More Interior Finishing

In my last project, I tried my hand at a Hong Kong seam finish. Right now I am working on McCall 5522, in a black and white poly charmeuse. Because the charmeuse was fairly thin, I thought the Hong Kong finish might show through. So for this project I have decided to use French seams and bias binding. Since the fabric is thin and ravels easily, I'm also going to use my rolled hem foot.

French seams are actually pretty simple to do; much simpler than the Hong-Kong finish, in fact. In making a French seam, you are basically creating a casing for the seam. The only hard part about making a French seam is to always remember that you start with the fabric wrong sides together, which is the opposite of what you normally do.

The first step is to sew the fabric, wrong sides together, with a narrow (1/4 in) seam allowance:


Then, trim away the fabric on the seam allowance very close to the seam:


Then press the trimmed allowance to one side:


Then, "flip" the fabric over the trimmed allowance, and press again, so the right sides are together:


After pressing the fabric, return to the sewing machine and sew another seam, again using a 1/4 inch seam allowance, enclosing the original seam inside a casing:


Press your seams one more time, pressing the casing to one side:


Here is the completed French seam:


Now, there are no exposed seams at all on the interior of the garment:


And the exterior looks perfectly normal:


The only places that you can't really use a French seam finish is on very curved seams, like the armscye. There, however, I can use binding:


My Singer 401 and 603 both have binding attachments that make it super-simple to add either premade bias binding, or to add my own binding. They also have rolled hem feet, and I have been experimenting with them to create a nice hem finish on this project:


Overall, I am very happy with the results of my foray into creating better finishes on the interior of my garments. In fact, given that I can get such nice results doing this, I am feeling less and less like I need a serger. Is it wrong that I feel like this is a superior way to finish the interior of garments than serging?

Well, It's All Over

I now have time to breathe again.

The wedding was Saturday, we had people in town beginning the Tuesday before, and finally got rid of everyone on Sunday.

There were some things that went really well, and some things that made me want to light things on fire.

If anyone who reads this blog and are in St. Louis and planning a wedding, I these are the places that we had a great experience with:

1. Our photographer. We used Guillermo Gomez from St. Louis Color. He had 2 assistants with him, made fantastic recommendations for locations for photos before the wedding, as well as some great ideas for the photos themselves. He essentially dismantled the chapel's pews to get the shots that he wanted, and must have taken 4000 frames. Seriously. And his prices are reasonable (remember, I used to be a wedding photographer, I know what this shit costs). He also will still do the "old style" leather albums for you, even though EVERYONE else has moved to the "coffee table" style books with the pages printed digitally.

Photographing at City Museum:


Photographing at the Chapel:


2. Photo locations. We went to the City Museum. And while they did charge us all to get in (Guillermo said that is the first time that has happened with him. But hey, we get it. Times are tough all over), they did not place any restrictions on what we could do and where we could go, even essentially blocking the main staircase for a while. There was another wedding party there just before us, and you essentially become a part of the attraction. We opened up velvet ropes and went wherever we wanted to. We climbed on the exhibits. Sat on window sills. And no one said a word. Same thing at Union Station. We blocked the stairs to the Grand Hall, the main entrance so we could use the lighted floor...and no one said a word.

More at City Museum:



At Union Station:



3. Restaurants and Bars. We had our rehearsal dinner at Blueberry Hill, and since we had so many people in town we also hosted a dinner at Momo's and also a brunch at Sasha's. I can't say ENOUGH about how great the staff was at all the locations. Our party ended up larger than expected at Blueberry Hill and they totally took it in stride. Momo's gave us a room to ourselves, and our waiter was amazing. They put up with all KINDS of noise and didn't say a word. And talk about putting up with a raft of shit...Sasha's. We have gone there every time "the girls" are in town and every time they put up with noise, rowdiness, to much wine drinking, and still don't have our photos on the wall as "perma-banned." After the rehearsal dinner, we went as a group to the Pin Up Bowl. They didn't really know that they were hosting a wedding party, so I can't speak to that, but I can say that they are a consistently fun place to go, the prices are reasonable, and everyone always has a good time. We also showed up completely unannounced for lunch at India Palace, and they pulled together a huge table for us in record time. Not to mention they have the most awesome food of all time. I could eat there every week. Oh, wait, I DO eat there every week!!!

At Sashas:


Delicious Dreamsicle Martinis at the Pin Up Bowl:


At Momo's:



At Blueberry Hill:


4. Salon on the Avenue. We went there to get the bridesmaid's hair done on the morning of the wedding. They had coffee and snacks ready for us, they did the hair in record time, and didn't even flinch when we went next door to Straub's for wine and food.


5. The reception hall. We had a fantastic experience with The Franklin Room. They were amenable to most of the craziness that we wanted (including letting us bring in our own hurricanes provided they were served from their bar). They are super-reasonable. The only drawback would be for smaller wedding parties....while their price per person is fantastic, and includes the open bar, they do have a 200-person minimum. We nearly made it. All but three tables were occupied, and it was set up for 200. The food was good, although a limited menu. But that is the trade-off for such a reasonable price. They had fantastic servers, they kept everything on schedule, and let us in the Thursday before to decorate and set out favors on the tables. I can't say enough about how great the Franklin Room folks were.

Decorating at the Franklin Room:


At the reception:


6. The dresses. Since 5 of the 6 bridesmaids were from out of town, we used David's Bridal...because they couldn't have gotten into town to try dresses on anywhere else. It had to be a chain. We also bought my dress there, as well as my mother's and grandmother's dress. They put up with me trying on basically every dress in the store (two times) and the alterations department at the Sunset Hills location is amazing. You couldn't even tell where the dresses had been altered. And they were altered A LOT.


7. The florist. I used Hollyhock's in Overland. They did a beautiful job and at an incredibly reasonable price. They were actually my second call. The first florist basically told me to go fuck myself when I said the wedding was on Valentine's Day. I won't name names, but you know who you are, large, well-known florist at the intersection of Clayton and Big Bend. Next to the Greek grocery. They claimed that they "don't do" weddings on Valentine's Day. I asked "Really? Really. For money and everything? You don't do it?" They told me that no florist would do a wedding on Valentine's Day. Well, not only did Hollyhock's do it, they told me that the Valentine's Day thing was a load of bullshit, because when V-Day falls on a Saturday, the busy day is actually the Friday before....because everyone wants the flowers delivered to the office, so they can show off.

The list of things that I am less than pleased about is considerably shorter, but most of it is just that their services pale in comparison to how awesome the other places were.

1. The cake. I won't complain too hard here because I asked for something odd and specific, and what I wanted would have been better done in fondant, and I hate fondant, so I hobbled myself there. On the plus side, the cake was delicious. It was red velvet, with cream cheese filling. It was not dry in the least bit. On the other hand, it was smaller than I expected. That is because when you go into their shop, all the sample cakes are GIGANTIC. What they don't tell you is those cakes serve 350-450 people. I ordered a cake for 160 and it looked MINIATURE in comparison. OK, I get it, that is my problem. But, what isn't my problem is the fact that they didn't match the icing to the swatches that I took them, and they slapped some cheap mardi gras beads on them rather than doing it in frosting LIKE I ASKED. The fleur de lis' on the sides were also supposed to be white, but hey, I guess they had to be purple and green since they didn't do ANYTHING ELSE on the cake like I asked them to. It wasn't exactly ugly. It just wasn't what I wanted. So I won't recommend them. I also won't tell you who the bakers are, because they did great jobs for other friends of mine.

The "Meh" Cake:



2. The chapel. While the chapel was gorgeous and the rehearsal and ceremony went smoothly, we suffered from a complete lack of communication from the Event Services Office at Wash U. OK, so they had a change in staff. I get that. They moved to a new building. OK, I understand that, too. But we paid $300.00 an hour to use that place. The least they could have done was not force me to chase them down for information 2 days before the wedding. A call, even a week before, would have been nice. On the other hand, the chapel is gorgeous, and they let us do whatever the hell we pleased in the time that we were there.

The Chapel:


3. The Shoes. David's Bridal gets to be on both the good and the bad lists. Those were the most uncomfortable shoes I have EVER worn. I think they may have been made out of cardboard and thumbtacks. And maybe some wire and staples. TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE SHOES. Never buy the shoes at David's Bridal. I don't CARE if they dye them to match. Just wear silver shoes or go get something from Macy's.

The thing that made me REALLY want to set something on fire was actually rectified. Four days before the wedding the band called J. and told him they wouldn't be able to learn our choice of music for the first dance, so they were going to play a recording. My response was "Aw HELLZ naw!" Only louder and with more curse words. And then my whole head burst into flames.

Needless to say, they learned the song.

Big Day Dress

Updates Feb. 16, 2009:

Here are some photos of my neice in her dress on the day of the wedding:


And from the back:


And the two of us together:


Original Text Feb 4, 2009:

I just completed Butterick 4385, a special-occasion dress, for my niece. This is the dress that Sadie will be wearing for the wedding on the 14th.


Sadie picked out her own fabrics, which would explain the bright blue lining, but overall I think that the selections went together fairly well. She wanted pink matte satin for the dress and a pink and blue brocade for the jacket and the contrast band across the top and straps.


The dress was rated as "easy," but I think that the reason for this is because the instructions direct you to do a couple of things that I would consider short-cuts; or directs you to do things that you could get a better finish if you did it a different way. For example, top band is sewn with the wrong sides together, leaving the raw edges to be hemmed under. A better way of doing it would be to sew it right sides together and turn it. They also provide instructions for a standard zipper, when an invisible zipper looks sooooo much nicer.

Here are some of the details of construction:

First, the jacket. The jacket is very simple, and the lining is inserted by just sewing it to the jacket wrong sides together, and turning it.

But, even with a ton of pressing, because there are no facings, this means that the lining will "roll out" and be visible from the outside. To prevent this, I top stitched all the way around the edge to keep the lining in place. Since the lining and exterior are two drastically different colors (this is what you get for letting an 11-year-old pick out the fabric) I used pink in the top thread and blue in the bobbin to sew. This is not something that the pattern instructions mention, but I think it gives a better finish to the jacket.

Another thing that the pattern instructions fail a bit at is the attachment of the straps. In the instructions, the straps are attached to the same seam where the band is attached to the bodice:

But, this means that the band flops forward because there is nothing holding it up. So, I hand stitched the straps to the band. This also meant that I could leave the back of the band open rather than securing with hooks and eyes. I did this because my niece, like her auntie, suffers from a bit of under-the-arm-above-the-bewbie pudge, that tends to fold the band over if it is too tight. This way, I can leave the band a bit looser, but it is still secure and remains standing.

I also had to cut the band a touch longer than the pattern indicated because I did NOT cut it on the bias to preserve the integrity of the pattern on the brocade. We did a full muslin, and in that, the band was about 4 inches longer than what I would have gotten by not cutting on the bias. Here is the muslin, made from old sheets, marked with sharpie, and with the extra room at the hips pinned out. I had initially cut it with 2 inches extra room at the hip since Sadie's measurements were larger than those indicated by the pattern. But, I wound up taking it right back out in the final product, as it was not necessary.

Another thing that the pattern instructions don't really address is how to hem the dress. It instructs you to "hem" it, but beyond that, there is no detail. To keep down the bulkiness of the hem, I added hem tape, and hand stitched the hem catching just a few threads on the inside, so the hem is nearly invisible from outside. The lining is machine hemmed:

I also hand stitched the lining to the invisible zipper:

Overall, I am very happy with the way the dress came out, and Sadie is happy with it as well (she pets it every time she is near it in the sewing room). For the "big day" she has pink tights and silver shoes, so she will be bright if nothing else. She is also very excited about the fact that she gets to go with Grandma to get her hair done.

I'll update with pictures of her in the dress after the "Big Day."

Vogue 8455 With Hong Kong Seam Finish

I just completed Vogue 8455, which recently went out of print but I had in my "pattern stash." I made it from a poly suiting from the bargain table at Hancock's, it cost a whopping $1.00 a yard. The reason that I selected this is because this was basically a muslin. I didn't make a muslin because I was concerned about the fit...Vogue patterns typically fit just fine...but because I wanted to practice on improving my skills and starting to finish the interior seams in a nicer way. I set this as a goal for myself this year; now that I am fairly competent in the actual construction of the garments and have mastered some necessary pattern alterations, I wanted to start with a simple pattern to begin to develop skills with specialized seam finishes.

Since I don't have a serger, the kinds of seam finishes that I can do are french seams, flat-felled seams, I can apply seam binding, or I can do a Hong Kong finish. After some research (check out this tutorial from the Timmel Fabrics website), I decided that the Hong Kong finish would be the best to start with.

I am actually quite happy with how well the Hong Kong finish turned out, and how easy it was to learn. Here are the completed interior seams of the skirt:


Here is how I did it...

First I cut bias strips from pre-washed cotton broadcloth using a ruler and a rotary cutter. I cut the strips 1 1/2 inches wide.

After assembling the skirt, I applied the finish. I started by sewing the bias strip to the seam allowance on what would be the right side of the fabric:


I then "flipped" the bias strip over the seam I just made and pressed it down:


Then I turned the skirt over so I could iron from the other side:


"Wrap" the bias strip around the seam allowance, and press down:


Then back to the sewing machine. Instead of "stitching in the ditch," like in the tutorial, I used a thread that matched the bias strip and stitched juuuust at the edge, like you would with seam binding. I just thought it was prettier that way, the results are the same.


Then turn the seam over and trim away the excess fabric, right along the edge of the seam you just made. The bias fabric won't ravel because it is cut on the bias:



Here is the finished seam:


I also did the same treatment on the inside waist band. Since according to the instructions, the seam allowance would be pressed under and the band hand stitched along the fold, I cut off 5/8 in from the bottom of the band. I then applied the same treatment to the band as on the seams and then hand stitched it down. It really doesn't serve any purpose, other than looking pretty:


I also found a mistake in the instructions. There are two version of the skirt, one with vertical pleats, and one with pleats that are angled. I made the version with angled pleats. The instructions tell you to baste the pleats, and then match the pattern mark in the center of the pleat to the basted seam and stitch down. But that only works for the vertical pleats. The way the pattern is drafted, if you did this with the angled pleats it would make the top edge of the pleats so uneven, you would have to trim back the top of the skirt to even the fabric.

But, if you fold the pleats to the side, they match the top of the fabric perfectly:


Based on the drafting of the pattern, rather than following the instructions I folded the pleats to the side and stitched them down.

Here is the finished product:


And here is a similar skirt from Ann Taylor, the original price was $109.00. I got mine for a whopping $7.00, and that includes the pattern (on sale for $3.99) and the zipper. The pink binding was made from scraps left over from making a messenger bag.