Category Archives: Tips

Philippa pants: fitting and adding a ‘tummy stay’

After a few sewing fails in a row (some Lander pants in a frankly hideous fabric choice, a vintage jumpsuit that looked 80s in the wrong way, some patchwork jeans that looked straight-up weird) I was so happy to finish these trousers and be 100% in love with them. They are Anna Allen Philippa pants in a stretch corduroy from Minerva, which I received as part of being in their blogger network. My main blog post about the pants will be going up over there later, but I thought I’d go into a bit more detail on the fitting and construction process over here.

I don’t often toile patterns but I did in this case as I wasn’t at all sure what size to cut and thought I may need some adjustments to cover the size difference between my waist and hips on such a close fitting design. The pattern comes with a complete separate booklet of useful fitting tips and I also sought some very helpful advice on Instagram.

The main consensus pointed to a full stomach adjustment, reducing the crotch depth, and giving more space in the thigh.

Thanks in particular to Evelyn @slowintention who sent me these diagrams showing how she did the full thigh and full stomach adjustments.

Toile 3 – which repurposed the aforementioned horrible-fabric Landers by the way. What was I thinking. Pinching out the crotch wrinkles with pins.

Over the course of three toiles I made the following adjustments:
– 1” full stomach adjustment (I added space both horizontally and vertically as you can see in the main slashed areas above)
– Graded up a size at the inner front thigh, tapering in again towards the knee
– Took 1” off the rise all around, and wedged a further 3/4” out of the crotch curve at the lengthen/shorten line
– Scooped out the back crotch a bit at the seat (low butt adjustment)
– Omitted the back darts completely (?!)
– Sewed the outer leg seams at a 3/4” seam allowance, mainly to compensate for the stretch in my fabric
– Shortened the leg length by 1″
– Converted the waistband from straight to curved (a tutorial is included in the pattern for this; I only needed it because I lowered the rise to where my body curves in). I sewed cotton tape into the top seam of the waistband to prevent stretching over time.

The fit is still not perfect! There are some diagonal drag lines on the back leg and there is excess fabric bunching around my knees – I was focusing on the waist/hip area and only toiled down to the mid thigh. The grainline seems a bit twisted too which I wonder is down to maintaining the straight side seams. But I don’t really mind! They’re crazy comfortable and I think they’re the kind of trouser that will need minor adjustment each time it’s sewn due to fabric variances.

I pretty much went my own way with the construction. I cut-on the fly facing pieces to the main front leg and used my preferred Sandra Betzina method to do a zip fly instead of the button fly as in the pattern. I’m proud of this fly front, it’s super flat and I interfaced the surrounding area inside to keep it sturdy. The cool matte black button came as a spare with a RTW pair of jeans!

I also decided to add a sort of tummy-tuck stay piece into the front for a bit of firmness in this area – similar to a pocket stay/holster but as these have no front pockets it’s just a layer of self fabric. I used the front pieces to draft them off and anchored into the fly and side seams as they were sewn. I stretched the pieces a little as I sewed them in and I think this really helps in smoothing out the front area.

Next time I sew this pattern I will try using a non-stretch fabric as recommended, but this pair is so comfortable and I’m pleased with the fit I ended up with.

Space Kyoto

I feel like I’ve been having a bit more fun with sewing lately. Case in point, this sweater with all the shiny and ruffles thrown at it!

The first part of this project came about when i meet up with the lovely Jess on her recent trip to the UK, and dutifully took her to my wonderful local fabric store, Ray Stitch. Jess got some excellent sweatshirt knit and striped denim and since I can never leave there empty handed I picked up a few of these sparkly space embellishments for £1.50 each. (Some are in their online store, but not the stars.)

[Image sources on my Pinterest]

I’ve been a bit obsessed with space print stuff for quite a while now and have quite the little collection of moon’n’star-festooned clothing, along with quite a large wish/inspiration list. Some of it can run quite pricey so it’s the ideal candidate for ‘DIY instead of buy’.

Luckily I’d just made my pick of fabrics for my December Fabric Store ambassador allowance, amongst which was a black merino-mix sweatshirting that was calling out to be bedecked with shiny things. I’d call this fabric a French terry more than true sweatshirting; it has a smooth front side and loopy back and isn’t too thick, so it was a great candidate both for these iron-ons and for my choice of pattern, the Papercut Kyoto sweater.

I made the Kyoto up as before, with an inch or so of length taken out of both the body and sleeves. This time I added the fun ruffles to the sleeves, which worked really nicely in this medium weight knit. I simply overlocked the raw edge of the ruffles rather than hemming to keep them airy and drapey.

I ironed the embellishments on right at the start, after cutting but before construction. I placed them on the front of the sweater fairly randomly, used a bit of washi tape to stick them down then pressed a hot iron over the back of each patch for ten seconds. They feel very well stuck down and hopefully they will launder ok.

I’ve been gently encouraging myself to get more into sewing in the evenings again, and this was a perfect post-work fun and relaxing sort of sew, which was done in under two hours. I’m thrilled with how this sweater turned out. It’s a little bit novelty and silly but also highly wearable and of course perfect for this festive time of year.

Fabric provided by The Fabric Store as part of their ambassador program.

Better Pictures Project + a quick editing tutorial

Hallo! If you read Gillian’s blog, Crafting a Rainbow, you’ll have seen she asked me to contribute to her Better Pictures Project this month on the subject of taking better indoor photos, especially in winter. I was flattered when Gillian asked me to share some tips because I don’t see my photos as particularly great; in fact I often feel bad that I don’t get outside to shoot more often. I usually feel too self-conscious to shoot in public, plus it’s so much faster and easier to control conditions and get a variety of detail/angle shots indoors, which is what I like to see when I’m reading blogs myself. So it’s likely you’ll be stuck with my fireplace and sewing room wall some more this year, ha ha.

Edit blog photos

You can read the post over on Crafting a Rainbow for details of my photography setup, and I’m sharing a bit more detail here on my typical editing process, which I believe makes up a large proportion of getting a decent indoors shot. I’m using Adobe Photoshop CC 2015 on my iMac – I’m afraid I can’t advise on other software solutions as I only use Photoshop!

Edit blog photos

Here’s a typical photo straight out of my camera. It’s not too bad, but my typical adjustments to make a shot like this a bit better are to correct the light levels and cropping.

Edit blog photos

Because I use a wide-angle lens and my light source – the window – is coming in from the side, I often get vignetting: darker corners compared to the centre of the image. To brighten them out I use the Dodge tool. Select a large, soft brush on the top toolbar, set the Exposure to 20-30%, and gently brush on the dark areas until they brighten up. I might also brush on other areas that have got a bit shadowy like my face or darker areas of the garment.

Edit blog photos

The bottom half of my images are usually dark and shadowy so you can’t see the details of the garment properly, so I even this up too. Enter Quick Mask mode by hitting the little ‘dotted circle inside a rectangle’ icon near the bottom of the left toolbar, or shortcut: hit the Q key. Now select the Brush tool and paint over the dark patch with a large, soft brush. The mask is painted in red – that’s just temporary so you can see it!

Edit blog photos

Then I press Q again which exits Quick Mask and turns the mask into a selection, outlined by a dotted line. The mask actually selects the inverse of what you painted, so hit cmd+shift+i to invert the selection.

Edit blog photos

Then I use the Curves tool (Image > Adjustments > Curves or cmd+M) to bump up the brightness of the selected area – it will just affect the bit that was masked, and because we used a soft-edged brush it will tone in with no obvious edges. I don’t really understand how Curves works, but by pulling up the middle of the line I find it creates a nice even brightness-punch without blowing out the colour or detail.

Edit blog photos

As I say in the post I wrote for Gillian, I try to reduce things poking into shot as it’s visually distracting. I haven’t shoved my coffee table out of the way enough so I’m going to clone it out. Again use the Quick Mask to brush over the thing you want to remove.

Edit blog photos

Invert it, right click on the selection, and hit ‘Fill’. Make sure ‘Content Aware’ is the contents type and hit OK. The selected area will be filled with a sampling of its surroundings so it disappears. PHOTOSHOP MAGIC. I may also use the Clone Stamp tool to brush out smaller distracting details.

Edit blog photos

Finally, I’ll straighten and crop the image using the Crop tool. Make sure ‘original ratio’ is selected so you have uniform image sizes and drag and rotate the handles to a nice composition. You’ll see gridlines come up dividing the image into thirds and it’s nice to try and have the image’s focal points sit on one of the gridlines for a pleasing composition (the rule of thirds).

Edit blog photos

Finally, I may apply a couple of filters – I find these help my images have a cohesive ‘look’ to them. I save these as Actions so they can be run instantly across every photo in the set. You can find lots of free filter actions online: try DeviantArt. You’ll probably want to tone down the result by setting a lower opacity on the Layer palette. When you’re happy, merge down all the layers and save.

Edit blog photos

Done! This process takes me under five minutes per image, and I think it’s worth the small amount of effort. I hope it was helpful, and let me know if you have any other questions or tips about indoor photography or photo editing. Are you participating in the Better Pictures Project? Are you a fan of indoor or outdoor shots on sewing blogs? Should I suck it up and get outdoors sometimes?

Kaleido-Datura, and tips on machine-sewing buttons

Datura

In anticipation of springlike weather, I scooped up the Deer & Doe Datura pattern from Ray Stitch recently. It had been on my to-buy list for a while but seemed an extravagant price for a tank – but I was swayed by how well D&D patterns fit me and the snazzy triangle cutout neckline.

Datura

I used 1m of this lovely Liberty lawn from Shaukat, a digital collage print called Matt Maddison: the kaleidoscope triangle pattern seemed just too perfect a pairing with the Datura’s neckline. I toyed with the idea of blocking the yoke in black but decided to just insert a bit of flat piping into the seam instead.

Datura

The Datura is labelled as advanced and there are indeed a few techniques in there to make things satisfyingly challenging. The language and diagrams in the instruction book weren’t always super clear either – I got a bit confused when attaching the shoulders, but luckily found this sewalong tutorial which cleared things up. Attaching the bias along the neckline with the correct gaps between the triangles took a bit of trial and error too. Size-wise I cut a 38 at the top blended to 42 at the hip, and cut the hem length of the largest size.

Datura

I’m really happy with the fit and wouldn’t change anything, but something is still making me feel a bit unsure about the finished garment. I think it’s perhaps a bit too fussy in design for my day to day wear, and I also don’t find the shape very flattering on me – it seems to enhance pear proportions. We’ll see if it grows on me or languishes unworn once spring comes along.

Sew on buttons by machine

But how about a buttony bonus? I thought I would share how I sew on buttons by machine, in case anyone is doing this tedious chore by hand and wondering how I can sew so many without going crazy. You’ll need a button foot (I have this cheap generic one for my Janome) and some clear sticky tape. If you don’t have a button foot, you can remove the presser foot entirely and just use the ‘stump’ to hold the button in place, though it’s trickier.

Attaching buttons

1. Mark your button positions per the buttonholes.

Attaching buttons

2. Place the buttons and tape them down. You can tape each separately or use one long bit of tape.

Attaching buttons

3. Measure the distance between the holes of your button. Mine’s about 3mm here. (For four hole buttons you can either measure and sew the holes in pairs parallel to each other, or diagonally across from each other. Or a jaunty arrow!)

Attaching buttons

4. Set up your machine: go for a zig-zag stitch with the width set to the distance you measured between the holes and the length at the shortest your machine will go (mine’s 0.2mm). And best to set your machine’s speed to the slowest it will go, to negate needle-slamming-into-button situations (heed the voice of experience).

Attaching buttons

5. Fit the button foot to your machine. As you can see, it’s like a little clamp with a gap in the middle, which holds the button nicely in place for you.

Attaching buttons

6. Slide the button under, aligning centrally under the foot and making sure the holes are horizontally parallel. At this point I usually lower the needle manually to check it’s going to hit the left-hand hole in the right place, then go ahead and run the machine on slow speed. I go for about 5 or 6 passes of the zigzag between the holes. For 4-hole buttons you’ll then need to re-align to the second pair of holes. My machine has an auto locking stitch which anchors my stitches at the start and end, but if yours doesn’t you will probably want to leave a tail and secure by hand.

Attaching buttons

8. Pull off the tape and cut your thread tails (if you need to secure your ends, thread the tails onto a needle, bring to the wrong side and knot to secure.). Voila, fast and secure buttons – I’ve never had one fall off yet. Hope it was helpful!

Tips to save time on fitting

Save time on fitting tips

Another ‘readers ask’ email came in, this time from Linda, who asked me about striking a balance between time-saving techniques and ensuring a good fit. Skipping the fitting process to save time is clearly a false economy if you end up making garments that don’t fit properly – but who wants to make a toile every time we try a new pattern? When I thought about how I approach this issue, I can offer up a few tips which might help to speed along the fitting process.

Save time on fitting

1. I know own my shape pretty well now, so I make pre-emptive changes to patterns based on how my body deviates from the ‘norm’. For me that means cutting smaller at the shoulders and bigger at the hips, taking out neckline wedges, making a sway back adjustment, and shortening the bodice. The Big 4 commercial pattern companies (Butterick, Mccall, Vogue and Simplicity) all use the exact same fitting block (thank you Fit for Real People for that nugget of insight), so I make those same alterations to any new Big 4 pattern as soon as it comes out of the envelope. Often this addresses the major fit issues and I can fine-tune as I sew.

Save time on fitting

2. Do a bit of research into pattern companies and pick one that targets your body shape. For example, Deer & Doe designs for slimmer shoulders, bigger hips and a C cup bust so usually fit me straight out of the packet. Try Sewaholic for pears, SBCC for petites, Named if you’re tall and willowy, etc. Check the company’s standard sizing chart and if you span 1 or 2 of the size range instead of 3 or 4 then you might be onto a good fit.

Save time on fitting

3. I refer to the finished garment measurements to check I like the design and wearing ease that’s been adding to the pattern. Often I’ll compare it to a similar RTW or pre-made garment to see how it measures up. If the finished measurements aren’t given you can just measure the pattern pieces, being sure to remove seam allowance and fold out any darts/pleats.

Save time on fitting

4. Self-draft from your own fitting blocks. This obviously takes a bit more upfront effort, but you know it will fit properly. You could also compare your blocks to commercial patterns, but to be honest I find this a bit difficult because it can be like comparing apples to oranges – a closely-fitted shell without seam allowances will not correspond to a fully-designed pattern with wearing and design ease added.

Save time on fitting

5. Make the same pattern over and over! It’s surprising how much variety you can get from one pattern, and once you’ve ironed out the fit and construction it goes really fast the second, third, fourth time. If your chosen pattern allows it, try altering the base fabric for wardrobe variety. Try pleated trousers in both a rigid twill and drapey wool suiting, or a shirt-dress in crisp wax cotton and flippy viscose.

I hope these tips were helpful – they definitely work for me to save time, and I don’t have fit disasters very often these days even when skipping the toile process. Anyone have more tips to add?

Quick tutorial: Weave-in serger tails as you sew

Serger

This is a special weekend, because I have my overlocker back! The lovely man at Maury Sewing Machines in Hackney patched it up real good for me, and also gave it some general TLC – sharpening the blade, changing the bulb and giving it all a nice clean and oil. It’s like a new machine and I’m so glad to have it back in working order for only £50. I’ve spent all weekend sewing up the pretty knits in my stash into some much-needed basics to replenish my Kondo-ed wardrobe – tees, sweaters and casual dresses. I’ll share them soon, but for now I have a quick tip on how to speed up your overlocking process a bit by weaving in thread tails as you sew.

Weave in serger tails as you sew

I first saw this technique mentioned as an aside during Heather’s Ginger sewalong, and it’s also outlined in the Simplicity sewing book, which of all my reference books is the one with some really handy tips, especially in the overlocker chapter. It’s a really useful time-saver to neatly finish an overlocked/serged seam wherever you’ll be leaving the start of the seam open (ie not crossed over by another seam) in the finished garment. For example at the shoulder seam if you sew on a neckband in the flat, a sleeve seam with a flat-set cuff, or some types of pocket bag. I hope the photos and descriptions make sense, shout in the comments if not!

Weave in serger tails as you sew

1. Make sure you have a decent length of thread chain (a couple of inches) coming off the machine before you start sewing. Now feed in the seam and sew the first 1 or 2mm, so the needle is only just engaged with the fabric. Stop and hand-crank the needles to the down position if they aren’t already.

Weave in serger tails as you sew

2. Raise the presser foot. Grab the thread tail and pull it round the left-hand side to the front. You want to pull pretty tight so that any stitches on the little prongs behind the needles fall off and become taut.

Weave in serger tails as you sew

3. Pull that tail right around to the front so it’s in front of the presser foot in line with your stitching line. Lower the presser foot again.

Weave in serger tails as you sew

4. Now keep sewing, and your thread tail will get caught in the seam as you sew it. After a couple of inches you can pull it off the right-hand side so the excess is cut off by the blade.

Weave in serger tails as you sew

The result! Tidy seam edge, zero effort. Will you be giving this a go?