Everyone Has Designs on Custom Embroidery

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Everyone Has Designs on Custom Embroidery

Amid a fast-fashion landscape in which so much can be easily produced, some consumers long for something special — merchandise personalized by human hands.

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Emily Simpson, owner of Chainsmoke, a chain-stitching business, was commissioned by the filmmaker Josh Safdie to embroider his name on a shirt he wore while directing “Marty Supreme.”

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Atsushi Nishijima

By

Jason Diamond

March 30, 2026,

5:00 a.m. ET

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In our age of mechanical and A.I. reproduction, even something sold as “limited edition” can be easily acquired. That’s one reason Emily Simpson believes her chain-stitching operation, Chainsmoke, has been successful.

“Without sounding woo-woo about it, there’s a spiritual connection between physical human hands being in the process that makes it more special,” she said.

The chain-stitching technique, which has roots in ancient China, gets its name from the way the thread loops to look like a chain, and has been used for everything from tapestry in the Middle East to the lettering on midcentury bowling shirts. Ms. Simpson, who has a Masters of Fine Arts degree in fiction from Columbia University, where she studied with such writers as Heidi Julavits and Gary Shteyngart, “grew up around sewing machines.” She uses a 1966 Singer 114K103 — a chain-stitch embroidery machine — to sew art and lettering into old army jackets and vintage work wear.

Recently, Ms. Simpson was commissioned by Josh Safdie, the filmmaker, to stitch his surname onto a shirt he wore while directing “Marty Supreme,” and she embroidered several costumes for the table tennis players in the Oscar-nominated movie. Ms. Simpson has also done work for musicians like Stevie Wonder and the band the Walkmen, and she stitched matching bowling shirts for the comedians Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers for a live episode of their podcast, “Las Culturistas.”

Ms. Simpson has done work for musicians, filmmakers and comedians, like Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, for whom she stitched matching bowling shirts.

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From left, Kate Hesler; Wally Krantz

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Ms. Simpson keeps her embroidery operation small because she does all the stitching herself and wants to keep it that way.

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Wally Krantz

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