I sew in a corner of our bedroom where there’s not much natural light. The windows are small and mostly screened by trees. In addition to the overhead lights, I have all sorts of extra lamps set up – one on my desk, another clamped to the ironing board, and another next to the sewing machine. Plus I have two umbrella photo lights. It’s a lot of lights, and yet it’s still not enough!
I recently heard about a sewing machine LED light kit from inspiredLED and thought it would be perfect for me. I ordered it and installed it on Friday. The kit costs $30. For an extra $15 I added the expansion kit so that I could install LED lights on my kids’ sewing machine, too. After using both machines pretty heavily this weekend I can tell you that I highly recommend these kits!
This is my Janome 2160 DC whom we affectionately call Gnomey the Janome. Here you see the amount of light the light bulb inside the machine provides. As with most sewing machines, the light is a pretty puny one-directional spotlight. I was ready for an improvement.
This is what the LED kit looks like:
You get a strip of LEDs, two clips, a small cord, a power cord, and a switch. Installation was very easy and quick! inspired LED has this 2-minute video on their site that shows you exactly how it’s done:
I measured and cut the LED strip to length and stuck it on my machine.
Then stuck on the two clips and threaded the little wire through.
The last step is to stick on the switch, plug the little cord into one side and the power cord into the other.
The whole process took 5 minutes or so.
Now for the moment of truth!
The entire bed of the machine is now lit! Here’s a side by side comparison:
Having these lights is going to really help when I teach people to use their sewing machines in my Get to Know Your Sewing Machine class. More light makes all the thread guides so much easier for students to see.
This is my kids’ sewing machine. It’s Janome Sew Mini.
We’ve been really happy with it for a kids machine. It’s tiny and portable and very straightforward to use. There’s no on/off switch so they never accidentally leave it on. When you press the pedal it sews as long as it is plugged in. But…and this is a big but…there’s no light at all. Isn’t that weird?
Up until now we’ve had a desk lamp next to their machine, but after a while the lamp would get pretty hot and if a their hand brushed against it they’d get burned. No good! The LED expansion kit has changed all that.
Good-bye hot desk lamp! When the kids want to sew they just flip the switch on the side of the machine and the lights come on. LEDs never get hot and they’re so bright!
I highly recommend the Sewing Machine LED Light Kit from inspiredLED. If you can see better, you can sew better. Right on.
I have great natural light in my studio, but terrible TERRIBLE lighting after dark – so I’m very interested in these! How well do the lights stick inside the arm of the machine? I often machine quilt large quilts and stuff a lot of fabric through there. Do you think pulling a lot of fabric through that small space could pull the strip of lights off?
They stick really well. I can’t say for sure how they’ll hold up over time since I’ve just used them over a weekend, but I they feel like they’re stuck on there pretty well. I don’t think the fabric would pull them off.
The flexible strips are meant to adhere very well to all machines (about 10years) , that being said : installing the strip and moving it after installation will cause the adhesive to become compromised. As for pushing fabric through while quilting I have heard that some women have snagged fabric on the corners of the LEDs, my solution to this was to cover the lights with some scotch tape. The tape won’t effect the light out-put, and will create a smoother surface for the fabric to pass by! Please let me know if there are any other questions regarding the sewing machine LED lighting kit!
– Erica, Inspired LED
Thank you, Erica!
I’d seen some LED lights for sewing machines on Pinterest and we had a LED light left over from a fish tank that we never really used. This summer I used command strips to attach it to my machine (also a janome :O). Mine doesn’t have as many lights as yours, but it has been totally life changing!!!!!! The older I get, that machine light seems dimmer. I too had a desk lamp, the swing arm kind, and I could never get it in the right spot. I can’t imagine how I ever sewed before.
My kids have the hello kitty janome, also no light, and they want one, so I was planning to pick on up from the pet store.
The pet store! That’s pretty brilliant.
I saw these somewhere the other week, so cool, definitely on my wish-list. I have a nice big window in my room, but it’s on the wrong side of my machine, plus in the late afternoon & evening the lighting in here is terrible. These little LED’s would be perfect. 🙂
They are really pretty neat. I love mine and the kids are very happy with theirs.
Perfect! I’m starting to get questions about my birthday/christmas wishes and this is going on the list.
What a brilliant idea! If you will pardon the pun! I must get one of these lights for my machine.
Hi Abby, thank you so much for this post! I need this!! Please explain something. What do you mean that you ordered the expansion kit and could put it on your kids’ machine as well. Does that give you a second set of lights and a second cord to use on a second machine? Thank you so much!
Yes, it does. You can read about the expansion pack on the website.