How to Sew DIY Personalized Beach Towels with Big Letter Applique

Sew names, phrases, or cute designs to personalize beach towels! This easy sewing project makes a great gift. If you have a fabric cutter you can use it, but it’s totally not needed to make cute alphabet letters and more, and then applique them to a towel or other item.

You don’t need an embroidery machine or anything fancy to make the applique letters.

You can use any word processing program (like Word or Pages) to pick out a font and enlarge the letters to a size you like.

Then print them out and use fusible web adhesive (like HeatnBond lite) to trace the letters. After that, fuse the traced shapes to the back of your fabric and cut them out with regular scissors.

I show how to use HeatnBond lite in this cute applique tutorial.

Iron the letters onto the towels and satin stitched (a very short stitch zig zag stitch) around them. The trick to a pretty satin stitch is usually to use some kind of embroidery stabilizer (I like the iron on kind) on the back of the project. But towels are thick enough that it usually isn’t necessary.

Here’s another tip: I LOVE using embroidery thread for applique projects. It gives it a special sheen and makes the design really POP! Polyester embroidery thread is more resistant to sunlight and laundry detergents than cotton thread too.

If you have a fabric cutting machine (like a Cricut or Brother ScannCut), you can use that to cut out letters too.

Iron HeatnBond lite onto the back of your fabric pieces and cut out the letters with the machine. So easy.

I have lots more free applique designs for you to download below. Have fun personalizing all your beach towels!

Check out all of my free applique designs.