I’ve been meaning to sew several of these for quite some time (this pattern made an appearance in the Spring Wardrobe Plans that I made last winter) but always put it to the bottom of my list because I planned for my Netties to be quite basic so they could be paired with more exciting garments in my wardrobe. Sewing basics can sometimes be a touch dull! I’m glad that Sewing Indie Month has got me started on Netties at last because this one only took an hour to sew and now I finally have a basic navy long sleeve to pair with my printed Lazo Pants (the women’s pattern that we have been working on for the last several months)!
Aside from the Nettie, the second SIM pattern bundle includes some great pieces that will work well with Fall sewing plans. They are largely knit projects which are quick and easy to accomplish during the busy month of September! Here are the designs included:
There are quite a few patterns that pique my interest in this bundle (since I love wearing knits). The highest priority for me is the Jasper Sweater by Paprika Patterns which I will be sewing this winter. I think it would suit my sister and her mountain climbing/camping adventures very well and so it would make a great Christmas present!
This pattern bundle will be on sale until this Thursday September 10th. This time, 20% of the proceeds will be donated to the organization Women for Women which helps women dealing with violence, marginalization and poverty due to war and conflict. Head on over to the Sewing Indie Month headquarters to check out the pricing for this bundle. It is organized in such a way that you can pay anywhere from $25 to $38 depending on how many of the patterns you would like.
Now, time to talk a bit more about my Nettie and my Lazo Trousers:
The Nettie is sewn out of a very stretchy and very soft bamboo knit which I purchased from my local Fabricland. I decided to sew the scoop neck and high back variations with long sleeves and I chose to make it as a top rather than a dress or a bodysuit. I simply cut the pattern a couple of inches below the “Attach skirt” line (for the dress variation) to give myself lots of length. I avoided bindings by cutting out two fronts and two backs to create a shirt lining. This way I would have a bit more coverage than a single layer of the thin fabric provided and the neckline finish would be very clean (which is my favorite look for scoop neck t-shirts). To assemble the shirt I sewed the shoulder seams on each set of Nettie bodies and then I placed the two shirts with right sides together so that the neckline formed a “O”. I stitched all the way around this, under-stitched around the neckline and then pulled the lining through to the inside. From this point onwards I treated the two layers as one shirt and sewed the rest of the garment as per normal.
I chose the size 2 when cutting out the Nettie pattern and I like the tight sleeves and close fitting bodice but I think the shoulders ended up being way too narrow for me. I expected this based on how wide and straight my shoulders are compared to my chest measurement – they have always given me problems when purchasing store bought t-shirts! I wanted to see how the size 2 fit for this shirt though and for my next variations I plan to go up to a size 4 and maybe even increase the shoulder width further.
The Lazo Pants that I paired my new Nettie with are made from a crazily printed Tencel which is my favorite fabric choice for this pattern. It has such a nice weight to it while still retaining a floaty and casual feel. I like that these pants make me feel as though I am wearing a skirt – my legs are completely unrestricted. For this pair of Lazos I added a tie belt in self fabric. I figured, if I am going to make statement pants, I may as well pull out all the stops by placing a big fabric bow front and center!
Sorry to tease you by showing you the Lazos while the pattern still languishes unfinished! We are still working away on it and promise to release it one day :P.
I hope you are able to join in the Sewing Indie Month celebrations! Be sure to check out the other bloggers who are posting their SIM projects while the pattern bundle is on sale:
It’s the second ever Sewing Indie Month this September! If you haven’t heard about it yet, I will explain what this month is all about. It is a month celebrating independent sewing pattern companies and the sewists who use them. This celebration was begun last year by Mari of Seamster Patterns. You may remember how I took part last year by offering a tutorial on the Tilly & the Buttons blog, interviewing the ladies at By Hand London, and publishing a tutorial from Seamster Patterns on my blog. This year I decided just to enjoy the month rather than being involved behind the scenes because we were pretty busy moving homes and settling in. Mari very kindly offered to include me in the blog post tour though so that I could take part in the sewing fun (but avoid all of the work!).
This year, for Sewing Indie Month, you can expect more collaborative blog posts, lots of tutorials and another sewalong contest with loads of prizes.
Sewing Indie Month is kicking off early this year by launching a pattern bundle sale featuring a pattern from each of the companies involved this year. This first bundle is released early to give you lots of time to sew a few muslins before any of the contests begin. The bundle will be on sale until August 12th (this coming Wednesday). The pattern bundle is being offered as a “pay what you want” bundle and 20% proceeds will be donated to the International Folk Art Alliance. This organization provides education and exhibition opportunities to folk artists around the world. You can read more about the many projects this alliance is involved in here.
In order to purchase the bundle, you can head to the Sewing Indie Month HQ at Sew Independent. You will notice that the bundle is tiered so, you can unlock extra patterns to add to your bundle by electing to purchase it for a certain price:
As you can see, the bundle is huge selection of varied and unique indie patterns including a few of my favorites such as Sew Over It’s Ultimate Trousers and Dixie DIY’s Bonnel Dress (perfect for the last month of summer!). I think the entire set would make an excellent Fall wardrobe this year and it is also a great opportunity to try out a few indie pattern companies that you may not have sewn from before. Patterns and their corresponding companies include:
If you haven’t yet heard of the Saltbox Top by Blueprints for Sewing or the Sorrel Dress & Top by Seamster, this is because these are brand new pattern releases that are currently only offered within the bundle. Both would make lovely tops to go with the Ultimate Trousers or the Cressida Skirt!
I decided to sew the Mississippi Ave Dress by Sew House Seven to pair with this blog post – I hadn’t heard of Sew House Seven before and I thought that their dress design was very unique and pretty. It looked like a quick project (which was necessary to convince me to leave my veggie gardening efforts and step into the sewing room at last!). It has been really hot here at night so I sewed up the pattern as a cool cotton night dress.
I used a a rich teal hand stamped and dyed cotton from Stylemaker Fabrics. I purchased it a couple of months ago and see now that there is only 1 1/4 yards of it left and it is on sale! Wow, it sold quickly! I really enjoyed playing with the border print for this pattern because the panels and shape of the dress are quite unusual. I positioned the bodice and main skirt pieces so that like colours would be together on the dress – I’m pleased with how the red design radiates out from the high waist.
The dress is quite comfortable with an elastic waist and modest neckline. It would also be flattering in a drapey rayon as the pattern suggests – next time!
Feel free to check out what some of the other bloggers have made from Pattern Bundle #1 – there are lots of inspiring projects already posted with more to come before the sale is over!
I hope you’ll enjoy Sewing Indie Month this year and that you might consider taking part in the events to come. Thanks, as always, for choosing to be a maker and for choosing to support small pattern companies such as Thread Theory!
Did you enter one of the sew-along contests for Sewing Indie Month? I just finished my entry using the Out And About dress pattern from indie pattern company, SewCaroline, and a wonderfully soft and drapey bamboo jersey knit from Britex. This post was originally posted on the Britex blog yesterday but I thought I’d share it here as well since it’s always fun to add a little selfish sewing amid all the menswear projects on the blog :). I made a number of alterations to the pattern (since I’m entering my dress in the Pattern Hacking contest) and am really happy with how the dress turned out!
The Out and About Dress has two sleeve options – elbow length and full length – but Caroline has also made a tutorial to create a sleeveless version. I thought a dress with full sleeves and a full length skirt in a distinctive stripe would be a bit too stripey and I am glad I went with this sleeveless version as ever since I finished the dress it has been so hot that there has been no need for sleeves!
The next change I made was to create a chevron effect on the front and back bodice. I did this by placing the pattern pieces on the bias and adding seam allowances at centre front and centre back.
I made sure to line up the stripes on the side seams so that the chevron would continue all the way around the body (you can sort of see this effect in the photo below).
And here are the back chevrons!
The only thing I don’t like about the results from this little alteration is that the bias cut fabric (understandably) likes to stretch out and resulted in drag lines at my shoulders. I don’t think they are too noticeable though.
This pale lemon and tan striped bamboo jersey is so beautifully drapey – perfect to show off the gathered maxi skirt. It feels very swishy when I walk but also very light. I really dislike when maxi dresses make me feel weighed down by folds and folds of skirt fabric but this light jersey almost feels like I’m wearing nothing! Although it is light and delicate feeling, its strength has been thoroughly tested with this dress. I spent a day out in the sun with Matt and my brother and sister-in-law playing bocce, attempting handstands and taking a stab at acro yoga (so much fun!) and the dress survived all sorts of horseplay and even a blood stain from aggressive acro . The blood stain came out easily and the dress had no sign of heavy wear – this was a level of resilience I would not expect from a delicate knit maxi dress! Indeed, it hadn’t even been washed when I took these photos (after wearing it for two hot days and storing it in a suitcase) and it still looks crisp and new.
The last modification I made to the Out and About dress pattern is that I added a tie belt to help support the weight of the gathered skirt and to camouflage the bulk added by gathers at the waist. Each tie is 50” long and is a sewn tube of fabric with one end that has been finished and another that is sewn into the side seams directly above the waist seam. I made them really long so I could wrap them around a couple times so I had more coverage across my stomach (I like the feeling of structure this adds to an otherwise very comfortable and floaty dress). Aside from the tie belt, I also added clear bathing suit elastic along the waist seam
and shoulder seams to further help these seams hold their shape.
I really enjoyed sewing Caroline’s dress pattern and have already begun to imagine many more dresses to create with it! In fact, I think a maxi using the Abstract Smoke & Gold Rayon Knitjersey would be absolutely perfect for a wedding that I am attending in August. I think I’ll add the flutter sleeves that Dixie made a tutorial for as part of Sewing Indie Month and finish off the dress with a shimmery gold belt.
In my opinion, there is nothing more comfortable and also elegant than swanning around in a maxi dress on a hot summer afternoon – something I know I will be doing all summer long!
Today marks the second to last day of Sewing Indie Month! It has been a great month featuring all sorts of newly forged connections and creative projects. Thanks again, Mari, for organizing this for all of us indie pattern companies!
As the last scheduled event of the month (aside from the sew-along contests of course – you still have time to enter before they close on June 4th!), I have interviewed the talented women behind the indie sewing pattern company, By Hand London.
If you haven’t heard of them before (I am fairly certain most of you have!), they are the creative masterminds behind the dress pattern that went viral not too long ago…yes, they produced the Anna dress pattern!
As far as indie pattern companies go, the By Hand London team and patterns are certainly one of our biggest inspirations here at Thread Theory. I am an avid reader of your blog and most of all love the enthusiasm and humour the three of you put into everything you do. Can you introduce yourselves to our readers and discuss the essence of BHL?
Well, hello! And thank you for such kind words – the highest kind of compliment coming from you!
I’m Elisalex, and I make up one third of BHL – Charlotte and Victoria being my partners in crime. We design sewing patterns for women like us who take creative control over their own style. To further our mission of self sufficient style, we are also on the brink of launching a print-on-demand fabric service! (Head to their “About Us” page to read more!)
By Hand London is quickly becoming so much more than a sewing pattern company. Where do you see your company going in the next few years and what do you wish to add to and encourage within the sewing community?
We’ve always been big dreamers that’s for sure! Even in the early days of BHL we had keep reminding ourselves that we couldn’t do everything we wanted to do all at once, so we started with sewing patterns, and within a year had already begun planning our next move into the world of print-on-demand fabric… While world domination is very high on our to-do list, we want to expand organically, and most of all in a way that immediately responds to the demands of the making community. Over the next few years we’d like to find ourselves in our dream studio (club tropicana themed of course, and open to one and all to come and hang out and sew), efficiently juggling the fabric printing and the patterns, with more fabrics available, an ever growing library of sewing patterns and hopefully with a few more humans to bulk up the BHL team! We’re all full of ideas and potential plans for the future of By Hand London, but we’ll just have to see which ones end up materialising…
A huge challenge when sewing menswear is attempting to source interesting textiles with the correct fibre content and right weight to suit a pattern. Due to this, we are VERY excited about your new move in the direction of printing textiles. Can you outline some of your plans for this area of your business?
It’s great to know you’re as excited as we are about the fabrics! The print-on-demand fabric printing is going to be SUCH a thrill for us – not least of all because we’ll get to design our own fabrics and champion our favourite artists! The fabric printing will really open up a whole new world of making for BHL as we won’t be limited to providing a service for female sewists only. The fabric printing will be open to one and all – be it men, women, children, dressmakers, fashion designers, quilters, crafters, homemakers, students, party planners… The list is endless!
To begin with, we will have two types of cotton available to print on – the cotton poplin (which is already available in the form of our delicious Eloise print , and a soft and floaty cotton lawn – both wide width. Customers will be able to upload and edit their very own designs or choose from our gallery of existing designs, which will champion the work of artists, illustrators, designers and students who’s work we love. We’ll also be holding regular competitions open to one and all – our first of which resulted in over 200 entries and three wining designs, which are currently being test printed ready for production!
Do you plan to offer a range of textiles that can be custom printed? For instance, will your textile printer be able to print on knits or twills in the future (we hope so because it would be soooo amazing to have access to custom printed knits that are better suited to menswear garments!)?
To begin with we’ll have just the two types of cotton – the lawn and the poplin – but we absolutely plan on adding more! Rather than ordering in thousands of metres of every type of fabric under the sun, we plan on adding new fabrics as per customer demand. If we see that everyone is screaming and shouting for knits, we’ll be sure to provide.
Can you explain the printing process for your fabric? You mention on your blog that the fabric is printed digitally and uses eco-friendly inks. Can you explain how this is similar or different to the fabrics commonly found in fabric stores?
If you imagine a very big, very long inkjet printer, that’s essentially what we’re dealing with! The fabric is fed through and simply printed on just like paper in your printer at home. It’s that satisfying! One of the popular traditional fabric printing methods is also digital, but using reactive dyes, which although very vibrant and colourfast, need to be thoroughly washed, steamed and dried after the dyeing process. This uses up a lot of water in the process, which is not eco friendly at all! With pigment inks, all you need to do after printing is pass it through a (very hot) oven for a minute or two to effectively ‘bake’ on the dye – no water wasted and lots of extra steps needed! And best of all, the inks are safe for even the most sensitive skin.
Do you plan to offer your curated gallery of fabrics for sale through stockists worldwide or will your fabrics be available online only?
Given the nature of print-on-demand, our curated gallery of fabrics will be available only through us, as it will be printed and packed as each individual order comes in. But as with everything we do, if we find that we’ve got all the haberdasheries asking to stock our gallery, then I’m sure we’ll reconsider 😉
Can you describe the By Hand London studio? Do all three of you work in the same space? (I hope your studio is large – a textile printer would certainly not fit in ours :)!)
Ummm… Well right now our studio looks something like a shipping crate crossed with a prison cell. Throw in some rickety old shelving over-flowing with fabric and notions, and crockery that may as well be alive, and you start to get the picture! This has been our very first official studio, and most definitely a stepping stone until we find the next big thing. We’re searching high and low as I type for a bigger, brighter and more inspiring workspace that will house our printer, our growing collection of patterns and the three of us!
What does a day at the studio involve for the three of you? Who does what task and why?
A day at BHL HQ usually starts with getting the menial tasks and adminny stuff out of the way – packing orders, replying to comments and emails, going through numbers and the odd spreadsheet and such. As we do this we’re almost always catching up on each other’s love lives, weekend shenanigans and fighting over who’s turn it is to choose the playlist (which will invariably be sleazy RnB as Victoria’s choice, 80s grooves for Charlotte and Southern blues and country for me!). When we’re done with that, we’ll point blank ignore the amount of tidying up we should be doing and get to the fun stuff – this is changeable depending on what we’ve got going on any given day – we might be designing, blogging, planning a sewalong, heading out to do some fabric shopping, and always always always hustling and master-planning!
Your connection with the online sewing community seems very strong and always active. What are the key steps you take to ensure this? What methods lead to the most successful connections?
As I’m sure you’re aware, the online sewing community is absolutely the core of what we do. It’s all the wild and wonderful bloggers/Instagrammers/tweeters that not only help to spread the word to sewists the world over, but who also help to shape our patterns with their feedback and suggestions.
We really enjoy being a part of the constant flow of online communication, and I’d say, being visual creatives, that our favourite portal is Instagram for sharing and keeping up with day to day goings on. Twitter is great for quick fitting advice and general chit chat, but above all, and we’re very lucky here in the UK, we have a really active community of UK based sewists who go above and beyond to forge friendships in real life. Almost on a monthly basis there are sewing meet-ups, some huge: last year saw a 50 sewist strong meet-up organised by Rachel Pinheiro in honour of Sew Busy Lizzy s visit to London, and some more intimate – last month Clare Szabo organised a surprise bachelorette party for Roisin Muldoon! Needless to say, we all had very sore heads the next day…
What areas of BHL do you find the most rewarding? Does this answer differ for each of you?
While we all have different roles within the company and find different tasks more rewarding than others – I for one am happiest sat at the sewing machine or dreaming up and creating blog content – I think I can speak for Charlotte and Victoria when I say that seeing our little “company” grow from nothing is what rewards us all the most and spurs us on. We feel like we’ve achieved a lot in a very short space of time! Reading all the wonderful reviews of our patterns, hearing from happy customers and seeing the ball drop when we teach classes are all top on the Rewards List.
I can’t help but notice that you love cats…seeing as we have a very spoiled cat here at the Thread Theory studio who loves nothing more than lying on tissue patterns and batting pins around, do you have any stories or photos to share of your cat’s sewing related shenanigans?
We certainly do love our kitties! At my house (which started out as our studio, before we found the cell) I have two cats – one of which right now happens to be grooming her nether region whilst snuggled up in the quilt I’m still working on…
We love them, but man do they get in the way!! The amount of pattern tissue they’ve torn, fabrics they’ve embedded with their fur and bobbins lost to their playfulness… But we get them back pretty good – there was the time when we turned a white paw blue with felt tips… And that April Fool’s when we “released” our first sewing pattern for cats!
Thank you, Elisalex, for and inside look at your quickly growing company! I am so impressed with how far you’ve come in such a short amount of time and I eagerly anticipate where your next adventure in fabric printing will take you! I hope that Thread Theory readers – who I know are constantly looking for new sources of menswear fabrics – will take your hint to scream and shout for you to expand into knits eventually ;).
What types of fabrics and prints do you most look forward to ordering from the BHL ladies? They’ve started with such an interesting selection of florals: I love how subtle their monster themed Eloise print is and I think one of their next prints, Charlie, is absolutely stunning!
Sewing Indie Month is just over half way over but there are still loads of great tutorials and events to come! Today, my Coco hacks have been published on Tilly and the Buttons. Head on over to Tilly’s blog to check out what projects I’ve been working on and to get the Coco pattern for yourself! Its an excellent canvas for countless different variations. You could have a closet full of garments sewn from this pattern and I don’t think anyone would realize that they stemmed from the same design.
Dixie, of the pattern company, Dixie DIY, has posted the Q&A she did on us on her blog today! If you are wanting to get to know Matt and I and our pattern company a little better, now is the time to get reading! Thanks, Dixie, for the great (and funny!) questions (example: she wonders how Matt reacted to my Comox Trunk inspiration “research” :P).
In other news, have you noticed things are [starting] to look a little different around the blog? I’ve been inspired by some awesome blog re-decorating sprees around the web (have you seen Oonaballoona or Mokosha‘s new blog looks?…so pretty!) so I decided to give it a try myself. I have a cold right now so a day in front of the computer is just the rest I need to get better!
It’s slow going because this is NOT my area of expertise by any stretch of the term. I’ve managed so far to:
Update our header
Remove all the excess (and ugly) links from above and below the header
And, most importantly, use the “Image” widget to convert some of our links to pretty graphics. I have no idea if that is how I was supposed to do this but, after too long hopelessly sifting through Google searches, I decided that it was the only way I could figure out and so it would have to do!
Are you familiar with WordPress blogs? I would love your suggestions about how to spruce this place up!
I still have lots of work to do. For example, I want to:
Figure out how blog following services work (they are such a mystery to me!). I am thinking of introducing Blog Lovin or Feedburner so that there are more ways than subscribing by email to follow our blog. Is that something I can do with a WordPress blog? I hope so!
I’m going to clean up the actual pages that the side bar graphics link to so that you can find all sew-alongs, posts, photos and information about each pattern in one place).
I also somehow would love to make the header link back to our home page instead of having the link “Home” at the top right of the blog. What do you think…is this possible???
Thanks in advance for your help! If you got through these boring blog update lists and my pleas for help, then I have a reward for you: Check back first thing tomorrow because we will be releasing a new pattern…FOR FREE!
Today, we have a guest tutorial for you, as part of Sewing Indie Month! Mari, of Seamster Sewing Patterns, is not only the mastermind behind this month’s cornucopia of events, tutorials, and contests, she has also kindly taken the time to contribute a tutorial of her own to our blog.
She’ll be walking you through how to dye fold-over elastic with food colouring and how to apply it to our Comox Trunks. The tricks she will be showing you will allow you to avoid using the self-made binding for the fly and to skip the worry of using a twin needle or zig zag stitch while hemming the legs. These are both of the steps that sewers found to be the most tricky during our Comox Trunk Sew-Along. Thank you, Mari, for providing an alternative method to finishing these areas of the trunks!
Now over to Mari, who you can thank for making your Comox Trunk sewing life just that much easier!:
Hello Thread Theory readers! I’m Mari and I run Seamster Sewing Patterns. Today I’m going to show you how you can easily dye fold over elastic with simple ingredients you have at home, like food coloring. Then, I’ll walk you through attaching fold over elastic to the Comox Trunks.
Why dye fold over elastic when you can get a lot of colors online? It’s fun! Seriously, I find it really excited to see what colors I can come up with. It’s like finding a spare $5 in your pocket when doing laundry; the color you get can be a total surprise, but a really good one. Dyeing is also a great way to quickly customize a project, make it extra special, and get fun colors you won’t be able to find in your local fabric store.
Before we begin though, let’s go over a few dyeing basics.
In this tutorial we’ll be acid dyeingnylon fold over elastic. Acid dyes are one of the easiest dyes to get started with. They involve the use of acid (nothing scary dangerous, just vinegar for this tutorial!) and can be used to dye protein fibers like wool or silk and often nylon. They will not dye cotton or polyester. That is why it’s very important to make sure you’re using fold over elastic made from nylon. How to find out if your elastic is made from nylon? Ask your local or online shop. I bought the elastic I’m using in this tutorial from Peak Bloom. They told me their solid colored fold over elastics are made from nylon, while their patterned fold over elastics are made from polyester. Keep that in mind if you order from them.
The reason why I’m not showing you how to dye polyester is because it’s difficult to do at home. It also necessitates constant, high heat, which would badly damage the spandex in your elastic. Acid dyeing with nylon also calls for heat, but is a little more forgiving. So, we must strike a balance between heating our dye bath (solution of water + dye) with maintaining a temperature below 105F (40.56C) so our elastic doesn’t degrade .
One more thing to note before we get started, you’ll see I’ve been very specific in the list below by specifying the use of wooden, plastic, or stainless steel tools. That’s because certain metals act as mordants, which can change the color of your dye.
Here is a quick reference “recipe card” that Mari made for you to refer to while dying. She includes a detailed write-up and photos below, so keep reading before you begin your dyeing project!
…And now the full tutorial:
In order to dye we’ll need a few things:
crockpot (you could use a regular pot over a stove, but I find it’s easier to use a crockpot for consistent temperature and because it lets me walk away without worrying about burning the house down)
water
food coloring
distilled white vinegar
non-iodized salt (optional, it helps drive dye into fibers, but I only had himalayan salt on hand, so I didn’t use any in my experiments)
wood, stainless steel, or plastic stirring utensil
plastic gloves (optional, but great if you don’t want to scrub dye out of your hands)
glass or stainless steel bowl
plastic, glass, or stainless steel measuring cups and spoons
thermometer
dish soap or synthrapol (special soap used when dyeing)
Here’s my basic dyeing recipe:
1 c water
10 drops food coloring (you can use a couple drops less and still get a brilliant color; for a light color use just a few drops)
1T distilled white vinegar
1yd 5/8” fold over elastic or 2yd 3/8” fold over elastic
For the Comox Trunks I graded from a size 28 to a 34, for which I only needed about 30” of 5/8” fold over elastic to sew to the leg and cup openings. However, it’s best to give yourself a little extra, so instead of 30”, I dyed a full yard, although you may need to dye more.
Because my local fabric store doesn’t carry wide elastic made from nylon that’s needed for the waistband, I dyed an extra yard of fold over elastic to sew on top of my polyester elastic waistband for purely decorative purposes (Morgan: Nice idea, Mari! What a great way to customize boring waistband elastic by adding strips of colour!).
In total, I dyed 2yd of fold over elastic, for which I doubled the basic dyeing recipe above.
Here’s how to dye nylon fold over elastic:
Fill your crockpot about 3/4 full with water and turn it on. (I set mine to high, but each model cooks at a different temperature, so you’ll need to experiment)
Fill your glass bowl with water (going by the recipe above) and mix in salt if you’re using it.
Stir in your food coloring and let the mixture heat. This is your dye bath. Once it has fully heated, take its temperature. If it’s well below 105F (40.56C) you may be able to bump your crockpot up to medium or high. If it’s above 105F (40.56C) lower your crockpot to medium or low.
While waiting for your dye bath to heat, wash your elastic. This will get out any chemical residues that could give you an uneven dying job.
Submerse your still wet elastic in your dye bath. It’s important that the elastic be wet before putting it in so that the color will take up evenly.
Pour vinegar around, but not on top of your elastic. Thoroughly stir it in. As you pour in your vinegar you’ll notice your elastic quickly chaining color.
Let your elastic sit in your dye bath until you’ve reached your desired color or until your dye bath is exhausted. Periodically check on it and give it a little stir to make sure it’s as dark as you want it. I usually let mine site for about 1-1/2hrs. A dye bath has been exhausted when the fiber has soaked up all the dye that’s in the water. My recipe is a little heavy on the dye, so there’s usually some left over. Since food coloring is cheap I don’t mind that there’s some extra dye being thrown away at then end.
Wash your elastic. If dyed at high enough of a temperature, there shouldn’t be much dye rinsing out of your elastic. If you’re concerned about more dye leaking out, toss it in a washing machine. Let your elastic air dry.
Now that we have our custom dyed elastic, let’s sew it to the cup and leg openings. Note that the Comox Trunk pattern calls for the leg openings to be hemmed at 5/8″. By binding the openings with fold over elastic the legs will be 5/8″ longer than if they were hemmed. (Morgan: You could simply trim off this extra 5/8″ if you would like to keep your trunks the original length.)
To show you how to sew fold over elastic to the Comox Trunks I made a video tutorial. The technique shown here can easily be used with other knit garments too, like my Yellow Tail Camisole. If you prefer reading over watching, below the video is a transcript with a few extra tips that didn’t make it into the video.
Video Transcript:
Hey everyone! This is Mari from Seamster Sewing Patterns. As a part of Sewing Indie Month, a month long sewalong and celebration, I’ve been working with fellow indie sewing pattern maker Thread Theory to bring you a tutorial on sewing with fold over elastic.
Fold over elastic is a great way to finish the edges of knit garments. Today I’m going to demonstrate how to do that with Thread Theory’s Comox Trunks sewing pattern.
For this tutorial I’m using less than a yard of 5/8” wide fold over elastic for the size 34 Trunks. Fold over elastic is like the knit version of bias tape. That means it will fold over on itself to encase the raw edge of your fabric. Before we begin, take a good look at your elastic. See the central groove running down the length of your fold over elastic? That’s the fold line where you’ll be folding your elastic in half.
Also see how one side is shiny and one is plush? You can use either side. For these trunks I want the plush side to be visible, which also means it will be directly touching the wearer’s skin, while the shiny side will be hidden.
I’m going to show you how to attach fold over elastic two ways. But if you’ve never sewn with fold over elastic before you’ll definitely want to practice first on a scrap of fabric!
To begin with, we’ll be attach the elastic to a flat edge, in this case the cup opening on the Comox Trunks. To figure out how much elastic you need, lay the elastic in a straight line alongside the curved part of the cup to which it will be sewn. Your cut piece should be long enough to reach from each end of the cup opening.
Now for the sewing! Use a wide zig zag stitch for this step. I like a stitch that’s 3 wide by 3.5 long. In this step we’ll be stitching the fold over elastic to the wrong side of your fabric, or what will be the inside of your garment.
Remember that the side of the elastic you DON’T want visible will be the side that directly touches your fabric; in this tutorial that’s the shiny side. Line up the raw edge of the fabric with the central groove in your elastic. That means half of your elastic will be sticking past the edge of your fabric. It’s also easiest to get started if there’s a little extra fold over elastic hanging past the end of the cup opening. That helps prevent your fabric and elastic from getting sucked down into your sewing machine. For easiest visibility while sewing, your fabric should be on top of your elastic and your elastic should be directly touching the throat plate on your machine.
Once you have everything lined up, begin stitching the two together. Stop after you’ve sewn a few stitches, making sure your needle is still piercing your fabric and elastic. Now gently pull your fold over elastic. It is incredibly easy to stretch out your fabric as you attach your fold over elastic. Gently pulling your elastic helps prevent that and as long as you don’t pull too tightly it won’t gather your fabric. Keep stitching your fabric and elastic together, making sure the raw edge of the elastic aligns with the center groove in your elastic and that your elastic is slightly stretched out while your fabric is feeding through your machine at a normal rate. When you get to the more curved section of the cup opening you may wish to pull on your fold over elastic just a little bit more tightly.
Now we’ll stitch the front of your elastic to the right side of the fabric. Fold the remaining half of your elastic over the raw edge of your fabric. Stitch it to your fabric using a straight stitch or a very narrow zig zag stitch. When stitching 1/8” or closer to the edge it’s called edge stitching. If you’re using a contrasting colored thread like me, you may want to break out an edge stitch foot if your machine has one. That way you can more easily edge stitch a nice, straight line. And that’s all there is to it!
Next, I’ll show you how to sew fold over elastic in the round to a garment’s opening, like a sleeve or neckline. In this case, we’ll be binding the leg openings of the Comox Trunks.
Before we begin, we’ll need to determine how much elastic to cut. Lay your assembled trunks on the table. Like we did when cutting elastic for the cup opening, we’ll lay our fold over elastic out in a straight line, from each edge of one of the leg openings. Double that length and cut your elastic. Next, fold your elastic in half, right sides together. Using a 3/8” seam allowance, straight stitch the raw ends of the elastic together. Do this for each leg’s elastic.
Your fold over elastic will be smaller in circumference than your leg openings. So, mark your leg openings and fold over elastic at four evenly spaced points. Then, pin the elastic to the leg openings at those marks. See how the leg openings are larger? It’s important to evenly pin the elastic and fabric together so that the elastic evenly stretches to meet the fabric.
Same as before, we’ll stitch the fold over elastic to the wrong side of our fabric. What we’ve got to watch out for here is that the raw edges of the elastic’s seam allowance don’t peek out. Now, stitch the elastic to your fabric using the same 3 x 3.5 wide zigzag stitch as we did when sewing the cup opening. After you’ve sewn a few stitches, stop with your needle piercing your fabric. Then grasp your fabric and elastic where the next pin is and pull until the elastic is the same length as your fabric. Sew the elastic and fabric together, remembering to align the raw edge of your fabric with the central groove of the elastic. Keep sewing like this until you’re back to where you started.
After that, switch to a straight or very narrow zig zag stitch. Fold your elastic over the raw edge of your fabric. I like to start stitching a little bit before the elastic’s seam allowance so that I’ve got a few stitches anchoring things down. Often when I get to this side the fold over elastic’s seam allowances will be peeking out. So, I’ll tuck them under. Using a seam ripper helps since the seam allowances are so small. Once your seam allowances are no longer visible, keep sewing around the garment’s opening until you’re back where you started.
That’s it! Simple, easy, fast, no annoying stretched out edges.
To make your own Comox Trunks, go to threadtheory.ca, where you can also find another tutorial by me on how to dye your fold over elastic.
To see what other great tutorials and hoopla is going on around Sewing Indie Month, head over to SeamsterPatterns.com.
Thanks for watching and happy sewing!
Thanks Morgan and Matt for having me on your blog! And happy Sewing Indie Month everyone!
. The blood stain came out easily and the dress had no sign of heavy wear – this was a level of resilience I would not expect from a delicate knit maxi dress! Indeed, it hadn’t even been washed when I took these photos (after wearing it for two hot days and storing it in a suitcase) and it still looks crisp and new.
