Lasercut Leather Patches

Here's an easy laser cutting project to add some flare to your life.

Step 1: Come Up With Some Designs!

Find an image you want to turn into a patch. Here's something I feel passionate about.

Simple black line images work best.

Step 2: Add Holes to Sew Through

You want to add holes to your design so that you can easily sew through the leather.

These holes should be about .04" in diameter, but you may want to adjust depending on the needle and thread you are working with.

Make sure these are evenly spaced and are not too close to the edge of your patch.

I would recommend using the sewing as a way of adding colour and lines to your patches.

Here I'm going to use thread to make the word "pizza" pop.

Step 3: Cut Them Out

I'm working with a raw piece of leather, that is just under 1/8" thick. You can use any leather, but i find that thicker leather keeps its shape nicely.

To make sure that the piece of leather was flat in the laser bed, I've taped it down.

Step 4: Sew the Inside Parts of Your Design

Once cut, you want to sew any bits that are inside the perimeter of the patch. In this example, I've finished up the heart veins with thread. You can get fancy with your sewing techniques or you can keep it real simple. No real sewing experience necessary.

Step 5: Sew Them on Real Good

The final step is to attach them to your bag/pants/jacket for the world to see. You can get creative with how you do this, note the cheesy lines coming off the pizza patch and the needles sticking out of the cactus.

This project can also be an easy way of creating product labels.