Hen Party Heroes

This post has been moved to my new blog Should Be Sewing, check out all the photos here!

Tutorial: Necklace Display Stand

This post has now been moved to my new blog Should Be Sewing, check out the full tutorial here!

Cakes and Crafts

Last week I taught 2 groups of enthusiastic sewers how to embroider and construct their own snap frame purses. The classes were organised by Craft Creative Events, and were held at Tavern Co. on Smithdown Rd and Siren at the Womens Organisation on St James Street.

Tavern Co. where we had the top floor to ourselves.

Beautiful light and spacios Siren cafe. And they made their own bunting!

All the threads, fabrics and equipment were provided by us, as well as tea and cake!

Colour coded needle sheets and the BEST fabric glue in the world.

Stranded cotton wound onto old thread reels to make it easier to use.

Delicious selection of cakes from Siren, including a sew appropriate 'Red Velvet' cake.

The Liberty fabrics I picked up at Standfast went down a treat, particularly the William Morris designed Strawberry Thief print (absolute classic). Once everyone got their embroidery going it became very quiet, extreme concentration!

Even though some of the participants had never done any embroidery before they all produced a really beautiful purse, just using the most basic of stitches.

Just lazy daisy stitch but using different lengths and numbers of petals to make a little cluster of flowers.

Lazy daisy cluster for a large flower with satin stitch and french knots in a lovely subtle palette.

Two coloured running stitch to personalise a phone case.

Running stitch, back stitch and 2 purple sequins to make a couple of very dainty flowers, in colours perfectly matching the lining.

Back stitch, french knots and a little bit of couching to make a flower echoing the lining.

A little running stitch bird to match the Strawberry thieves inside.

Lazy daisy and stem stitch to make flowers and butterflies.

Brilliant geometric pattern in simple straight stitches with sparkly gold sequins.

More lazy daisy and running stitch to make a colourful bouquet.

Lazy daisy, french knots and sequins to carry on the colourful flowers from the Kayoko print lining.

A very fuzzy picture of the most dainty embroidery, love the fly stitch grass and tiny prick stitch stems.

A colourful mix of lazy daisy flowers, leaves and french knots, with another stitchy bird.

Chevron blanket stitch, lazy daisy petal, back stitch stems and a buzzy satin stitch bee.

Delicate stem stitch stalks with red lazy daisy petals.

I love that from starting with the exact same materials they all created something really individual!

Tutorial: Caped Crusader

We’ve been in our flat since the beginning of December but until Tuesday had been keeping all our clothes in a suitcase on the floor, not very convenient. Having finally got a wardrobe up to our second floor flat I had a mini purge of my clothes before putting them away, and culled a few plaid skirts for fabric and filled a bag for Oxfam. Amongst my soon to be shredded skirts was this wool blend half-circle (dreams of Mad Men office chic but just too frumpy).

 My initial plan was to hack a bit off to make myself a muff, but having opened the side seam I thought the shape leant itself very well to a little cape-coat. So, I am going to share with you how I made a dowdy skirt into a swish little cover up!

 First up, I removed the zip and the waistband (both worth keeping, never throw anything away!) When you lay the skirt out flat you can see how the shape would work for a cape. In an ideal world I’d have used a full circle skirt, lots of extra volume for swooshing and more room for arm movement, a half circle works just fine though.

 I folded the skirt down the centre and marked the middle on the waist edge, then pinned the skirt onto my mannequin with that centre point lined up at the centre back of the neck. If you’re doing this yourself and don’t have a mannequin I’d advise using yourself instead and having a reliable friend there to help.

 Then, I brought the edge I unpicked round to the front, keeping the grain running straight across (made easier by the check pattern) and pinned to the centre front. Doing this with both edges, lining up the squares, gave me an overlap that was equal on both sides (but a hem that was not, ho hum).

Once this was all pinned in place I had extra fullness around the neck area, easily fixed by putting a dart in each shoulder.

Because I matched the squares, which left me with an uneven hem, I also had an uneven neckline at the front so I copied the curve from the left side and trimmed the right side down to match. I also cut across the line of the darts leaving a 1.5cm allowance.

Next, I unpinned the cape from the mannequin, leaving marker pins in to show CF’s and CB. I used this as a pattern piece to cut my lining. Because the skirt is already hemmed I cut the lining to the same length, so that once the lining is hemmed it will sit shorter than the outer.

These two helped.

 

Next up, I hemmed the lining then stitched my shoulder darts in lining and outer. In the picture they are sewn straight across, but I later altered this to a slight downward curve at the shoulder end to stop it being too pointy. If you fancy you could hand tack some shoulder pads in too.

 At this point it might be an idea to interface the centre front edges of the outer cape, just so far as they overlap, to give a crisper shape and a bit more stability for whatever fastenings you use. I didn’t have any interfacing so I didn’t bother.

The front edges I sewed right sides together, then to stop the lining rolling to the outside I understitched the seams to the lining edge (fold the seams over to the lining side and stitch through all three layers close to the edge from the right side).

Back on the mannequin I pinned the CF and CB back in place and measured the neckline circumference. I could have drawn up my own collar pattern, or just seamed the neck edge and left it collarless. Piping or some other sort of trim would have made a nice finish too, but I had a collar I’d removed from another jacket (also cannibalised for fabric) and luckily it was the exact right size so I sewed that straight in, matching the CB of the cape to the centre of the collar, and understitching the lining as with the front edges.

 

 I decided to just put a fastening at the top of the opening, and used two press studs with a couple of big vintage buttons on top for detail.  At this point you could stop and you’d have a very nice cape, but I wanted to belt mine in for shape so I used the leftover waistband (you see!) and made a simple belt loop for the centre back, using the mannequin to find the right level for the waist.

The next step is possibly the trickiest, but it makes all the difference. To get that cape-coat effect you need to belt around the front and back but leave the ‘arms’ free, so I made little faced windows, two on the front waist, and two at the back, to thread my belt through.  The method I used is a shortened version of the Bound Buttonhole Tutorial on the Coletterie blog (full of incredibly useful dressmaking tips and techniques, as well as the wonderful patterns they produce).