I tried to make this McCall's M6437 blouse in style D. It ended up looking like a martial arts Gi or Victorian bathrobe!
I made a muslin that fit, but the final fabric still made it look stifling and old-fashioned.
I get exasperated trying to gather that fabric! I really want to know - ladies, do you use a gathering foot? Doing this with basting threads always looks uneven to me, and I get tired. If you do use a gathering foot, how do you measure the gathers to fix exactly around the joining piece that is not gathered? Does the foot just help do the work that your arms would do, or does it sew down the gathers, so that they cannot be spread apart or put back together to fit?
I even added button loops on the back using the voile. The final disaster was the bubbling of the interfacing. I learned that I should use sew-in interfacing, or pre-shrink it, or use more expensive kind that does not shrink? What do you use?
This gave me quite a sad face. I hope I can remove the collar and save this fabric for something else.
I posted more details here.
I'm not giving up on our challenge, and I look forward to seeing more of your new clothes! It is very motivating for me!
I made a muslin that fit, but the final fabric still made it look stifling and old-fashioned.
I get exasperated trying to gather that fabric! I really want to know - ladies, do you use a gathering foot? Doing this with basting threads always looks uneven to me, and I get tired. If you do use a gathering foot, how do you measure the gathers to fix exactly around the joining piece that is not gathered? Does the foot just help do the work that your arms would do, or does it sew down the gathers, so that they cannot be spread apart or put back together to fit?
I even added button loops on the back using the voile. The final disaster was the bubbling of the interfacing. I learned that I should use sew-in interfacing, or pre-shrink it, or use more expensive kind that does not shrink? What do you use?
This gave me quite a sad face. I hope I can remove the collar and save this fabric for something else.
I posted more details here.
I'm not giving up on our challenge, and I look forward to seeing more of your new clothes! It is very motivating for me!
it seems the simpelist looking patterns give us the most fits, for me a gathering foot makes the gathers too tight, there's more control by hand you might could do a lose stich with a gathering foot then work it by hand to even it out, I haven't sewn garments in over 20 years so I'm sure there'll be lots of fits lol!hang in there! you can do it!
ReplyDeleteHelen
Helen
Thank you, Helen!
DeleteI have a gathering foot, and don't use it, nor do I love it. :(
ReplyDeleteI agree with Nanna - loosely hand stitch, or set your stitch length of your machine to the highest setting, and control the gathers that way.
From what I can see, the fabric is really cute! Maybe you can re-purpose it into a skirt!
About the interfacing you should soak in warm water and then roll in towels and then lay flat to dry to pre-shrink or you could use the sew in kind. At my fashion school they swear by the sew in kind, but I'm lazy and tend to use the iron on kind (to varying levels of success I suppose). Hope that helps.
ReplyDeleteRosa
I learned a tip from somewhere that you can put a finger behind the presser foot as fabric feeds through.... This will cause the fabric to ease and gather slightly while using the longest stitch on your machine. I have found this to be very successful. If I need more gathers, I pull the threads to increase. This technique is especially helpful when I stitch in double rows to ease in a sleeve cap. It takes care of all of the "easing" for me.
ReplyDeleteHi Stephanie, the finger behind the presser foot works for easing or very slight gathers. When I use a gathering foot, I don't overgather to start with, only slight gathers. If not enough, I add to them. The other way to do gathers is use the ordinary foot on your machine. Set stitch to longest length. Do a row of stitching just inside the seam allowance - leave tails both ends. Then do a row of stitching about quarter inch away from first row, in seam allowance - again, leave tails. Pull up the stitching and you will have gathers. Adjust to the garment, wind tails around pins so that the gathers don't loosen, pin and baste to garment.
ReplyDeleteIf in doubt with interfacing, always pre-shrink.
ReplyDeleteShame about the interfacing - I have just started using good quality interfacing and it makes all the difference. I am sure you will be able to save the fabric and make it into a lovely top.
ReplyDeleteAs with gathering.. Do you have a serger? If so, you can create a nice gather on softer fabric by changing the stitch length to 4.0 and the differential feed to 2 to 2.5.
I don't use a gathering foot either. I prefer to do it by hand. Sometimes all of the feet get to be a little to much for me. Maybe with some practice I'll use them, but I find that I spend too much time trying to figure out how to use all of my gadgets. lol.
ReplyDelete