The Stem Stitch is an outline stitch, but it gives an effect of greater width than the Kensington Outline. It is used whenever a heavier outline than the Kensington is needed to secure a well balanced result in the whole design, and when the Long and Short Stitch would prove too heavy. This stitch consists of a closely set row of short stitches, which are placed in a slanting direction within the outline. This stitch may be worked without a frame.
Send the needle up from beneath, just within the outline; if you are working a leaf, then begin at the stem. Keeping the needle pointed downwards, insert the point of the needle on the outline a little above, so that the stitch shall slant upward, and bring it up again, within the line, a little above the first stitch. Follow the outline in this manner to the tip and back to the stem on the left side (see figure above.) The more the angle is increased the wider the line becomes. This stitch is of especial value in stems, which need to be wider than the ordinary outline which make them, and it is from this that the stitch gains its name (See article entitled “How to Embroider Flower Stems.”)
