Kimono Sleeve Gussets

Sleeve gussets are often seen in garments and sewing patterns from the 50's era, where kimono sleeves gave the then-desired sloping shoulder line.  A problem with kimono sleeves - where the sleeve is cut in one with the bodice - is that as the fit becomes closer, the range of movement of the arm becomes more limited.  This is where a gusset comes in handy.  After all, these ladies still needed to brush their hair!

A gusset is usually a diamond shaped inset at the underarm, and effectively lengthens the underarm seam - ie the distance between elbow and waist.  It allows a closer fitting bodice and sleeve, while still providing room for extension of the arm.  Variations exist - the diamond may be comprised of two triangles, it may be shaped with a contour dart, or it may be cut in one with another garment panel.  The dress I am sewing at the moment has a short kimono sleeve with a combined undersleeve and gusset:

The corners of the gusset are set into reinforced slashes in the bodice panels (those markings that look a bit like darts on the pattern), and are also set into the points where the side seams join.

It is not generally necessary to underline the sleeve gusset, but the gusset I am sewing is cut in one with the undersleeve, and as the rest of my bodice is underlined I've chosen to underline for consistency.

When I underlined I machine basted the slash line to the pivot point, to hold the layers together and mark the exact point.  You can also see the notches in the seam allowance about 1cm above and below this line which mark the stitching line:

Before you cut the slash into the bodice, it needs to be reinforced.  This also gives you a seam allowance to work with at the slash point.  I cut some 5cm squares of silk organza on the bias, then sewed them to the right side of the bodice panel centering them over the point.  Using a short stitch length, sew along the stitching lines taking a short stitch across the point:

You can use any lightweight closely woven fabric, it will not be visible in the finished garment. If you think your main fabric is likely to fray, also fuse a small piece of lightweight knit interfacing to the wrong side around the point.

Slash to the point, turn organza square to the wrong side and press:

Next I sewed the side seams of the bodice from the bottom up, stopping exactly at the crease formed by pressing in the last step:

If your gusset is a diamond shaped one, you will also sew the underarm seam of the sleeve at this stage.

The gusset has seam allowances of equal width all around it, but the seam allowances on the bodice panel vary and converge to zero at the slash point.  Therefore when sewing, it is the stitching lines that must match rather than the cut edges.  For this Burda pattern, each corner of the gusset is numbered - make sure you match these to the correct numbers on the bodice!  Start with right sides together and the gusset lying underneath:

Beginning at the sleeve hem sew towards the first point, remembering to align the stitching lines and not the cut edges.  Stitch directly alongside your previous stitching, in the crease formed by pressing:

Notice how the organza square is giving us a seam allowance towards the points, where there would otherwise be just a few threads!   Stitch as close as you can to the point (within 1mm), and stop with the needle down:

Raise your presser foot and pivot the gusset so the next stitching line faces towards you, I've rolled back the bodice so you can see what I mean:

Now pivot the bodice panel to the left so that your new stitching lines become aligned:

See all that fabric behind the needle?  It needs to be laid flat so you will not have corner puckers.  With the presser foot up and the needle down, slip your left hand between the two layers and smooth it out - so the top and bottom layers are flat right up to the back of the needle:

Now we are ready to sew the next pass, towards the underarm point.  At each turn, make sure you start and finish at the correct point on the gusset itself - ie where the stitching lines intersect.  As you approach the underarm point, fold the seam allowances out of the way and stitch right up to the point, finishing with a backtack:

Halfway there!  Now restart at the same point on the other side of the underarm seam - I place the needle down at the start point, rearrange the fabric to lay flat, then the third pass can be made towards the second slash point:

Again - stop with the needle down, swivel your fabric into position, flattening it to avoid puckers, and sew to the sleeve hem:

You can see I have a bit of a mismatch - I tried to get away with it, but had to unpick and fix instead as it affected the way the sleeve hem rolled - it just shows how important it is to get everything to match correctly. Some people never learn...

Check that the stitching lines on your gusset are even:

And that there are no puckers at the gusset corners:

And you're done!  You can trim away the excess organza and then press the seam allowances towards the bodice.  If your garment is more casual you can edgestitch the seam allowances, which provides stronger reinforcement.  I don't want to edgestitch on this dress, but I am going to catch-stitch the seam allowances to the organza to help it lay flat.

Burda have some rather confusing instructions for the next step - so I'll give you my interpretation next up, along with finishing the remainder of the bodice.

Happy sewing!

The Aftermath

Christchurch, New Zealand,
post-earthquake, Tuesday 22 February 2011

I originate from the South Island and know Christchurch quite well, or at least I did.  I've flown in and out a zillion times en route to visiting family, I've explored the Port Hills and Lyttleton, now destroyed.  I've admired the city's historic English architecture, now destroyed.  I've even sold my clothes in a Cashel Mall boutique, now inevitably destroyed.  I do hope that the owners are OK.  

If I feel devastated, I can only begin to imagine how locals feel.  But I do know all of New Zealand feels very thankful for all the international assistance being offered - we're a small country, and this is a big disaster.  Thanks World.

I wanted to post something, but couldn't find the right words.  But sometimes someone else comes along and writes them for you, and here they are, from today's NZ Herald:

By Paul Holmes

A letter to Christchurch

5:30 AM Saturday Feb 26, 2011

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Images of the ruins in Christchurch have deeply moved New Zealanders everywhere. Photo / Getty Images

Dear Christchurch,

I'm writing to you as an Aucklander, to my Christchurch cousins and brother and sister Kiwis. And I just want you to know how much we're all thinking of you and how much we love you and how much we feel for you in these impossible days.

Your city is on its knees. Our eyes fill with tears at the sight of it. We watch the TV and listen to the radio all day and we hear your emptiness, your loss, your dismay, your shock, your disbelief. We see that ubiquitous bloody silt from the liquefaction, that weird up-thrust of clag that fills your back yards and covers your roads and buries your cars.

We look at you and we look at it all and we know what it means. When we hear that the CBD will be closed for weeks, we know what that means for business. We know what it means for your kids, for their state of mind, for their health, for their next pair of new shoes with winter coming.

We know.

So many of you are involved in the tourism business. We know what those pictures going round the world will do for tourism. We know what it's going to do for the insurance premiums. We know some of you, after this, won't be able to afford insurance.

And we know what your cathedral means to you. I heard someone say the other day on television that the cathedral is a Christchurch icon. No. It's a New Zealand icon. All our lives we've had the Christchurch Cathedral.

I know you think we Aucklanders are up ourselves. I know you bang on about bloody Aucklanders. But really, we're just the same as you. We're Kiwis, before we're anything else. We're strugglers, like you. We get up and go to work and do the best for our kids, just like you. We help our neighbours, just like you, and we've watched you helping each other this week and we've all been deeply moved. We just want to walk up to the television screen and hug you and hold you.

Of course, that is something in itself - we've been able to watch what's been going on. So many of you in Christchurch, lacking electricity, haven't been able to see television or listen to the radio or plug your computer in or charge your cellphones. And you may have loved ones missing as well and heaven knows how you're getting your information and how lonely and isolated you must feel. I hope you have someone to put an arm around you.

John Key was right this week. No act of kindness is too small. That was very homespun of him, wasn't it? That's why I suppose he's so good when this stuff happens.

And I know from September, when I went down for a look, that television might show the bricks lying in the street and the great crumpled buildings in their hideous forms. What it doesn't show is the minute damage, the cracked floors, the broken pipes, the destruction of so much of everything you've built and so much of what you hold dear.

Anyway, the TV coverage has been very compassionate, very graphic, very real and wall to wall. I must say how well I think TV3 did on the first day. Hillary Barry had just the right tone. Then I flicked on Sky News. There was Hillary across Australasia. Then I flicked on CNN. There was Hillary, right around the world.

The most vivid report, and one of the briefest on the first night, was from my former colleague John Sellwood in Lyttelton. He painted a brilliant word picture of the destruction down the main street of the town. It was a lesson in voice reporting. It was passionate but precise and you could hear all the shock of the day in his voice.

On Wednesday, at Hawkes Bay Airport on my way to Auckland, there was a flight due out to Christchurch. In the packed Koru Club every eye was on the television screen. I spoke with Stu, who just wanted to get home to Christchurch. He talked to his wife on Tuesday morning, an hour and a half before the earthquake. She was heading in to Cashel Mall to get her hair done. Cashel Mall was pummelled, of course.

Stu couldn't get hold of her all day. After the quake she and others were trapped in the mall. When they got out, it took Stu's wife three hours to walk home. Stu finally got through to her about 6 on Tuesday night. He said he'd just been through the worst day and night he'd ever had.

Then, just before I got on the plane, I spoke to a woman who works in Lyttelton. She told me that on Tuesday, about lunchtime, her staff ran her to the airport. By the time she landed in Napier, Christchurch was in ruins. She told me that if she hadn't taken that flight, she would have been killed. She has a desk right next to a great brick wall. The entire wall fell across the desk.

What we're seeing this week, Christchurch, is the way you carry on. That's one of the qualities we love about you. You keep going. Everything you rebuilt after last September has been ripped up and torn apart again and you keep going, and we cheer for you and we cry for your pain and heartbreak.

And as each day has gone by this week, we've seen more and more clearly the enormity of the human and infrastructural destruction.

You've got the right man as your mayor, though. Bob Parker is a face and a voice of competence and reassurance. On Wednesday night, I worried about him, so tired and careworn did he look, and I wished he'd simply head home and get some sleep. But there he was on Thursday, fresh as a daisy, the world's media hanging on his every word, talking up the city he loves, willing you to survive.

Anyway, I just wanted you to know how much we're all thinking of you and watching you and praying for you and hoping for the very best for you in your dark hour of worry, longing and sorrow.

Sincerely,

Paul

Underlining with Silk Organza

My Totally Unnecessary Cocktail Dress is made from a polyester/elastane satin, and as I wish it wasn't stretchy (I'm shopping from stash here!), I'm underlining it with organza to make it stable.  The Burda version (#125- 11-2007) uses silk duchess satin which has zero mechanical stretch, and I'm hoping I can make my fabric behave in a similar manner by underlining with silk organza, which also has zero mechanical stretch.

Silk organza is brilliant for underlining - I use it a lot in wedding gowns, hence the ivory colour I'm using here!   It is lightweight, crisp, and is easy to cut, sew and press.  It even makes a great press cloth!  Underlining adds body and stability to your shell fabric, and allows you to catch stitch hems and seam allowances invisibly.  Here's how I did the bodice:

• To ensure the pieces are identical, I cut the fabric and organza together - lay the organza on top of the satin, chalk around the pattern, and cut both layers together.  It is less accurate to cut both pieces on the fold, especially when using fabrics of different thicknesses, as the fold itself takes up millimetres.  I am always careful not to cut silk duchess satin on the fold, as the foldline can leave a permanent crease - not great down the CF of a gown!                                   

• Sew the organza to the satin, and then treat as one layer.  You can hand baste if you have the time, but I like to machine it like above.  I stitched with the stretchy satin underneath, so any stretching that occurred when sewing was counteracted by the feed dogs.  I always work from the centre out.  First sew the fold line of each dart, starting exactly at the apex and sewing to the edge.  Sew the edges within the seam allowance, and cut the threads at the end of each seam for easy removal.  After each pass check that the fabrics lay flat - if not unpick and resew.  You can see I had to do a slight adjustment here:

• Some fabrics require slight ease in the organza, and some fabrics require slight tension in the organza.  This is something that is decided by trial, error, luck and experience.  For new fabric combinations do an experiment - cut a couple of 20cm squares in each fabric, baste the fabric and underlining together, then sew the two squares together with a seam.  Press and examine - does any bubbling/puckering occur?  Sometimes one layer needs an extra millimetre or two, so gauge the percentage and adjust the amount of ease/tension in your underlining accordingly.  I allowed some ease in my underlining because the outer fabric is stretch, it seems to be working so far... just need to fix that top left...

• So now the front, back and sleeve gusset panels are all underlined and I'm ready to proceed with the rest of construction.  I sewed the darts next - I think it is easier to sew darts while the panels are still flat, Burda instructs you to do it after the sleeve gussets are inserted, I'll let you decide!

Next up - the kimono gussets!

The Totally Unnecessary Cocktail Dress

Do you ever have the craving to make something that is totally unnecessary, just because it is so fabulous?  I do!  And that craving suddenly came to me when I saw this nifty vintage cocktail dress in a Burda magazine:

Whenever I am at the main library I skim through the Burdas, and I found this design in the November 2007 issue.  It is a reproduction of an original pattern from Burda's October 1958 magazine.  Almost hyperventilating, I mentally scanned through my stash on the spot, and eventually thought of some burgundy satin that I've had for ages.  I have actually been trying to sell it on TradeMe for a while, so now I am glad that it never sold!  It is a stretch satin though with about 5% stretch, because I do not want a stretch bodice I am underlining it with organza to try and stabilise it - only one way to find out if that works!  Plus that poofy skirt is just crying out for some crisp organza inside it...

I haven't bothered with a toile because a) I am out of calico, b) I couldn't wait until tomorrow, and c) I have plenty of this satin, so I cut straight into the cloth that evening - very excitedly I might add, because despite being polyester/elastane this fabric gives the illusion of silk duchess when underlined - look!

I'm taking photos as I go, so hope to have some tutorials soon on underlining, kimono sleeve gussets, and other handy tips I think of as I make this lovely dress - it's looking awesome so far!

The Westhaven Skirt

I'm going through an "I like nautical" phase at the moment, and when I spotted the roll of striped grosgrain that I hadn't yet put away, lying atop some recently acquired red linen, the idea for a new skirt was born.  Sometimes being untidy is good!!

We nipped down to Westhaven marina for some shots yesterday evening.  DH took the photos this time - look at my hair, the wind, the electricity between us!

On the left you can just see the Auckland harbour bridge, which locals have nicknamed the coathanger because of its shape.  On the right you can see Rangitoto Island which is one of our many volcanoes dotted around about the city.

This is probably the best photo of the actual skirt (and my hair!) behaving:

This skirt has two outward facing pressed pleats either side of the CF and CB that are stitched to just above the hipline.  It is easy to draft from a basic skirt block - you just add the pleat allowance and incorporate the darts into the pleats.  I shaped the front waistband and gave it a centre notch for a bit of interest:

The pleats and the waistband are both topstitched at 6mm with 120weight thread.  I got a bit carried away and did a bound buttonhole - I only did that because my machine doesn't do buttonholes, and I couldn't wait until Monday!  It does look nice though, and was easy to do in the linen.  I machined the hem and sewed the grosgrain over the stitching to hide it:

Look at these lucky guys getting ready to sail off for the weekend.  We're staying at home to work on the house - paint removal is not fun.  Don't be surprised if I choose to sew instead!

Which type of zip do you prefer?

Now you're going to check the title again and think I meant to say colour, but I did mean type of zip - I just couldn't resist photographing this old zip swatch that I found rummaging through my zip box!  Something I could never understand is why they produced so many similar shades of orange, yet the range of greens was completely limiting...  

I have to admit I am an invisible zip fan.  My philosophy is that unless it is part of the design, a closure should be as discrete as possible, and for this reason I prefer the 'invisibleness' of an invisible zip.

When I first started sewing, standard dress zips were all that was available and there was no other option.  I constantly struggled with topstitching a straight line down the edge of the zip, especially around the zip pull.  My recent adventures with vintage sewing patterns and their charming instruction sheets have brought all those distant memories back!

Do modern sewing patterns still use standard dress zips in their instructions?  I don't actually have any so I don't know!   I notice there are still large numbers of this type of zip in the shops, so somebody is using them.  Now that invisible zips are so widely available, I don't see any advantage in using a standard zip anymore.  They are necessary for a fly-front application, but down the back of a dress or a skirt I don't think anything beats the appearance of an invisible zip.

I do appreciate a traditional handpicked zip like the method pictured above, but only for it's quaint factor.  I would handpick a zip in a vintage style dress purely as an era appropriate design feature.   Even though handpicking is a couture method and often considered elite, I still think an invisible zip has a superior appearance.

That's my opinion - what do you think?  Do you still use the standard dress zips, or are you an invisible zip fan too?

Burda September 1964

I found a 1964 Burda magazine a while ago, so let's look inside!

It appears to be smack bang in the middle of the transition between 50's and 60's fashion, as you can see strong influences of both decades throughout the magazine.

I love the make up, and that bag is cute too don't you think?

A paisley dress and a houndstooth coat - very 60's!

This Asian inspired dress is classic, and wouldn't look at all out of place today.

Tweed suits and dresses - many of the designs are quite boxy, and merely nipped in at the waist with a tie belt.  This is not a look that suits me so I was a bit disappointed to see so many like this, but my Mum said that is just how they wore them! 

Whatever happened to all this elegance?  Mainstream fashion today seems so downmarket in comparison!

But for me there are no designs in this issue that are screaming out make me, make me, make me!  Except maybe this one:

I like it, I'm just not confident I could pull it off successfully.  I suppose the right fabric with the right edge will present itself one day.  Maybe in pinstripe?

The guest designer must be a long tradition at Burda - in this issue it is Louis Feraud's turn.

Chanel-style coats - I rather like the horizontal panelling.

Some cute shirts, and some girls trying very hard to be cute!

But the items I love most in this issue are the shoes:

Adorable no? I want each and every pair!

What do you think - are there any designs from this issue that you'd love to make?  Which ones deserve to be resurrected, and which ones are best left to history?

More on rouleau loops, and some loopy inspiration...

Some rouleau loop ideas, from the depths of my wardrobe.....

some flat loops of silk inserted into a double folded CB edge...

A keyhole opening with a single button and loop, on a camisole back...

a skirt waistline, bound and finished with a button and loop...

and it's reverse...
(hopefully this answers your question Myrna!)

A lace dress with some side buttoning elastic loops...
(do you all recognise that button?!)

and the back, because as sewers we always like to look at the back don't we?!

The last 2 images aren't true rouleau loops, but use the commercially available elastic loops instead:

I find these semi-good, ie they have advantages and disadvantages.  This lace dress is 12 years old and the elastic hasn't given way yet, so it has a certain longevity.  But you must preshrink the looping under heavy steam, and it tends to stretch as you sew it on, therefore a bit of easing is required - my advice is to cut it to the pattern measurement, it will want to stretch but just make it fit.  And the garish white looping dyes nicely to an antique colour with a strong cup of tea and a teaspoon of salt!

And because some of you mentioned you have difficulty with making the actual loops, here is is quick phototutorial - a sort of picture-add-on to the previous tips:

Cut your loops on the bias 2cm wide, with one end to the selvedge if possible.

Fold strip in half lengthwise, and stitch 3mm from folded edge.

That means I align the foldline (right side) to the middle of my foot.  Stretch the fabric slightly as you sew.

I veer away from the foldline at the end to form a funnel - this makes it easier to turn through.  Thread a large needle with several threads for strength.

Attach the thread to the selvedge edge of the funnel - the selvedge won't let you down halfway through the tube!

Insert the eye of the needle into the tube...

and thread it through until the thread is almost taken in.

Now holding the needle and thread taut, slide the tube over the knot.  Pull the thread slightly to encourage the knot to slide into the tube.

Use your thumb and forefinger to slide the outer tube over the knot, while pulling the needle and thread.  (It doesn't look like my thread is very taut, but that is because I am holding the camera!)   It might take a bit of manipulation to get started, but once the tube starts forming you will find it easier.

Slide and pull, bit by bit, until the rouleau tube emerges from the end.   Try not to get it all twisty.

And soon you will have something resembling this.

Now trim your loops to size and start sewing!

In typical backwards fashion, my last post has tips on applying loops to your garment.  So check it out and give them a go on a future project!