In sewing

Sewing

Sewing is the craft of fastening or attaching objects using stitches made with a needle and thread. Sewing is one of the oldest of the textile arts, arising in the Paleolithic era...

 and embroidery

Embroidery

Embroidery is the art or handicraft of decorating fabric or other materials with needle and thread or yarn. Embroidery may also incorporate other materials such as metal strips, pearls, beads, quills, and sequins....

, a satin stitch or damask stitch is a series of flat stitches that are used to completely cover a section of the background fabric. Narrow rows of satin stitch can be executed on a standard sewing machine

Sewing machine

A sewing machine is a textile machine used to stitch fabric, cards and other material together with thread. Sewing machines were invented during the first Industrial Revolution to decrease the amount of manual sewing work performed in clothing companies...

 using a zigzag

Zigzag

A zigzag is a pattern made up of small corners at variable angles, though constant within the zigzag, tracing a path between two parallel lines; it can be described as both jagged and fairly regular....

 stitch or a special satin stitch foot.

In order to maintain a smooth edge, shapes can be outlined with back, split

Backstitch

Backstitch or back stitch and its variants stem stitch, outline stitch and split stitch are a class of embroidery and sewing stitches in which individual stitches are made backward to the general direction of sewing...

 or chain stitch

Chain stitch

Chain stitch is a sewing and embroidery technique in which a series of looped stitches form a chain-like pattern. Chain stitch is an ancient craft - examples of surviving Chinese chain stitch embroidery worked in silk thread have been dated to the Warring States period...

 before the entire shape including the outline is covered with satin stitch.

Machine-made satin stitch is often used to outline and attach applique

Applique

In its broadest sense, an appliqué is a smaller ornament or device applied to another surface. In the context of ceramics, for example, an appliqué is a separate piece of clay added to the primary work, generally for the purpose of decoration...

s to the ground fabric.

Variants

Variants of the satin stitch include:

• Brick stitch, in which alternate rows of satin stitches are offset by half the stitch length. Worked in several related colors, brick stitch allows stepped shading. (Brick stitch
  Brick stitch
  The Brick Stitch, also known as the Cheyenne Stitch or Comanche Stitch, is a bead weaving stitch with unknown origins in which individual beads are stacked upon each other much as bricks are stacked in a brick wall....
  
   is also the name of a beadwork
  Beadwork
  Beadwork is the art or craft of attaching beads to one another or to cloth, usually by the use of a needle and thread or soft, flexible wire. Most beadwork takes the form of jewelry or other personal adornment, but beads are also used in wall hangings and sculpture.Beadwork techniques are broadly...
  
   technique.)

• Encroaching satin stitch, in which the top of each row of stitches is set between the bottom of the stitches on the previous row.

• Long-and-short stitch, used for fine shading; in the first row of satin stitches, every other stitch is half the length of its neighbors. Subsequent rows in related colors are all of the same length.

• Padded satin stitch, in which shapes are filled with rows of small running stitch
  Running stitch
  The running stitch or straight stitch is the basic stitch in hand-sewing and embroidery, on which all other forms of sewing are based. The stitch is worked by passing the needle in and out of the fabric...
  
  es which are then covered with satin stitches.

Thread

Satin stitch is frequently made with embroidery thread, which has less twist than standard sewing thread. This gives a more uniform effect, with the individual threads' filaments merging together.

While good sewing threads produce acceptable satin stitch, low quality threads usually do not sit straight, and produce an uneven result.the colour of each thread usually does not matter .