The Glamour of Sequins

One of recent commissions is for an evening dress made entirely with sequin fabric. Its not something I’ve sewn a lot with so after a bit of research here are some tips I came across.
• Do not pre-treat the fabric
• Use a heavy needle which can actually puncture the sequins, either a denim needle, or a large size universal needle. And, be warned, you will need a lot of them – they are likely to break.
• Increase the stitch length to approximately 3.5 for standard seams.
• Seam finishes are not easily achieved with sequin fabrics so you are advised to line them.
• Make a faced hem by cutting a bias strip of soft fabric (like satin) about 5cms wide. Stitch with a conventional seam to the hem of the sequined fabric, turn under the facing, and hem in place at the top of the facing with hand stitching. The same facing technique can be used at necklines or armholes.
• For interfacing use silk organza, sewn in by hand. Do not fuse anything to these fabrics as the sequins might melt.
• Choose simple designs, the fabric is the star of this show!
• Buttonholes are next to impossible so create button loops instead,
• If it’s a zipper opening, stitch it in place by hand.
• Plan ahead
• Make a toile
• Use the muslin from the toile as your pattern piece
• Thread mark the stitching line
• Remove any sequins or beads that are within the seam allowances
• From the front of the garment, re-stitch any loose sequins or fill in any empty spaces with spare sequins by hand.
• Stitch slowly, take your time

Have you ever sewn with sequin fabric? What are your tips and advice?

 

Re-energise and Re-vitalise, Blogging Re-boot

I see from my posts that my first blog post resulting from my 30 day blogging challenge was on 30th January, clearly it should have been finished by now – ah well, kids with tonsillitis, snow days and studio moving all seemed to get in the way. Excuses excuses I know, but today I have been inspired again by the wisdom that is The Fairy Blog Mother What Alice doesn’t know about blogging isn’t worth knowing. It was Alice that made my blog page look so lovely and match my  websiteI’ve picked up a few commissions during the last month for some lovely dresses which I will share along the way and I will continue to offer some tips and advice on sewing.

 

In the meantime, here’s one I made earlier. I made this dress for a Bride who had a traditional Hindu wedding ceremony and wore this dress in the evening

 

 

A Day in the Life…….

Next 30 day blogging challenge to write about myself, a day in the life off. I’m writing this at the end of the day I’m going to tell you about, Monday 21st January. The UK has been brought to a standstill by a bit of snow which came down 4 days ago. I have 3 children and work my business around them so it didn’t really help that one of them was having yet another snow day off school today. Fortunately he’s old enough to leave for a couple of hours so my plan to go to Ladies Who Latte business networking.

After taking child 3 to school and walking the dog off I went with business head on. LWL is a great women’s networking group, i met some lovely ladies and friends and gave my 1 minute pitch. I spoke to two ladies about the prospects for Prom dresses for their 16 year old daughters and arranged to go to go to a coffee morning – well someone has to!

On return home I decamped into my icebox of a sewing room and put the finishing touches to an evening wedding dress. The bride is changing from her full on red and gold Indian Wedding Dress into the amazing coral and silver dress I have made for her. She’s completing the evening with a Bollywood style production – I have really enjoyed making this dress and can’t wait to see the pictures after the event.

During the afternoon I had an email enquiry and a phone enquiry which holds a great interesting project in store – frocks for a drag queen, I can’t wait!

The late afternoon was taken up with running around after children and feeding them. Of course the evening saw me catching up with my 30 day blogging challenge whilst watching Celebrity Bake Off – quality tv

So, there you have it, a day in the life of Jan at Sew Different

 

With Thanks

Some of you may have noticed that my 30 day blogging challenge has fallen somewhat behind schedule – only about 7 days though, not too bad! My next task is to say something nice, so I thought I’d say a great big thank you to some of those businesses who have helped be over the last year.

Along with the blogging theme I should thank Alice, The Fairy Blog Mother. I made her a dress to wear for Ascot and she made my blog look as great as it does. I love trade offs in business.

Alice based my blog appearance on my website which has been designed this year by Rhea and Trisha at Kicking K with all the words added by the singing and dancing Carlie Cohen of Copyworks Communications, Carlie is an active participant in BAOS in Basingstoke. These three amazing women not only run their own successful businesses but they also run Basingstoke Biscotti networking group helping others network their businesses.

I have this year joined a couple of business networking groups which have been invaluable, particularly biscotti, Ladies Who Latte and Athena (Basingstoke). I’ve made some great contacts, come across some fantastic businesses and earned myself some lovely clients.

Outside of local networking I have not yet met two people who have endless enthusiasm for their businesses. These cyber colleagues I have to mention are Susan at Sewbox who has supplied me with some lovely patterns and fabric to enable me to do the pattern reviews on this blog. Sewbox sell a great range of fabrics and patterns by small independent pattern companies. The other person I, and the rest of the sewing world has to thank is Fiona who runs The Sewing Directory. Fiona has worked really hard to pull together the most amazing, and useful directory of sewing related businesses over the last couple of years. If you see, you should go to this site, and if you don’t, you should go anyway and check out the listings of workshops in your area so you can learn.

Lastly for this blog I reserve a huge thanks to Sharron at Pride and Joy. Sharron is an enthusiastic retailer of all things vintage and crafty. Her shop in like an Aladdins Cave filled with furniture she has restored and breathed new life into, beautiful fabric supplied by Katy of Stay Stitching and lots of crafts supplied by local craft people from in and around Basingstoke and North Hampshire. Sharron saw the sewing opportunity I offered and has encouraged my workshops and drop in sessions, providing space and time (and lots of coffee) with huge generosity. I encourage anyone to call in and take a look around.

There have been many other business and business people who have helped me over the last year, too many to mention. I’m looking forward to meeting lots of new ones in 2013

 

What do I need in a Sewing Kit

Here I am on Day 4 of my 30 Day Blogging Challenge, Ok so those observant ones of you will know I’ve missed a couple of days but I’m bringing the tasks together.  Day 4 I’m required to ask a question in the title of my blog – I thought I’d keep it simple, seeing as I’m still practicing myself and trying to get into the blogging habit.

So, following my Top Ten Tips post the other day I thought I’d answer the question of what you need in your Sewing Kit when you are starting out on your sewing journey.

The Essentials

Dressmaking Scissors: You need good quality stainless steel scissors with around 22-25 cm blades. There are a variety of sizes and weights, buy the best you can afford and NEVER use them to cut anything other than fabric

Embroidery Scissors: For all thouse thread ends and fiddly jobs

Tape measure: A flexible tape for taking body measurements and checking the grain on your fabric. A straight sewing ruler is also useful

Hand Needles: You cant get away with not hand sewing and you need a variety of good sharp needles (and a needle threader if necessary) There are a wide variety of needles for different purposes. There is a really useful guide here

 

Machine Needles: An essential for your sewing machine. You must change them regularly and select the tight needle for the weight of fabric. There is a useful guide here

Thread: Generally, as a beginner you need a a general purpose poly cotton thread, widely available in a good range of colours. As you develop and start using  more interesting and particular fabrics then there is a thread for every occaision. There’s a really interesting blog about thread here

Seam Ripper: A great little gadget for taking out stitches that got there by mistake

Sewing Box: Of course you need something to keep it all in, anything from a fancy purpose made box to an old ice cream tub will do but its alot easier to love when its in a nice box.

There is so much more you will collect on your sewing journey - none of which you will be able to live without. All the essesntials are available at the large out of town craft store but have a look on line, there are so many great products at great prices.

Tell me what your favourite sewing box tool is and why you love it.

 

10 Top Tips to Start Your Sewing Journey

Welcome to day 2 of my 30 day blogging challenge. Today I have to blog a top tips so as one of my favourite workshops that I teach is “Get to Know Your Sewing Machine” I thought I’d focus on my top tips on that moment when you get that brand new sewing machine out of the box.

✂ Take everything out of the box and lay it out in front of you
✂ Open the manual, find out what each of the main parts are, where they go and how they move
✂ Take out the pack of accessories and check in the manual for what everything is for
✂ Use the images in the manual to thread the machine, take out the thread and do it all over again until you can do it easily
✂ Connect the power cord and again refer to the manual to see how to fill the bobbin and where it goes in the machine
✂ The machine should be set on a straight stitch so get lots of scraps of fabric and practice
✂ Change the stitch length
✂ Select a new stitch – try zig zag first, change the width and the length
✂ Try out the extra feet that come in the accessory pack
✂ Relax and enjoy, use your manual and you can’t go wrong

I think that’s covered it

Let me know if you are new to sewing if think it is straight forward to take the machine out of the box and use it straight away. If your an old hand at sewing what tips would offer?

 

Revitalising my sewing blog

New Year = New appraoch to blogging

I really enjoy reviewing patterns on my blog and am delighted that I have generated a small but bery valuable following, however, I’ve know for a while I need to do more with it. With this in mind I bought the 30 Day Blogging Challenge by Nikki Pilkington. This gives me a task to complete everyday in order to develop my blogging skills and generate more traffic to my blog and hopefully, my website. I’d really love your support and comments over the next month or so as I complete the tasks.

So, Day 1 – I have to review an article relvant to my industry. I searched through some of the links provided by the 30 Day Blogging Challenge and found something hidden away in The Guardian online. Rebecca Smithers wrote  “How I gave up retail therapy and learned to love mending”  It’s about her personal challenge of not buying new clothes for a year. She was reasonably successful but got plenty of new things from friends and family. She does say she revised her rusty sewing skills and started to mend and alter things but I suspect she didn’t go too far in that direction. The writer is slated in the comments because she accepted some rather expensive gifts and people claiming at least she had the choice. I think she missed a trick with this article, she mentions sewing but not with any great enthusiasm. She doesnt say what she learnt or what she achieved through mending and making do with her existing clothes. Neither is there any reference to any resources to find out how and where to learn these skills. I think if she had included more of that people might have been able to share sewing experiences or commended her for having a go.

The make do and mend revoloution needs more of a positive spin in the national press, Kirstie Allsop can’t do it all by herself through trying to revive cottage crafts. We need more people promoting the benfits of learning practical sewing; how to take up the hem on that dress, those jeans, that top;  how to take things in after you’ve successfully lost all that weight and how to make great clothes that fit you and all your individual curves.

So, there you have it – Day one of the 30 day Blogging challenge complete – thanks for reading and how did I do?

 

Pattern Review: Hot Patterns 1029

When Susan at Sewbox asked me to review a Hot Patterns pattern, I was spoilt for choice, Sewbox stocks 97 Hot Patterns patterns and they all look fantastic.

In the end I went for a shirt pattern because it reminded very much of one of my favourites I’d bought earlier in the year from a high street store .

The fabric I chose was Ruby, a Liberty Cord, available at Sewbox for £13.50 per meter.  I thought it would be great for the colder weather and when it arrived I was delighted, super soft and just what I was after.

So what do you get. Well my first surprise was the size of the pattern envelope, a large A4 sealed envelope, quite different to the usual size. The shirt isillustrated with hand drawn images, common to the Hot Patterns. There’s a great description of the shirt and fabric suggestions. The pattern is for advanced beginners.

On the back of the envelope there is a great body measurements size chart. Most patterns only guide you as to bust, waist and hip measurements but this is fantastic with 17 different measurements covering every eventuality ensuring that you truly can get the pattern to fit. There is a guide line on how much fabric to buy, unusual, given every other pattern you buy is very specific about fabric requirements.

Unfortunately my overall impression of the pattern envelope was a bit disappointing because of the quality of the print. It has all this great information on and fantastic illustrations but it looked like the ink on the photocopier was running out. Its just attention to detail – when you pay £14 for a pattern you expect quality all the way.

Once inside the envelope I found 2 sheets of proper white paper, not thin tissue, with the multi size pattern pieces printed on and the instructions. My preference would be to have the instructions ready on a separate sheet; you need to cut them off before cutting out your pattern pieces. Again the printing quality let Hot Patterns down. The instructions  were hard to read and the lines on the multi size pieces were quite faint in places.

So to cutting out and making up. The layout was easy enough. There was lots to interface so I recommend you do all the pieces as soon as you’ve cut them out. There is also a rather complex series of pattern markings for the front of the shirt which is how the placket is created. It does say it in the instructions, and I will repeat it here now – you must transfer those markings, if you don’t it will all go horribly wrong!

I found that overall the instructions were not that great in comparison to many other patterns I have used. There is an awful lot that goes unstated, I would suggest that only a reasonable confident stitcher would be happy with this pattern, someone who has been used to reading pattern instructions. It may well be that other pattern companies spoon feed us too much but I think there was some detail lacking in this pattern. I also felt that the making up process was quite disjointed. Not that this had an adverse effect on the garment but I thought there was a more logical way to go about it. It will be interesting to find out if other Hot Patterns do the same thing. Unlike the previous patterns I have reviewed here, there was no glossary with the pattern and nothing about finishing detail.

In advance of writing the review I had a quick look on the Hot Patterns web site  I  there is lots of information on there to support the patterns. There are sections with hints and tips on fitting and sewing and some more information about the patterns themselves. Its definitely worth a look, even if you’re not making a Hot Patterns (although you will want to when you’ve looked at the choice)

I feel I’ve been  negative about the pattern but in actual fact, it’s a great shirt. It’s a good pattern for those who want to move on to sleeves, cuffs and collars and the interesting challenge of plackets. It really is a superfantastic shirt and in the lovely Ruby cord its my favouite comfy winter shirt. It came in a little longer and wider than I would have liked but I can always alter that later.

Apologise for the lack of photos in this post – I’ve strugled to get them uploaded – anyone have any advice, I’d appreciate it.

 

Pattern Review – Sewaholic “Alma Blouse”

As soon as Susan at Sewbox suggested I review this pattern I loved it. There are so many possible combinations in one pattern that  you’d hardly need to ever get another. I’ve seen a few Sewaholic patterns but as yet never used one. They have a great look about them, presented as they are in a paper envelope.

This is a multi size pattern covering US sizes 0-16. there are 3 combinations illustrated on the pattern envelope but with a little imagination there are at least 3 more. I think this pattern is aimed at those who have a bit of working knowledge as it steps up to some slightly more challenging process like fitting a sleeve,  inserting a zip and creating a cuff on the sleeve (view C).  Sewaholic is run by Tasia in Vancouver, Canada. She has a great blog here where there are some great examples of this pattern made up by loads of different people. There’s also an opportunity to see some of the other patterns she produces and some hints and advice you might find useful in your sewing. There’s also a really useful conversion chart for metric fabric requirements       My fabric choice was again, a lovely Liberty Tana Lawn Cotton Print from Sewbox. Its called “Takashi” in pink and it is available at Sewbox for the excellent price of £11.95 per meter

Liberty Tana Lawn “Takashi”

The information on the back of the pattern envelope suggests 2.5 yards which was more than enough for View C – the one with the long sleeves. As with other multi size patterns the pattern pieces are printed on traditional tissue paper and given they cover 9 different sizes sometimes it is confusing to get the right line. I’d definately advise tracing off your size rather than cutting the tissue. There are obviously different pattern pieces for each neckline so make sure you cut the right front bodice piece for the view you have chosen and, make sure you cut the correct facing for the neckline shape – all the information is on the pattern paper.

The instruction sheet itself is well written with good illustrations. A beginner can easily make view A and B which have the sleeve as an added challenge over the Derby Dress which is in my previous review.

to conclude – I think this is a great pattern from someone who is looking to increase their confidence with dressmaking to the those who have been sewing for years. There are so many options here – if you use your imagination there are lots of options with neckline and sleeve combinations, I think it should be a staple pattern to be used again and again. and here is the finished result.

A big thank you once again to Susan at Sewbox for supplying the pattern and the fabric. Susan offers a great online service where you can buy everything you need from patterns and fabric to threads and zips

 

Review of Derby Dress – part two

Christina Haynes Derby Dress

So how did – the next couple of days turn into the next couple of weeks. Sorry for the delay but here goes with the second part of the review for the Derby dress pattern.

Just as a reminder, I’m making and reviewing Christina Haynes “Derby Dress” Pattern available from Sewbox

Once I’d found and traced the cutting line on the multi-size pattern it was plain sailing. This is a fantastic pattern for the beginner who wants to make a start into dressmaking. The instructions are clear, the images are clear and the process of putting it all together is simple.

To put it in really simple terms there are two pieces which make up the dress and a long bias strip. the rest is optional. However, if it your first time give the extra’s a go. The pockets and the collar are easy to apply and the instructions are easy to follow.

The instructions tell you how do make a bias strip which is where you cut a strip of fabric at 45degrees to the straight of grain. You then have to press each length however, if you get one of these little devices you can make your bias strip in no time at all. Its a great addition to your tool box.

The only down side I thought to the whole pattern was that it made up rather large. I know its a loose fitting throw over dress but it was huge. It was easy to resolve though. Take in the excess through the seam allowances.

the final version

So here it is, the final version. I did wonder if it would be too short for me but it was fine. I also tried it over a pair of white jeans – it looked great, not quite short enough as a tunic but its great to be able to extend its wear as it gets colder. I tried a t-shirt underneath it but mine didn’t look so good, I think it would work but you need the right shape t-shirt and that’s whatever suits you.

I’d definitely recommend this pattern if this is your first go at dressmaking. Its really easy with user friendly instructions and you can get creative with a few different options, its such a versatile number. Choose your fabric carefully, I’ve used Liberty Cotton Lawn fabric, which is great to handle and looks great, supplied by Sewbox who have a fantastic selection of cottons as well as a range of patterns and all the bits and bobs you need to make your dress.

Enjoy your sewing.