Cutaway embroidery stabilizers are needed to provide a stable base for delicate and stretchy fabrics both during the embroidery stitching process and afterward. Some fabrics are so stretchy they can force themselves down the throat plate. A cut-away embroidery stabilizer not only helps maintain the crispness of a design’s details during the embroidery process, it also helps retain the design’s shape after repeated washings. Having an angry customer return a sagging or stretched design will remind you of a cutaway backing’s advantages. A quality embroiderer should insist that cut away backings are both washable and dry cleanable.

Our cut-way machine embroidery backings range in weight from 2.0 to 4.0 oz/yd2. Cut away stabilizers, in general, tend to be more resistant to needling perforations than tearaway backings. In choosing a cut away, most embroiderers consider ease of cutting, wash stability, hoop stability, and perforation resistance. Cutaway backings tend to have more bulk than tear away stabilizers. Softness, ease of cutting, and stability can often be mutually exclusive properties for cutaway backings. In some cases, the embroiderer needs to determine which property is most important for a particular design. The softer backings tend to have more hoop stretch and, accordingly, will not allow as crisp a design as stiff ones.