Despite my best intentions and decades of sewing, I still mess up my sewing regularly. Oftentimes because I don’t follow my own advice, go figure!
Anyhoo, in this video, I share some of the mistakes I’m currently struggling with, Mostly when I skip the prep work or keep sewing when I really should go to bed! For instance, this weekend I stayed up until 2 AM to finish a skirt, and it’s a miracle nothing too bad happened since I was in haze for the last few hours.
5 Comments
Nancy Karpen
LOL! It really asks for mistakes to sew until 2 in the morning. You are lucky not to have made any serious mistakes. I just finally finished a top where I made more mistakes than I’ve made in awhile. I was working with a black cotton knit. Very nice quality that really was hard to tell right from wrong side. I dutifully use blue tape to mark the wrong side. I still made mistakes! I was very happy to get rid of it in my studio, by finishing it late this afternoon. I no longer sew anywhere near 2 am since I definitely make mistakes late at night. Not worth it.
Johanna Lundström
Yes sometimes projects are riddled with mistakes despite us doing good prep work, I’ve found that one mistake often triggers more, I wonder if it interrupt the flow of our concentration or something?
COREY HILL
My biggest mistake is not taking time to make a muslin of a new pattern. I find it time consuming but I am starting to spend more time with it and drafting my patterns. I typically use burda pdf and paper patterns since I can pretty much guarantee a good fit. I always check the finished garment measurements before I begin. I can’t tell you the number of times i have cut, sewed and finish a garment to find that it is too small. As part of this process i have started developing master patterns for tired and true fit garments (provided no extra weight gain). I now check new patterns against these for better fit.
As far as sewing: friday’s are alway pattern and fabric selection, typically drafting and cutting into the fabric, saturdays are construction all day with 5 large diet pepsi’s to keep me going until mid nite. I make sure I walk away from it. Sundays are for finishing details, mondays are for wear it. I use industrial sewing technique and garment construction order, I rarely need to following instruction, I find burda’s instruction don’t necessary work to give the most professional result.
I also completely agree on fabric choices. Sewing is costly and time consuming that is why everyone just buys cheap rtw. Buying great fabric is an investment and what I try to achieve is high end rtw looks using industrial sewing techniques. I never have any one ask me “did you make that” but “where did you get that” , the goal is to make a great garment that would normally cost 100’s to 1000’s of dollars to purchase for a fraction of the price. and look liked you stepped off the fashion runway.
Johanna Lundström
Yes not checking the fit and sizing is something we have all done! I wonder if we think that the pattern maker was somehow psychic and knew exactly how to construct a pattern that fits our own unique body exactly!
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