of where the advice comes from. This site is not affiliated with any of them.

What you need

A towel, washed and dried first. Cotton shrinks, so let it shrink before you stitch.
Water-soluble topping. A thin film that dissolves in water.
Backing. A medium-weight tear-away or cut-away (more on choosing below).
A new 75/11 needle. One sewing educator suggests going up a size for thick towels. Our embroidery needle guide explains the sizes.
Thread. One towel guide uses 40 wt polyester embroidery thread on top with plain white bobbin thread.
A water-soluble or air-erase marking pen. Optional: temporary spray adhesive and pins.

Why a towel needs a topping

The loops of terry cloth are the problem. Needle holes fall between them, and satin stitches and thin lines sink into the pile. A topping sits on top of the loops and gives the thread a smooth surface to lie on. A Brother embroidery machine manual lists napped fabrics such as towels and corduroy as the case where water-soluble stabilizer gives the best result. OESD says its wash-away toppings do the same job on towels and other pile fabrics.

Put the topping on in addition to your backing. A topping does not hold the towel steady, so it never replaces a backing. See our topping glossary entry for the short definition.

Taking it off afterward:

Trim jump stitches. Sewing Machine Fun finds this sometimes easier while the topping is still on.
Tear away the bulk of the topping by hand.
Dab what is left with a damp sponge or paper towel, or just wash the towel. The remaining residue rinses out.

Sewing Machine Fun warns that wash-away stabilizer does not do well in humid or steamy conditions, so keep it dry. For a fluffy towel, the same site suggests stitching a knockdown stitch first, a light pass that flattens the loops, and then stitching the design over it. If your design or software can add one, it is worth trying on a scrap.

Which backing to use

Towels are usually woven, and Sewing Machine Fun lists them among the stable woven fabrics that suit tear-away. Others prefer cut-away. The sources disagree, so treat it as a choice.

Backing	Use it when	Trade-off
Medium tear-away	Light to medium designs on a stable towel	Tears off, so little stays on the back
Medium cut-away	Dense designs, stretchy towels, or a design that must last	Stays on the back, so trim it close
Wash-away	You want nothing left on the back	Needs more care while it is wet or humid

Embroidery Library recommends a medium (2.5 oz) cut-away in most cases and trims it about 1/2 in (13 mm) from the design. OESD names towels and linens as projects where most of the stabilizer needs to come off, which is the job of tear-away, and it lists a medium-weight tear-away with a water-soluble adhesive coating for hard-to-hoop items such as towels. If you are unsure, stitch a sample on a scrap of the same towel. Our stabilizer guide covers the types in detail.

Hooping or floating a towel

Hoop the towel when it fits. Hooping gives more stability and makes alignment easier. Hoop the backing, the towel and the topping together, and line up your center marks with the marks on the hoop. OESD warns that forcing the inner ring into the outer ring can leave friction marks, so open the hoop wide enough for the thickness of the fabric and backing. If the bottom hoop slips, Embroidery Library suggests a piece of rubberized shelf liner under the outer hoop. Before you stitch, pull the rest of the towel out of the way so the hoop can move freely.

Float the towel when it is too thick. Hoop only the backing, spray it lightly with temporary adhesive, smooth the towel on top, add the topping and pin it well clear of the needle path. Keep the adhesive light. Sewing Machine Fun warns that too much can pull loops out of the towel when you remove the tear-away. Its guide to floating also describes sticking an item straight onto hooped sticky stabilizer with no spray or tape, but the author of its towel guide avoids sticky stabilizer on towels, because it can pull loops when it comes off, and prefers a magnetic hoop or adhesive spray with pins.

Floating is less exact than hooping. Embroidery Library warns of some fuzzy stitches and misalignment, although it says the design will generally turn out well anyway. For a rough thickness limit, Sewing Machine Fun says soft, single-layer items under about 0.2 in (5 to 6 mm) thick are fair game if you set them up correctly.

Use a magnetic hoop. Sewing Machine Fun’s towel guide recommends one for towels that will not fit a standard hoop, but it has to be made for your machine. Read our magnetic hoops guide, and our hooping guide for floating step by step.

Placement above the border

Most towels have a woven border or a plain hem across the end. Place the design so the bottom of it sits a set distance above that edge. OESD’s monogram placement chart gives these starting points, measured from the bottom of the design:

Towel	Above a border	Above a plain hem
Washcloth	1 in (25 mm)	1.5 in (38 mm)
Hand towel	1.5 in (38 mm)	2 in (50 mm)
Bath towel	2 in (50 mm)	4 in (100 mm)
Oversized bath towel	3 in (75 mm)	4 in (100 mm)

OESD puts the monogram on the side without the label, at the end of the towel opposite the label. It calls these numbers guidelines you can adjust to taste.

Other sources give slightly different numbers:

Sewing Machine Fun gives about 1.5 in (38 mm) above the border on a hand towel, the same as OESD, but about 2.5 in (64 mm) above the edge when there is no border. Its bath towel distances run the other way round from OESD’s: 2 in (50 mm) with no border and 4 in (100 mm) above a border. It also lets you center a hand towel monogram or shift it toward the right edge.
AllStitch gives 2 to 3 in (50 to 75 mm) above the bottom hem for a hand towel and 4 in (100 mm) for a bath towel.
Embroidery Library centers its tutorial design on a bath or hand towel with the bottom 4 in (100 mm) above the hem.

Because the sources disagree, fold the towel the way it will hang, hold up a paper printout of the design and adjust.

Marking the center:

Print a template of the design from your software, or cut a paper outline.
Lay it on the towel and mark the center point and the horizontal and vertical lines with a water-soluble pen.
Skip target stickers. Sewing Machine Fun notes they are not very accurate when the loops on the towel are long.

Choosing fonts and designs

Loops hide fine detail, so the design has to be bold. Embroidery Library recommends designs with solid fills and warns that light or delicate stitching gets lost in the terrycloth texture. Sewing Machine Fun’s author learned the same lesson when thin lettering vanished into the fluff, and now picks fonts with wide, thick letters.

Choose block letters with wide, thick strokes and solid-fill shapes.
Avoid thin script, tiny text and other light, delicate stitching.
Do not count on the topping to save thin lettering. It keeps stitches on the surface, but it cannot make a fine line look bold.

Design size for hand and bath towels

Your machine’s embroidery field sets the maximum design size, and the towel sets the practical one. A 4 × 4 in (100 × 100 mm) field only fits a design that size or smaller, so it suits a single initial or a short name. A 5 × 7 in (130 × 180 mm) field gives room for a short name or monogram, and larger fields help with long names and wide bath-towel designs. None of the sources above gives a standard design size for towels, so size the design to the towel.

Measure the plain terry above the border before you pick a size. For example, on a hand towel with a woven border, the placement chart above puts the bottom of the design 1.5 in (38 mm) above the border, so a 3 in (75 mm) tall design needs about 4.5 in (115 mm) of clear terry above the border. See our towel design size page for more on sizes, and use the will-it-fit tool to check a design against your field.

Stitching and cleaning up

Check that only one layer of towel is under the hoop and that no edges are caught.
Trace the design outline on the machine so the needle cannot hit the hoop or a pin.
Stitch.
Take the towel out of the hoop. A ring from the hoop may show. Embroidery Library says it comes out in the wash.
Trim jump stitches, remove the topping, and remove or trim the backing.
Wash the towel to clear any topping residue and marker lines.

If you are choosing a machine mainly for towels, our machines for towels page lists models with a 5 × 7 in (130 × 180 mm) field or larger. Check your manual for the thickness limit of your machine and hoop before you try a thick bath towel.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need a topping to embroider on towels?

Yes, in almost every case. The loops of terry cloth let stitches sink out of sight, and a thin water-soluble topping holds them on the surface. It goes in addition to a backing, never instead of one.

What stabilizer is best for embroidering towels?

Sources differ. OESD and Sewing Machine Fun point to tear-away for towels (Sewing Machine Fun says medium weight), while Embroidery Library uses a medium cut-away in most cases. Choose cut-away for dense designs or stretchy towels and tear-away for lighter designs.

How far above the border should I put a monogram on a towel?

OESD's placement chart puts the bottom of the design 1 in (25 mm) above a washcloth border, 1.5 in (38 mm) above a hand towel border, 2 in (50 mm) above a bath towel border and 3 in (75 mm) above an oversized bath towel border. With no border, it uses 1.5 to 4 in (38 to 100 mm) above the hem. Other sources differ a little, so test with a paper printout.

How do I embroider a towel that is too thick for my hoop?

Hoop only the stabilizer, spray it lightly with temporary adhesive, smooth the towel on top, add the topping and pin it clear of the needle path. A magnetic hoop is another option for thick towels.

What font works best on towels?

A font with wide, thick letters, plus solid fills. Thin or delicate lettering gets lost in the texture of the loops, so pick a bold block font over a fine script.