For most people, discovering that free-motion embroidery means you can draw with your sewing machine would be a mildly interesting thought and nothing more. For Cheryl McNay, it was the beginning of everything.
A qualified finance professional with three children and a career that left creativity with only the smallest pockets of time, Cheryl had painted for years and stitched since childhood. Making things had never left her; it had simply waited. Then, during Covid, a crocheted granny square bag reminded her of a fragment of herself that had been patiently set aside. From that moment, everything changed.
What followed was a City & Guilds accreditation in Machine Embroidery with the School of Stitched Textiles: a course that transformed not just her technical repertoire, but the way she understood art, process, and her own creative identity. Cheryl arrived with a painter’s eye and a single question: could stitch be used the same way as a brush? She graduated with her work hanging on the walls of her home, a vocabulary full of materials she had never heard of before, and the confidence to consider starting a creative business of her own.
Inspired by Cheryl’s story? Our City & Guilds Machine Embroidery courseΒ is designed for anyone ready to explore stitch as a genuine art form. Whether you come to the course as a complete beginner, a confident sewist, or, like Cheryl, a painter who has always been curious about what a needle and thread can do, SST offers the structured framework, expert tuition, and creative freedom to help you develop your own voice. Enrolment opens 24 October 2026. Find out more at sofst.org.
“Somewhere between the first sample and the last module, you stop worrying about getting things right and start enjoying finding your own voice.”
Cheryl McNay, Machine Embroidery Skill Stage 3
I Blame My Sindy Doll, and I’ll Stand By That
I often joke that I blame my Sindy doll for my passion for sewing. She was my first customer.
My mum taught me to knit, crochet, weave and sew when I was little, and before long poor Sindy had a wardrobe that would have made Barbie jealous. Whether the clothes actually fitted is another matter, but thankfully she never complained.
Then, as it does for most of us, life got in the way. I ended up having a career in finance, gained professional qualifications, got married and raised three wonderful children. Creativity didn’t disappear, but it had to fit into the little pockets of time that were left over. I’d always loved sewing and painting, but I never really had the luxury of disappearing into my sewing room for hours on end.
Like a lot of people during Covid, I suddenly found myself with some unexpected time while recovering. Naturally, I decided the obvious solution was to crochet a granny square bag. Looking back, that little bag changed more than I realised, because it reminded me how much I loved making things. It was as though I’d rediscovered a fragment of myself that had been patiently waiting while life happened.
I’ve always painted, so when I discovered that you could actually draw with a sewing machine, I remember thinking: wow, where do I start? I wanted to use stitch as an art form. I wanted to understand how artists develop ideas, experiment, and make a simple sketch into something that makes people stop and look. That’s what attracted me to SST.
From Paintbrush to Presser Foot: Discovering Free-Motion Embroidery
From the first module, I realised this wasn’t about following instructions. The tutors encouraged us to ask, “What happens if…?” Sometimes the process worked, and sometimes it didn’t. And that, it turned out, was entirely the point.
I found that every module introduced something new, and I loved researching contemporary textile artists because each one sparked another idea. I’d often sit down intending to spend half an hour on research and somehow emerge three hours later with fifteen new ideas, another book on my wish list, and a shopping basket full of materials I suddenly couldn’t live without. My poor postman.
The digital design side of the course was another surprise. After years working with numbers, using Adobe Illustrator and moving shapes around by half a millimetre felt deeply satisfying. I called it refining a design. My family probably called it dawdling.
Experimenting quickly became my favourite part: dyeing fabrics, painting them, layering them, adding stitch and beads, and then deciding they needed more beads. I also discovered that fabric dye will stain absolutely everything except where you intended, and that beads somehow always wait until you’re barefoot to make their escape.
As a painter, free-motion embroidery completely changed the way I thought about sewing. It stopped being about seams and hems and became another way of drawing. My sewing machine became another paintbrush, although my first attempts looked more like my machine had consumed far too much coffee.
Looking back through my modules now, I can see my confidence growing, module by module, sample by sample, sometimes mistake by mistake. If someone had told me two years ago that I’d be happily talking about Tyvek, Angelina fibres and soluble fabrics, I’d have thought they had completely lost the plot.
Keep Every Sample. Especially the Awful Ones.
The biggest surprise has been seeing my own work hanging on the walls at home. Every piece reminds me of a module, an experiment, or a technique I never thought I’d master.
Completing the diploma has also given me the confidence to consider starting my own creative business, which is something I’d only ever dreamed about before. I don’t know exactly where it will take me, but that’s part of the excitement. What I do know is that I’ll keep learning, keep experimenting, and, if history is anything to go by, keep buying fabric that I definitely don’t need.
I would recommend this course without hesitation, and I’m also toying with the possibility of enrolling on the next stage. The variety of techniques and the support you receive are exemplary.
Somewhere between the first sample and the last module, you stop worrying about getting things right and start enjoying finding your own voice. It has been quite a journey.
And if I could give one piece of advice to anyone thinking about starting: keep every sample. Even the awful ones. Especially the awful ones. One day you’ll look back at them and realise they weren’t failures at all. They were simply the beginning.
Cheryl’s story is a reminder that creativity, once sparked, rarely disappears for good. Sometimes it takes a granny square bag and a sewing machine to rediscover it. SST exists to give that creativity the structure, the techniques, and the community it deserves, at whatever stage of life you arrive.
If you’ve ever wondered whether stitch could be something more than a craft, whether it could be a genuine art form and a means of real personal expression, Cheryl’s journey offers a compelling answer. And the work hanging on her walls is all the proof you need.
