I was making a jacket from a Silhouette Pattern, Max's Jacket. The collar is an abbreviated version of a shawl collar where the under collar is a long extension at kind of a right angle to the shoulder seam. The center back seam of the collar is sewn, then the collar is laid back against the shoulder and back neck seams. I've had good success with this pattern before, largely due to the 3/8" seam allowance, but made a mess of the corner between shoulder seam and back-neck today.
I thought I knew it all-stay stitching the corner on the bottom of the collar before clipping, keeping the needle in the fabric and pivoting at just the right spot, massaging the under layer out of the way before continuing past the pivot,....
My mom and I had just been shaking our heads over her doing the same thing with a robe pattern where she re-did this corner 3 times, and still wasn't happy with the extra crinkle caught in the corner.
My solution: I ripped out the seam where it was puckered--about 3/8" on either side of the corner. Though it was still unstitched I smoothed the right angle of fabric at this corner until it looked close to how I wanted it. I went in with a needle and thread, using tiny invisible stitches to fill in the gap I had unpicked. It took me about a minute and the seam looked perfect. Pressing the corner before hand stitching might have helped if my fabric was more difficult to finger press into place.
This saved more ripping, cursing, and wear on the fabric. |
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I hate those corners more than I can say. Thanks for this tip. I'll be keeping this in mind next time I try this.
8/29/09 8:24 AM
Excellent tip. I too have at times ripped out a corner, pivot, join etc and then sewn it in by hand. Makes all the difference in the world.
8/29/09 8:41 AM
Great idea, never would have thought of it . Can't wait to try it...thank you for sharing!
8/31/09 1:59 PM
When I tackled this, it was on a self drafted pattern, so no instructions to go by. I finally got it to work, but how I wished for some tips like this one!
8/31/09 11:05 PM
I remember Montreal sewing teacher Angelina di Bello saying many years ago: 'You can do anything with hand sewing.' Perfect example.
10/6/09 12:35 PM
duplicate post.
10/6/09 12:35 PM
Bravo! after years of machine sewing, I unwittingly signed up for a quiltmaking class and learned hand piecing. I was amazed at how much more precise my sewing was by hand. Since then I have done tricky frustrating areas this way also.
6/18/10 7:11 AM