"I love learning new craft techniques, and when I first discovered bargello embroidery—with its beautifully simple vertical stitches—it immediately reminded me of pixel art. Bargello is a centuries-old needlepoint technique that dates back to Renaissance-era Florence, built from nothing but straight stitches arranged into bold, mathematical patterns. The moment I saw it, I thought: those stitches could totally hide a thin LED strip.
After a lot of experimenting, that idea turned into this: a 3D-printed bag with a bargello-embroidered front panel, embedded with a 3mm addressable LED strip. By 3D printing the canvas instead of using something off-the-shelf, I could shape it to any form I wanted and integrate it directly into the geometry of a custom-designed bag. The tapestry wool softly diffuses the LEDs, and I’m completely in love with how the gradients come to life—the animated glow feels almost like a secret being revealed when it turns on."
That is the intro snippet from my Bargello Blaze Bag tutorial, featured on the cover of Make: Magazine! I was very excited, and very grateful to the editorial team for choosing my project!
Check out Vol 97 issue here! 👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼
Dale Dougherty
This was possibly one of the most challenging articles I've ever had to write. I redesigned the bargello pattern so that it was a bit less fiddly to create. The original design had triple the amount of solder joints, and it felt a bit too much even for a weekend project, so I really wanted to come up with a design that was still visually interesting but more achievable. The original design is still cool though:
I love infusing modern tech into traditional crafts. These ancient techniques don't just stay alive by standing still; it stays alive by evolving. These crafts have been passed down for generations and every time we mix them with new technology, we make them ours. And then we can keep passing them on to others, along with the joy of practicing them too. I hope you check out the project and try out a new craft yourself!