How to Curve Text in Silhouette Cameo

For some vinyl projects, you may need to curve the text before applying it to your surface.  Learning how to curve the text is a simple, easy way to increase your use of your machine. Curving text with your Silhouette Cameo is super easy, and the results are adorable!  

Learning how to curve text using your Silhouette Design is one of those skills I felt as if I was ready to learn. I have curved text a few times, but not enough to really feel like I was able to do it often. Most of my projects have straight text, or if there are rounded shapes, it is solely because that is how the file is created.  So, I took it upon myself to curve a little bit of text…and it was easier than I thought!

Learning how to curve text in Silhouette Studio was something I attempted pretty early on.  Once I got the hang of it, I couldn’t stop! Curving text for a vinyl project is something that used to intimidate me.  Not anymore! It is actually very, very easy. Why do you want to curve text? Well, I find this helpful when applying vinyl to a curved surface, like a cup. Or, If I am trying to place a name on an already round cut ~ like a smiley face on a t-shirt ~ and I don’t want to just layer it straight across the design, I’ll curve it.  It gives your design a little bit of extra fun! I recently used this technique to vinyl some stainless steel wine tumblers for a friend, and they turned out super cute! I used it to put the word “Lil'” above the name “Jenn”, since she goes by “Lil’ Jenn”.  So cute!

To create a curve to your text, first open your Silhouette Design Studio. On the design screen, draw an Ellipse, aka a circle.  You choose this from the left hand side bar, where you see the shapes. 

From here, choose “Text” and type out the text you are working with.  At this point, you also want to choose the font you prefer, instead of trying to change it later.  Make sure your font style and size are set before you move on to the next step. Double click the text box, and you will see a green square around the edge.

To the bottom left of that green box, you will see a little black circle with arrows. Click and hold on that, and drag your text over the circle you just drew. As you move over the circle, you will see the text starts to curve along the edge of the circle. So cool!

This is the part of the process that allows for a little creativity. From here, you can position your text just right along the circle, so you can easily get it where you want it. All you have to do is continue to drag the little black circle with the arrows until you have your words just right.

Next, you need to separate your text from your circle. Select your text, and Right Click on it.  A menu will pop up, and you want to choose Convert to Path.  This is very cool ~ it is freezing your text in that position and curvature so you can cut it! At this point, you can pull the circle away and move it off your screen or delete it entirely, as you do not need it.  Just select the circle and drag it away.  Done!  

All you are left with is text.  Yay! 

For this particular project, once I had the text curved, I added the word “Jenn” positioned below it, so it would cut together.  This made applying it to the glass so easy!

While I would not say this is a totally amateur project, I feel as if it is a good, and easy skill to learn.  It actually ends up being much easier than you think with great results!