That’s what I’ve been waiting to see! Great to finally see some examples of fabric (other than the brief shot from the promo vid)! I really appreciate the time you put in to these—they’re not just “Hey look what I did,” but actually showing and comparing the different options along the way. Keep it up!
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I’ll reiterate the other folks’ statements–THANK YOU for this post, and for showing your process, especially! I’m so excited about working with fabric (including for applique) that seeing this makes the wait for my own Forge that much easier.
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Have you tried any only cotton women’s and denim? Have you tried other fabrics? Like knits?
Have you tried to make patterns on textiles?
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Not any other materials yet. Haven’t done much study on other kinds of fabric. I do know that cotton and wool will be pretty safe. Linen will be ok. Will try a t-shirt for a knit and check what other fabrics I have on hand. Corduroy and velvet would be interesting.
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Thanks for documenting your experiments!
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It would be interesting to see if you could use the cloud trace thing (on a simpler pattern) and then scale it up a bit to cut the shape out offset from the traced line. Like this, but with greater ease. I think that is what you were trying to do initially, but the pattern didn’t help. Certain direction changes in the lines and what have you would not work, but it could simplify things. I think cloud-done offset paths may already be in the hopper. So, a choice between scale and offset would be perfect. Scale could work for some things for now, though. Thanks for sharing!
Awesome job on testing the fabric…I’m gonna bookmark this, I’ve got a box of old jeans to play with.
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If I had a pattern that had isolated designs, it would work. Yesterday I did a scan, trace print with engrave and cut around. I had printed the rowmark Christmas vectors on a color laser printer and did several with two colors so I could more easily designate cut, score engrave.
If/when they add some simple drawing tools to the Glowforge workspace, that would be perfect. Like @karaelena pointed out with the Silhouette Pixscan feature.
And @takitus posted here:
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For those who can’t wait to get the fabric etching working, here is your solution!
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So, they use lasers to remove tattoos from the human body, and now they ‘tattoo’ clothing.
Is it only me that thinks the world’s gone mad 
John
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So excited to see some fabric testing! I do lots of quilting/sewing, and have a stack of projects in mind that I’m holding off on because they would be so much easier if I could cut the pieces out with a laser rather than by hand.
Excited to try out etching fabrics too - I’m excited for the personalization possibilities, especially something thick/fluffy like a fleece or minky!
Also want to try dabbling in some clothing with laser-cut lace in fabrics like pleather
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There’s a tattoo place near my brother-in-law’s place that has a laser tattoo removal studio next door 
(BTW, my son said the only thing that hurts more than getting a tattoo is having it lasered off.)
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Pleather is not usually laserable. It’s PVC based and that releases chlorine which will eat the electronics of a laser.
Real leather on the other hand is perfect.
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As jamesdhatch said pleather should not be lasered. There are some synthetic leather substitutes, often called vegan leather, that are laser safe. You can find laser cut examples on the web, but I have been unable to find a source that sells in less than factory-sized quantities.
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I’ve seen pix of etched fleece, and it looks great, but usually fleece is a synthetic (basically plastic) so I’m worried about laser-ing it, that it might be prone to catching on fire. Which would be bad.
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Nice experiment. Have you tried cutting cotton fabric with a fusible layer attached? It would be stiffer, and could then be ironed on to a project.
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I think it can be said that 100% cotton, wool and linen will cut perfectly however you want it cut. Heavier weights would stand up to some light engraving. I think I have some fusible stuff in my sewing kit. I’ll have to see what it is made of first and try it out. Great way to cut out patches, iron on and then sew around.
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I think for the most part that thin fabrics like this can’t really be worn after engraving. show pieces sure, and cutting is fine, but the engraved stuff always seems to just fall apart.
We have almost as many tattoo shops as Starbucks. Not sure how many doctors/dermatologists (strange how cheap it is to get one, but incredibly expensive and longer to get it removed).
But then again, we have probably more pot places than Starbucks.
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Did you see the TV show (or maybe it was a podcast/you tube) where the guy had his tattoo removed?
I think during one of his several sessions, he had to stop the attending to regain his composure. Ouch.
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