Black Cat Butterfly Embroidery Design, Instant Download

The cat is shown seated side-on with one paw stretched straight up toward a butterfly thats just landed on the very tip of it. The body is that deep solid matte-black silhouette style, but there are fine white highlight lines across the chest and around the eye that stop it from going completely flat. The butterfly above the paw is detailed with tiny wing veins in white against the black. Its a simple scene but the reach of that paw gives it alot of movement and personality for something thats basically 2 colours.

Digitised through industry software with the satin stitch density at 526 stitches per square inch across the black body fill. Thats on the firmer side which keeps the silhouette edge crisp and stops the satin from developing that wavy look you get with softer settings on larger fill areas. The file runs in 5 sizes from 3.06 inches wide up to 6.57 inches, with stitch counts from 7,010 up to 25,926. Use a medium-weight cutaway stabiliser on knit fabrics and a tearaway on woven cotton. The white chest highlights are a seperate colour stop, so you can skip that pass if you want a pure silhouette version with no highlight at all.

The idea occured to me after watching my own cat do exactly the same thing with a moth last summer, suprised at how much character comes through in just the angle of the raised paw. One customer wanted it on an orange tea towel for her kitchen and said the contrast looked really sharp. Use a topping layer on terry cloth or any looped fabric so those white detail lines on the butterfly wings dont get lost in the pile. Skip cutaway on firm cotton tea towel fabric, tearaway holds it fine at this stitch density.