Female: Hey, there Rob and Karin here. Welcome to threadheads.
Male: So whether you just started tuning in or you are a long time fan of threadbanger, you know that it is your job to tell us what you want to see on the show.
Female: Last week, we received this Your Transmission.
Female: In my school, we have to wear uniforms and part of the uniform rules is that we have to wear polo shirts. Red, black or white. But next year we are not going to have the uniforms anymore so I am going to be stuck with all these leftover polos that I will never wear which I really do not (Inaudible). The problem, I have no idea what to do with any polos. I do not have any product ideas. So if you could do a special or something about polos, it would really help me.
Male: So to answer your question, our first stop takes us to the home of Girlpopcorn.
Julie: My name is Julie Dunbar. I have a company called girlpopcorn.com and I do freehand machine embroidery. I used to be addicted to SmartPop and I have a bag every single day so popcorn girl was our name.
I started doing freehand machine embroidery about three years ago and I really wanted one of those expensive embroidery machines but they are like terribly expensive so I came up with a way I could use my own machine to do it. So now I am going to show you how I do freehand machine embroidery.
Today we have this little polo shirt for a toddler. You can definitely do it bigger and any design you want. We are going to put a submarine on it. I like to find my images on the internet and I put them in Photoshop and reduce them down to line drawings because then they are not copyright, that is one thing that is really important if you are going to sell your stuff. This magic stuff you need is called dissolvable stabilizer. You can tear most of it away and then dissolve the remainder in water.
The next step is just lay the dissolvable stabilizer over your drawing. I trace my drawing onto the stabilizer with a Sharpe. It is very important to use Sharpe because anything else will bleed onto your clothing. Now you choose where to put your image on the shirt. I like to wrap my images around the shirt or put them in odd places on the shirt. Just take your blue tape and tape the edges. This is the only fancy accessory you ever need for your regular sewing machine. Most brands have them. They are called freehand foot or stippling foot.
This great little tool allows you to move your fabric around in any direction so you can sew backwards and forwards and sideways. You can use a regular straight stitch. This design I like to do in one continuous thread because I hate tying the little knots required. Do not worry about hitting your lines perfect because, like that right there. Oops.
We are done. It is important to leave the threads long because now we are going to turn it over and pull them through the wrong side and we are just going to tie it around like this. Now is the fun part. When you get bored of doing that, you can just run it under water or throw it in your washing machine to dissolve the rest of it.
It is a little wet but it is finished. Now you know what to do with all those old polo shirts. Thanks for stopping by and letting me show you what I do. The shirt will just sit in my stuff. Visit my website girlpop.etsy.com. Bye.
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Female: So now that Julie is done with her lesson, we are doing to head over to the local DIY shows where she sells some of her goods.
Siri: Hi my name is Siri Wilson and I am cofounder of Treehouse Brooklyn and my business partner, Rebecca Lee and I started it with the intention to celebrate all the local crafters and designers in our community. There are so many factories that are creating so many bad things in this world and it is so much better to not buy things that are coming from those factories and to also have the touch of the hand that is on those items of the artist or the crafter that made it. It just makes it a little bit more special and a little more unique. I grew up in Berkley as a hippie child. My mom was a potter and I remember helping her making pottery and we had a jewelry business together when I was a kid and I made yarn dolls and I made female hamsters for my dollhouse. So I have always been making something or other.
Here at the Treehouse, we also have craft classes and craft surprise and a craft resource library so it really runs the gamete and they are all a lot of fun. One of our favorite designers here at Treehouse is named Bells and her constructions are beautiful and super cute and perfect for the summer days.
Another one of our designers that makes everything one of a kind is Bobbie. She is a local designer as well and this is hand dyed and silk screen fabric. So here is one of the pieces that I made. It is made out of organic cotton jersey and it is very flowy and comfortable and kind of sexy. As you can see, I hand sew partly because I am afraid of machines and partly because I cannot stop it.
This is Girlpopcorn clothes and accessories by her for women, kids, men. We have some cute bags that she made, some pillows. She is really eclectic.
Thanks for checking out Treehouse Brooklyn.
Male: Remember if you guys have any ideas for future shows, pick up a camera and send us something to threadbanger.com.
Female: Got a comment? Leave it below.
Male: Till next week.
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