Punch It Up: Punch Needle Name Tag Pattern

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Tag You’re It!

I teach and vend at, on average, twelve fiber events each year. Will and I both wear our own punched name tags in the booth, but most shows want you to wear an official festival or conference name tag or badge for safety and accountability—which is totally understandable! At Lambtown Festival last year, one of my students challenged me to make a badge holder that wasn’t plastic. Challenge accepted! Looking through my pile of badge holders, I chose the Oxford Certified Punch Needle Instructors Reunion Badge to beautify it! I also had several of my vendor friends ask when I was going to make them a name tag. In this article, I tackle both the badge holder and a simple name tag that would make a great guild project.

Materials:

Oxford punch needles: #14 fine, #13 fine, and #13 regular
Various amounts of worsted-weight yarn (for the floral name tag, I used Wooly Walkers Beryl and Fern, as well as Violet Jane Blueberry, and Eye on the Sky for the French knot flowers, both in fine)
Monk’s cloth to fit a small frame or hoop
Heat n’ Bond UltraHold 3/8” (9.5mm) tape
Heat n’ Bond UltraHold and Lite interfacing
Light iron-on interfacing (optional, but it sure makes life easier!)
Watered-down white glue
Tapestry needle
Regular fine point permanent marker (not ultra fine)
For the backs: pieces of fabric and wool felt
Iron
Badge magnets (peel and stick), pin backs or badge lanyards

Badge Holder Instructions

Business card sized badge holder.

For the badge holder, keep in mind that the one I created is designed to hold a business-card-size name tag. If you choose to make one for the larger conference badges, you’ll need to adjust your measurements. Once you have decided, trace the pattern onto your monk’s cloth.

Start by punching your badge holder with the Oxford #14 fine punch needle, and as with any fine-point needle, try to punch every hole, every other row. You may have to put a few more stitches in for some of the detail, but don’t fret! Outline the design in Beryl, punch the leaves in Fern, and the background in Blueberry.
From the front of the project, I used a two wrap French knot with rug yarn and the tapestry needle to make the flowers between the leaves.
1. French knot: With a piece of yarn in your tapestry needle, and looking at the loop side of the project, bring your needle up from the back where you want the knot. Wrap the yarn twice around the needle as shown and then push the needle back down through the fabric. Pull the yarn taut while creating a knot on the front. Cut the tails on the back to 1/2”, there is no need to tie them off.
  Wrap the yarn twice around the needle after bringing it up from the back.
  
  Push the needle back down through the fabric, pulling taught to create the knot.
  
  Three French knots.
Now that the punching is complete, remove your project from the hoop or frame. Using a piece of the iron-on interfacing (an inch larger than the design on all sides) iron it to the back of your punched project, making sure your French-knot tails are tucked within the borders of the design.
Punching complete.

Interfacing ironed onto the back of the badge holder.
To create the opening in your badge holder, cut an X from corner to corner making sure not to cut into the punched loops. This is a little scary, but if the interfacing is fully ironed on, it will keep from fraying!
After cutting an X into the window to finish the inside edges.
Iron on pieces of the Heat n’ Bond tape to the sides of the opening on the back of the piece. I simply cut them to size by holding the tape in place and snipping. They will be around 2.25” and 1.5”, but you do not want them to overlap each other. Trim the tip off the triangle at the bottom of the window down to ½” as shown. Next, peel the paper backing off the tape, fold the bottom 1/2” trimmed monk’s cloth to the back and iron it in place. Repeat with the other three sides of the cutout. If you find that the inner corners look a bit frayed, dab on some watered-down white glue on the back of those corners and let it dry.
Heat n’ Bond tape applied to the back and the bottom side of the opening trimmed and ironed down.

Window opening complete, from the back.
Next, you will finish the outer border in the same manner. Start by trimming the outer border of the project down to 1/2”. Fold in the corners and press with an iron to keep them in place. Now, iron four pieces of Heat n’ Bond tape to the back as you did for the center opening, making sure they are cut long enough so they overlap the corners. Peel off the paper backing from the Heat n’ Bond tape you applied, and iron all four sides to the back. The corners may seem a bit loose, but this will be addressed in the following steps.
Corners pressed and Heat n’ Bond tape.

Sides ironed to the back, ready for lining.
You will now add a lining to the back side of the piece before applying a final backing that will create a pouch that a card can be easily slipped into. Iron a piece of Heat n’ Bond Lite to the fabric that will be used to line the inside, making it easier to slide your card in and out. The fabric piece with Heat n’ Bond applied should be slightly larger than the pattern you will now trace on to the lining. Cut out the shape, including the window, peel the paper off and iron it onto the back of the punched piece. Pay attention to the corner areas and use the tip of your iron to make sure they are stuck down.
Heat n’ Bond Lite applied to the lining, with pattern.

Lining cut out and ironed to the back.
Take a 3 1/2” piece of the Heat n’ Bond tape and cut it lengthwise down the middle so it’s only 3/16” wide. Iron the two pieces onto the back outside edges as shown. Then iron on a full-width piece of tape at the bottom edge below the window. It is important to realize that the dimensions of the space between the inside edges of the tape should be just a bit larger than the size of the card that will be slipped into the holder. The inside edge of the tape on the bottom will be where the inserted card will sit once it is in place. The top will be left open for sliding the cards in and out. Using a 4 1/4” x 3 1/2” piece of wool felt for the backing, peel the paper from the tape, and iron the felt on.
Tape applied and ready for backing.

You should now have a pouch with an opening at the top. Slide your card into place and admire! You can now add your choice of hardware so you can wear it. Personally, I prefer a badge magnet rather than a lanyard, but I also thought a nice, beaded chain would be lovely on this design.

Name Tag Instructions

Now to create a nice, simple personalized name tag that will be great for guild meetings, classes or shows. As I mentioned, Will and I both wear our own punched name tags in the booth at shows and many of our vendor friends have asked, “When are you making me one?” With show season coming up (or in full swing when this article comes out), I thought this would be a perfect time to make some.

Sizing is the tricky part, my name only being three letters, isn’t an issue, but when your name is Alexandra and you don’t use a nickname, you must get creative! For shorter names in the three-to-six letter range, you can fit them onto a 4” to 5” name tag. I draw a horizontal line on paper to start sketching out a name and often give myself a middle and top line to make sure all the letters are of equal height. I like to draw the letters by hand, but you can also find a font on the computer that you like. Make sure to use a marker or pen that creates a line as thick as the yarn you are using, this helps with spacing as you draw.
When designing your own lettering, a few horizontal lines can help.

Creativity is important for longer names!
1. I find that by stretching my monk’s cloth before I transfer the lettering ensures that I won’t make a nametag that is too big or gets pulled out of shape. Tape the pattern you have drawn, right side up, on the front of your project; then, from the back, trace the letters onto the monk’s cloth with a permanent marker. (If you don’t have a light table, a sunny window is a great substitute when transferring the design.) If your name-tag design has straight edges, make sure you are on-grain when tracing and adjust as needed. Remember that from the back your name should be a mirror image when you go to punch!
I like to do the lettering first, then the border, and fill in the background last. For my name tag, “Una”, I used the #13 fine-point needle for the lettering and the #14 fine for the background which causes the letters to stand out a bit. For the outside border of the tag I used two colors in the #13 regular-point needle and the stem stitch technique to create a faux bead stitch look.
Name punched with a #13 fine and background punched with a #14 fine. Note the border.
Contrast makes a big difference in making the name stand out. I ended up re-punching the “Shelley” lettering with a more contrasting color for that name tag after the first attempt wasn’t vivid enough.
Contrast of chosen colors makes a big difference in readability.
After you have trimmed and parked your loops, and removed the project from your hoop or frame, do not cut out the name tag yet! At this point, measure the punched area from the back side and make a note of it for cutting out the backing material. Measure 1/2” from the punching on all four sides and pull threads to give you reference lines. On the back, place pieces of Heat n’ Bond tape next to the punching on all four sides and iron the tape in place. Now you can safely cut the monk’s cloth at your reference lines without fear of it fraying. Peel the paper from the tape and start by ironing the corners to the back. Then start pressing a long side to the back. Then iron down a short side, then the other long side, and finally the remaining short side.
Measure out 1/2” from the punching and pull threads for reference.

Heat n’ Bond tape applied to the back before cutting out at 1/2” border.

Paper removed, corners folded and pressed, and two sides pressed down.
Use the measurements you took earlier to draw a rectangle on the paper side of the Ultra Hold Heat n’ Bond. Cut out the shape roughly a quarter inch outside the rectangle, this will make sure the edges of the fabric you use for the back will not fray. Iron the piece of Heat n’ Bond to the back side of your backing fabric, whether it’s felt or a piece of quilting fabric, and cut the fabric down to the rectangle. Peel off the paper and iron the fabric to the back of your name tag, making sure to use the tip of your iron to carefully seal the edges and corners down.
For finishing name tags with rounded corners or sides, apply the Heat n’ Bond tape on the straight edge and cut out small pieces of tape for the rounded areas. Iron on the tape by making small pleats on the rounded areas. Finish with a piece of fabric as above.
Finishing a name tag with rounded corners.
Now add a magnet or pinback and wear with pride!

Now it’s your turn, Tag, You’re It! Let’s move away from generic plastic name tags and create your own one-of-a-kind name tags and badge holders! Imagine going to a guild meeting or fiber show, showing off your creativity and starting conversations. As always, drop me a line if you have any questions—I’d love to see your name tags!