What your design looks like once it is actually made
The AI gives you a picture with unlimited colours and infinite detail. A patch is thread, yarn or moulded rubber, and every one of those has a smallest thing it can make. This is where the two meet — the same design, side by side with the patch it becomes, in every construction we produce.
Nothing here is a surprise you find out after ordering. It is the conversation we would rather have first.
Design a patch free
Drag the handle. Rendered for illustration — every real order is proofed and approved before production.
Pick a construction to see the difference
The same design is rendered in all seven, so the comparison between them is like for like. Each page has its own drag-to-compare view, the numbers that constrain it, and what will not translate.
What is true no matter what you order
Six limits that come from physics rather than from us. Knowing them up front is the difference between an artwork approval that takes one round and one that takes four.
Gradients become steps
Every thread, yarn and rubber construction builds an image out of a fixed number of solid colours. A smooth blend in the preview becomes two, three or four bands. Only printed patches keep a true gradient.
There is a smallest thing that can exist
A stitch, a yarn loop and a mould wall each have a physical minimum width. Anything in the design thinner than that is either thickened until it can be made, or dropped. This is why tiny text and hairline outlines are the first casualties.
Near-identical colours get merged
Three shades of blue that read as three on a screen become one thread. We pick the merge deliberately and show it to you on the production artwork before anything is made.
Photographic faces do not survive thread
Realistic skin tone and facial detail need continuous shading. In thread they become blocks and the likeness is lost. Portraits should be printed, or redrawn as a stylised illustration first.
The border is a real, physical edge
A merrowed or hot-cut border occupies about an eighth of an inch all the way round. Artwork that runs to the very edge of the preview loses that margin, so we pull the design in slightly.
Nothing is manufactured until you have seen the production version
Our team redraws every design for the construction it is being made in, and you approve that artwork first. The preview starts the conversation; the production artwork is the promise.
Common questions
Why does my finished patch look different from the AI design?
The design is a picture on a screen with unlimited colours and infinite detail. A patch is built from thread, yarn or moulded rubber, each of which has a smallest possible feature and a fixed number of colours. Manufacturing has to round the design to what the material can hold. Our team does that redraw for you, and you approve the production artwork before anything is made.
Can a patch have a gradient?
Printed (dye-sublimated) patches reproduce true gradients. Embroidered and woven patches approximate them as bands of thread; chenille and PVC cannot do them at all and use flat colour instead.
How small can text be on a custom patch?
About 1/4 inch cap height on embroidery, about 1/8 inch woven, and roughly 1/12 inch printed. Chenille cannot hold small text at all — lettering under an inch is embroidered on top instead.
Do I get to see what the patch will actually look like before it is made?
Yes. Every order gets production artwork redrawn for the construction you picked, and nothing goes to manufacturing until you have approved it. You can also order a single stitched sample first.
Design it, then see it made
Designing is free and unlimited. When you are ready, our team redraws the artwork for the construction you pick and you approve it before anything is manufactured.
Start designing free