Geek Fashion with Diana Eng
**Title: How to Create a Conductive Thread Embroidery Project with LEDs – A Step-by-Step Guide**
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### Introduction to Fashion Nerds and Diana Ing
Nerds come in all shapes and forms—whether it's Urkel, Milhouse, Napoleon Dynamite, or even President Obama, we’ve seen them all. But when it comes to fashion nerds, few stand out as much as Diana Ing from *Project Runway*. Known for her unique blend of fashion, technology, science, and math, Diana is back with a fun and innovative project from her book, *Fashion Geek*. In this article, we’ll walk you through her DIY guide on how to add a touch of electricity to your wardrobe using conductive thread and LEDs.
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### Materials Needed for the Project
Before diving into the project, make sure you have all the necessary materials:
- A pocket protector (for your tools)
- A pair of glasses (to protect your eyes while sewing)
- A protractor
- Your choice of garment to sew on
- Conductive thread
- Scissors
- Two LEDs for the robot’s eyes
- A 2032 coin cell battery (3 volts, small and circular)
- Disappearing ink pen
- Needle nose pliers
- Regular, non-conductive gray thread
- Wire cutters
- A sewing needle
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### Getting Started: Tracing the Pattern
The first step is to trace the pattern of your circuit onto your chosen garment using a disappearing ink pen. This ensures that you can clearly see where to sew without damaging the fabric.
Once the pattern is traced, it’s time to prepare the electronic components:
1. **Breaking Leads Off the Battery Holder**: Use needle nose pliers to bend and break the leads on the bottom of the battery holder until they snap off.
2. **Creating LED Beads**: Cut the shorter lead of each LED to about half an inch and the longer lead to 3/4 inches. Then, use the pliers to curl these leads into small circles, creating “se wearable beads” for your project.
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### Sewing the Circuit: Positive Side
Now that you’ve prepared your materials and traced the pattern, it’s time to start sewing. Begin with the positive side of the circuit:
1. **Sewing the Battery Holder**: Place the battery holder on the marked spot on your garment. Start sewing at the positive side of the battery holder by stitching through the fabric and then wrapping the conductive thread around the positive contact point for a secure connection.
2. **Sewing LEDs**: When you reach the robot’s head, stitch through the larger loop (positive side) of each LED. Wrap the conductive thread around the lead to ensure good contact before sewing back down.
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### Sewing the Circuit: Negative Side
After completing the positive side, move on to the negative side:
1. **Sewing the Battery Holder**: Stitch up through the negative part of the battery holder and wrap the thread around the negative contact point for a strong connection.
2. **Sewing LEDs (Negative Leads)**: When you reach the top of the robot’s head, stitch through the smaller loop (negative side) of each LED. Wrap the thread tightly around the lead to ensure conductivity.
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### Final Touches and Testing
Once both the positive and negative sides are sewn, make sure not to let them touch, as this could short circuit your project. Here are a few final tips:
- **Trimming Thread Ends**: Use Soo glue on the loose ends of your thread to prevent them from flapping around and causing shorts.
- **Testing Your Circuit**: Place the battery in the holder with the positive side facing up (marked with a “+” sign). If everything is connected properly, your LEDs should light up!
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### Conclusion:DIY Nerds Unite!
With this guide, you’ve successfully created a conductive thread embroidery project that combines fashion and technology. Don’t forget to share your creations in the comments below and connect with us on social media for more exciting DIY projects.
Whoa! That’s nerd to the max—live long and DIY!
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*Remember when we used to say “mySpace.com”? My what Myspacenerds!*
"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: ennerds they're everywhere Urkel Milhouse Napoleon Dynamite heck even President Obama's a little nerdy but rarely do we come across a fashion nerd this week at threadbanger our search for the nerdiest how-to led us to project runways own fashion nerd Diana ing she's taken a lesson out of her new book fashion geek and showing us how to add a little bit of electricity to our closets using conductive thread and LEDs materials you'll need are a pocket protector a pair of glasses and a protractor hi my name is Diana Ing and we're in my apartment studio in noita you may know me from Project Runway season 2 I was the fashion nerd because I like to combine fashion with technology science and math um you can visit my website at Fashion nerd.com I just read a book called fashion geek it has 13 Do-it your self fashion technology projects that teach you how to combine electricity with fashion we're going to taking robot and friend conductive thread embroidery project from the short circuit project in my book fashion geek still so the things that you'll need for this project are the Garment that you're going to be sewing the robot embroidery too conductive thread scissors two LEDs for the robot's eyes a 2032 coin cell battery um they're 3 volts and they're really small in circular uh a bs7 battery fer um for that battery specifically disappearing ink pen needle noose pliers and regular gray thread that is not conductive wire cutters and lastly you'll need a sewing needle we're going to be embroidering the robot and friend um circuit onto this piece of white fra so that you can see how it's made but you can actually embroider it onto Any Garment the way a circuit works is that there is a positive and negative side to the power supply um which is this battery over here there's also a positive and negative side to the LED um you can tell because the legs on the LED or the leads are two different lengths the long one is going to be attached to the positive side of the battery and the short one will be attached to the negative side of the battery so when we're embroidering this circuit we need to make sure to differentiate between the positive and negative side when you're looking at the pattern you'll notice that there's a negative conductive thread which will attach to the negative side of the battery and the negative side of the LEDs and that's going to be the long dash line and then there's the positive conductive thread which is going to attach to the positive side of the battery and the positive side of the LEDs this is the dot line over here the first thing that you want to do is Trace the pattern onto your garment with the disappearing ink so there's a little bit of prep that needs to be done with the electronic parts before we can sew with them we're going to be making the LEDs into sewable beads and we're going to be breaking the leads off of the battery holder you can break the leads off of the battery holder by by just grabbing them with pliers and bending them back and forth until they break these leads are usually located on the bottom of the battery holders and they're to solder the battery holders into place on a circuit board on the LEDs we're going to be cutting the lead shorter and then we're going to be bending them into little circles like this led bead you're going to want to cut the shorter lead to be about half an inch in length and the longer lead to be about 3/4 Ines in length now you're going to bend the lead straight up so that the LED can lay flat using a pair of needle nose pliers I like these really thin jewelry pliers um you're just going to curve the lead into a circle so this is the longer lead so we're going to make a bigger circle on this side so you just gradually start curling at the end okay and then with a smaller lead you're going to curl it into a smaller Circle you can use the very tip of the pliers and now you have your LED bead so you're going to do the same thing with the second LED for the other eye what happens when you put together one band and one filmmaker to create an original music video for $99 watch World premier videos every week at $99 music videos.com $99 music videos is best experienced with Verizon FiOS Internet you're watching threadbanger now we're going to start sewing the circuit we're going to be sewing with a single strand of thread start sewing at the positive side of the battery so just place the battery holder right where you've drawn it over here and the positive side is this side right over here so not the end of your thread we're going to start by stitching up through the fabric then going through this little hole over here which is the positive contact after you've come out of the battery holder you're going to want to wrap the conductive thread around the positive contact so that you make sure that it has a really good connection what you do it's come up through the part over here and now you're going to just wrap it so it loops around and then go back down through that hole that you came up out of do the same thing a second time sewing through the battery holder and around the contact so now you're going to stitch down following the dotted line over here be sure to stitch along the top of your fabric so that your Stitch line will be visible because it's part of the pattern and just pick up little pieces of the fabric with the Tipping your needle so when you get to uh the robot's mou you're going to start stitching on the LEDs and you're going to stitch on the larger Loop which is the positive side of the LED to stitch on the LED just um go up through the LED with the thread and then you're going to go through the fabric and back up through the LED okay and now you're just going to wrap the inductive thread around the um lead of the LED just to make an extra good contact and then Stitch back down through the fabric to the back okay now sew across to make the rest of the math pattern now you're going to stitch on the large loop of the other LED eye and you're going to sew in the same way that you did the last one um after you have both of the LED eyes sewn on you're going to knot the thread at the back so now we're going to be sewing the negative side of the circuit so we're going to stitch up through the negative part then we're going to be stitching through these two slots in the battery holder and once again um like with the Positive contact we want to make sure to have really good contact with the negative contact so that the circuit will be well connected so we're going to wrap this thread underneath the negative contact over here and Stitch back down through the opposite slot in the fabric once the battery pack is sewn down sew the rest of the pattern make sure that the positive thread and the negative thread do not touch or you will short your circuit and basically the thread will get really hot and then melt okay so when you get to the top of the robot's head you're going to sew on the negative leads of the LED so you're going to start by stitching up through the small Loop um you're going to stitch up through the loop again then to make a really good connection you're going to stitch around only through the loop not through the fabric and then Stitch back down through the fabric and then we're going to stitch on to the other loop of the LED for this other small Loop just do the same thing okay Stitch only through the loop make a connection and then go back down into the Fab and when you get near the neck over here um you're going to want to make sure not to stitch all the way into the neck because that is actually the positive red and we don't want to create any short circuits so stop about one stitch length beside the next Stitch since that's the positive thread and Stitch down to the back of the fabric flip it over and KN the thread a little trick I like to use while sewing with conductive thread is to coat the ends uh in Soo glue because once you cut the thread there are the Loose Ends that can kind of flap around and touch other parts of the circuit and create a short circuit so you really don't want to do that so you can just take the soo and dab a little bit on on the Loose Ends and cover them this is probably the most exciting part now that you're finished sewing the circuit you're going to test it with the battery make sure that the positive side of the battery is on the top it has a little Plus on it and you just stick into the battery holder see if the LEDs light up using the regular thread so the rest of the pattern and you might want to double up the regular thread because conductive thread is usually a little bit thick so you want it to match so we're done sewing our little robot in friend conductive circuit um thanks for coming over threed Banger and visiting snip snip a big thanks to Diana for hanging out with us what makes you a geek let out your inner nerd in the comments below and if you're really a nerd you should be following us on our social networking sites twitter.com and facebook.com see you next week whoa that is nerd to the max live long and DIY nerds do the robot do they that's how they dance twitter.com and facebook.com remember when we used to say myspace.com my what Myspacenerds they're everywhere Urkel Milhouse Napoleon Dynamite heck even President Obama's a little nerdy but rarely do we come across a fashion nerd this week at threadbanger our search for the nerdiest how-to led us to project runways own fashion nerd Diana ing she's taken a lesson out of her new book fashion geek and showing us how to add a little bit of electricity to our closets using conductive thread and LEDs materials you'll need are a pocket protector a pair of glasses and a protractor hi my name is Diana Ing and we're in my apartment studio in noita you may know me from Project Runway season 2 I was the fashion nerd because I like to combine fashion with technology science and math um you can visit my website at Fashion nerd.com I just read a book called fashion geek it has 13 Do-it your self fashion technology projects that teach you how to combine electricity with fashion we're going to taking robot and friend conductive thread embroidery project from the short circuit project in my book fashion geek still so the things that you'll need for this project are the Garment that you're going to be sewing the robot embroidery too conductive thread scissors two LEDs for the robot's eyes a 2032 coin cell battery um they're 3 volts and they're really small in circular uh a bs7 battery fer um for that battery specifically disappearing ink pen needle noose pliers and regular gray thread that is not conductive wire cutters and lastly you'll need a sewing needle we're going to be embroidering the robot and friend um circuit onto this piece of white fra so that you can see how it's made but you can actually embroider it onto Any Garment the way a circuit works is that there is a positive and negative side to the power supply um which is this battery over here there's also a positive and negative side to the LED um you can tell because the legs on the LED or the leads are two different lengths the long one is going to be attached to the positive side of the battery and the short one will be attached to the negative side of the battery so when we're embroidering this circuit we need to make sure to differentiate between the positive and negative side when you're looking at the pattern you'll notice that there's a negative conductive thread which will attach to the negative side of the battery and the negative side of the LEDs and that's going to be the long dash line and then there's the positive conductive thread which is going to attach to the positive side of the battery and the positive side of the LEDs this is the dot line over here the first thing that you want to do is Trace the pattern onto your garment with the disappearing ink so there's a little bit of prep that needs to be done with the electronic parts before we can sew with them we're going to be making the LEDs into sewable beads and we're going to be breaking the leads off of the battery holder you can break the leads off of the battery holder by by just grabbing them with pliers and bending them back and forth until they break these leads are usually located on the bottom of the battery holders and they're to solder the battery holders into place on a circuit board on the LEDs we're going to be cutting the lead shorter and then we're going to be bending them into little circles like this led bead you're going to want to cut the shorter lead to be about half an inch in length and the longer lead to be about 3/4 Ines in length now you're going to bend the lead straight up so that the LED can lay flat using a pair of needle nose pliers I like these really thin jewelry pliers um you're just going to curve the lead into a circle so this is the longer lead so we're going to make a bigger circle on this side so you just gradually start curling at the end okay and then with a smaller lead you're going to curl it into a smaller Circle you can use the very tip of the pliers and now you have your LED bead so you're going to do the same thing with the second LED for the other eye what happens when you put together one band and one filmmaker to create an original music video for $99 watch World premier videos every week at $99 music videos.com $99 music videos is best experienced with Verizon FiOS Internet you're watching threadbanger now we're going to start sewing the circuit we're going to be sewing with a single strand of thread start sewing at the positive side of the battery so just place the battery holder right where you've drawn it over here and the positive side is this side right over here so not the end of your thread we're going to start by stitching up through the fabric then going through this little hole over here which is the positive contact after you've come out of the battery holder you're going to want to wrap the conductive thread around the positive contact so that you make sure that it has a really good connection what you do it's come up through the part over here and now you're going to just wrap it so it loops around and then go back down through that hole that you came up out of do the same thing a second time sewing through the battery holder and around the contact so now you're going to stitch down following the dotted line over here be sure to stitch along the top of your fabric so that your Stitch line will be visible because it's part of the pattern and just pick up little pieces of the fabric with the Tipping your needle so when you get to uh the robot's mou you're going to start stitching on the LEDs and you're going to stitch on the larger Loop which is the positive side of the LED to stitch on the LED just um go up through the LED with the thread and then you're going to go through the fabric and back up through the LED okay and now you're just going to wrap the inductive thread around the um lead of the LED just to make an extra good contact and then Stitch back down through the fabric to the back okay now sew across to make the rest of the math pattern now you're going to stitch on the large loop of the other LED eye and you're going to sew in the same way that you did the last one um after you have both of the LED eyes sewn on you're going to knot the thread at the back so now we're going to be sewing the negative side of the circuit so we're going to stitch up through the negative part then we're going to be stitching through these two slots in the battery holder and once again um like with the Positive contact we want to make sure to have really good contact with the negative contact so that the circuit will be well connected so we're going to wrap this thread underneath the negative contact over here and Stitch back down through the opposite slot in the fabric once the battery pack is sewn down sew the rest of the pattern make sure that the positive thread and the negative thread do not touch or you will short your circuit and basically the thread will get really hot and then melt okay so when you get to the top of the robot's head you're going to sew on the negative leads of the LED so you're going to start by stitching up through the small Loop um you're going to stitch up through the loop again then to make a really good connection you're going to stitch around only through the loop not through the fabric and then Stitch back down through the fabric and then we're going to stitch on to the other loop of the LED for this other small Loop just do the same thing okay Stitch only through the loop make a connection and then go back down into the Fab and when you get near the neck over here um you're going to want to make sure not to stitch all the way into the neck because that is actually the positive red and we don't want to create any short circuits so stop about one stitch length beside the next Stitch since that's the positive thread and Stitch down to the back of the fabric flip it over and KN the thread a little trick I like to use while sewing with conductive thread is to coat the ends uh in Soo glue because once you cut the thread there are the Loose Ends that can kind of flap around and touch other parts of the circuit and create a short circuit so you really don't want to do that so you can just take the soo and dab a little bit on on the Loose Ends and cover them this is probably the most exciting part now that you're finished sewing the circuit you're going to test it with the battery make sure that the positive side of the battery is on the top it has a little Plus on it and you just stick into the battery holder see if the LEDs light up using the regular thread so the rest of the pattern and you might want to double up the regular thread because conductive thread is usually a little bit thick so you want it to match so we're done sewing our little robot in friend conductive circuit um thanks for coming over threed Banger and visiting snip snip a big thanks to Diana for hanging out with us what makes you a geek let out your inner nerd in the comments below and if you're really a nerd you should be following us on our social networking sites twitter.com and facebook.com see you next week whoa that is nerd to the max live long and DIY nerds do the robot do they that's how they dance twitter.com and facebook.com remember when we used to say myspace.com my what Myspace\n"