With the holidays fast approaching one of few fall back that I go on for every season is the incorporation of a ribbon. Adding stitching just makes the ribbon a bit more defined and adds a fun touch. This is super fast, and highly effective.
1. Set Up the document.
Use the Rectangle Tool to make a rectangle of any size. I made mine 825px by 50px. But the size does not matter as I will show you how to adjust it later.
2. Choose your colors
Set the fill color to what you want the base of the ribbon to be. Set the stroke color to what you want the stitching color to be. I also set my stroke to 3 pt.
For my fill I used: #045172
For my stroke I used: #63be82
3. Offset Path
Go to your Appearance panel. With the Stroke Layer selected click the “add new effect” button below.
Then select “Path” > “Offset Path”
Your default inputs should look like this. Which will make your stroke go outside of the base, as seen in the second photo.
To make the stitching inside I use negative numbers and play around until I believe the stitch is in the right spot. On this one I was happy with -5px.
4. Dashed Lines
This is when the fun creativity happens with the ribbon. I love going through the dashed lines panel and playing around with different type of stitching that could happen on a ribbon. Thick, thin, close together, far apart, all even, or not. It’s all fun from here.
The basic and effective setting is an even dash. Side Note: If you only input a number in the first dash panel it will make the gaps even.
4. Completed Ribbon
Now you have a completed ribbon to do whatever you like with it. Best part is, this method allows you to use the new warping tools that the latest CC 2014 update has.
Here are sine uses in using ribbon in your design.
Hope you found this tutorial useful. Let me know how you play around with ribbon in your designs.
Ham Eye Am 
