SEWING

Sewing is the stitching of cloth, leather, furs, bark or other materials, using needle and thread. Its use is nearly universal among human populations and dates back to Paleolithic times (30,000 BC). Sewing predates the weaving of cloth. Sewing is used primarily to produce clothing and household furnishings as curtains, bedclothes, upholstery, and table linens. It is also used for sails, bellows, skin boats, banners and other items shaped out of flexible materials such as canvas and leather. Most sewing in the industrial world is done by machines. Pieces of a garment are often first tacked together. The machine has a complex set of gears and arms which pierces thread through the layers of the cloth and semi-securely interlocks the thread. Some people sew clothes for themselves and their families. More often home sewers sew to repair clothes, such as mending a torn seam or replacing a loose button. A person who sews for a living is known as a seamstress or seamster (from seamsmistress or seamsmaster), dressmaker, tailor, or garment worker. "Plain" sewing is done for functional reasons: making or mending clothing or household linens. "Fancy" sewing is primarily decorative, including techniques such as shirring, smocking, embroidery, or quilting. Sewing is the foundation for many needle arts and crafts, such as applique, canvas work, and patchwork. While sewing is often seen as a low-skill job, the task of designing good-looking three-dimensional shapes from non-stretching two-dimensional fabric generally requires extensive hands-on knowledge of the design and principles of mathematical manifolds. Flat sheets of fabric with holes and slits cut into the fabric can curve and fold in 3D space in extensively complex ways that require a high level of skill and experience to manipulate into a smooth, ripple-free design. Aligning and orienting patterns printed or woven into the fabric further complicates the design process. But once a clothing designer with these skills has created the initial product, the fabric can then be cut using templates and sewn by manual laborers or machines.

General sewing methods:
Hand-sewing is still done to some extent for finishing and repairing garments. Sergers are becoming more popular for home use, but are not capable of all the functions of a traditional sewing machine. Because of this, people usually purchase a traditional sewing machine first, and purchase a serger at a later date. Serger prices typically start at two to three times the cost of a traditional sewing machine. Hand-sewing: using a needle and thread with your hands to produce stitches. Machine-sewing: using a machine to produce similar effects to hand-sewing, but at a much quicker speed. Sewing machines can be electrically or mechanically operated. Electric machines are by far more common. Overlock Serging: trimming the edge of fabric and overcasting all in one step, sometimes with the option of stitching as well. Also used for creating artistic effects. Serging is ideal for stretchy fabrics or fabrics that should have neat edges. Virtually all commercially-sold clothing is completely made with one or more specialized industrial sergers. Almost all of these methods can be done by either hand, sewing machine, or a serger; however, the specific techniques used can be quite different. Some methods are not appropriate for some applications, even though it may be possible to replicate another method. As an extreme, you could technically duplicate serging with hand sewing, but it would take at least several hundred times as long to do the same work. Furthermore, some techniques are not possible with other methods: making an embroidery stitch called a French knot is easy by hand, but impossible by sewing machine or serger.

Seam allowance in Sewing:
Seam allowance is the area between the edge and the stitching line on two (or more) pieces of material being stitched together. Seam allowances can range from 1/4 inch wide (6.35 mm) to as much as several inches. Commercial patterns for home sewers have seam allowances ranging from 1/4 inch to 5/8 inch. Sewing industry seam allowances range from 1/4 inch for curved areas (e.g. neck line, armscye) or hidden seams (e.g. facing seams), to one inch or more for areas that require extra fabric for final fitting to the wearer (e.g. center back).

Bend-the-Rules Sewing: The Essential Guide to a Whole New Way to Sew

Dressmaking/Tailoring/General:
Mending: using general techniques and specialized methods such as darning to repair textiles. Quilting: sewing together layers of fabric and/or fibrefill to make warm blankets and clothing, or used for effect. Machine quilting is most common, but quilting "purists" and traditionalists do all quilting by hand. Serging: uses multiple threads to produce a stretchy and secure edge finish or seam that keeps raw edges of fabric neat. The term "serging" is a lot used to refer both to the act of sewing with a serger, and the type of effect the serger produces. Embroidery or machine embroidery: artistic embellishment. Backstitch or back stitch and its variants stem stitch, outline stitch and split stitch are a class of embroidery and sewing stitches in which individual stitches are made backward to the general direction of sewing. These stitches form lines and are most often used to outline shapes or to add fine detail to an embroidered picture.

Applications in Sewing:
Basic backstitch is used to outline shapes in modern cross-stitch, in Assisi embroidery and occasionally in blackwork. A versatile and easy to work stitch, backstitch is ideal for following both smooth and complicated outlines and as a foundation row for more complex embroidery stitches such as Herringbone ladder filling stitch. Although superficially similar to Holbein stitch, commonly used in Blackwork embroidery, backstitch differs in the way it is worked, requiring a single journey only to complete a line of stitching. Stem stitch is an ancient technique; surviving mantles embroidered with stem stitch by the Paracas people of Peru are dated to the first century BCE.[1] Stem stitch is used in the Bayeux Tapestry, an embroidered cloth probably dating to the later 1070s, for lettering and to outline areas filled with couching or laid-work.[2] Split stitch in silk is characteristic of Opus Anglicanum, an embroidery style of Medieval England.[3] [edit] Description of the technique Backstitch is most easily worked on an even-weave fabric, where the threads can be counted to ensure regularity, and is generally executed from right to left. The stitches are worked in a 'two steps forward, one step back' fashion, along the line to be filled, as shown in the diagram. Neatly worked in a straight line this stitch resembles machine stitching.

How to Make Sewing Patterns

Buttonhole stitch and the related blanket stitch are hand-sewing stitches used in tailoring, embroidery, and needle lace-making. Buttonhole stitches catch a loop of the thread on the surface of the fabric and needle is returned to the back of the fabric at a right angle to the original start of the thread. The finished stitch in some ways resembles a letter "L" depending on the spacing of the stitches. For buttonholes the stitches are tightly packed together and for blanket edges they are more spaced out. The properties of this stitch make it ideal for preventing raveling of woven fabric. Buttonhole stitches are structurally similar to featherstitches. In addition to reinforcing buttonholes and preventing cut fabric from raveling, buttonhole stitches are used to make stems in crewel embroidery, to make sewn eyelets, to attach applique to ground fabric, and as couching stitches. Buttonhole stitch scallops, usually raised or padded by rows of straight or chain stitches, were a popular edging in the 19th century. Buttonhole stitches are also used in cutwork, including Broderie Anglaise, and form the basis for many forms of needlelace

Darning is a sewing technique for repairing holes or worn areas in fabric or knitting with needle and thread alone. It is often done by hand, but it is also possible to darn with a sewing machine. Hand darning employs the darning stitch, a simple running stitch in which the thread is "woven" in rows along the grain of the fabric, with the stitcher reversing direction at the end of each row. Darning is a traditional method for repairing fabric damage that does not run along a seam and where patching would create undue stress for the wearer, such as the heel of a sock. Darning also refers to any of several needlework techniques worked in darning stitches: Pattern darning is a type of embroidery that uses parallel rows of straight stitches of different lengths to create a geometric design. Net darning, also called filet lace, is a 19th century technique using stitching on a mesh foundation fabric to imitate lace. Needle weaving is a drawn thread work embroidery technique that involves darning patterns into barelaid warp or weft threads.

High Fashion Sewing Secrets from the World's Best Designers: A Step-By-Step Guide to Sewing Stylish Seams, Buttonholes, Pockets, Collars, Hems, And More (Rodale Sewing Book)

A lockstitch is the mechanical stitch most commonly made by a sewing machine. The lockstitch uses two threads, an upper and a lower. The upper thread runs from a spool kept on a spindle on top of or next to the machine, through a tension mechanism and a take-up arm, and finally through the hole in the needle. The lower thread is wound onto a bobbin, which is inserted into a case in the lower section of the machine. To make one stitch, the machine lowers the threaded needle through the cloth into the bobbin area , where a hook catches the upper thread at the point just after it goes through the needle. The hook mechanism carries the upper thread entirely around the bobbin case, so that it has made one wrap of the bobbin thread. Then the take-up arm pulls the excess upper thread ( in the bobbin area ) back to the top of the machine , the tension mechanism prevents the thread from being pulled from the spool side , the needle is pulled out of the cloth, and the feed dogs pull the cloth back one stitch length. Lockstitch is so named because the two threads, upper and lower, "lock" together in the hole in the fabric which they pass through. The term single needle stitching, often found on dress shirt labels, refers to lockstitch, as opposed to chain stitch which unravels easily and is usually used on lower quality garments.

The running stitch or straight stitch is the basic stitch in hand-sewing and embroidery, on which all other forms of sewing are based.

Straight or Flat stitch is a class of simple embroidery and sewing stitches in which individual stitches are made without crossing or looping the thread. These stitches are used to form broken or unbroken lines or starbursts, fill shapes, and create geometric designs. Running stitch, Holbein or double-running stitch, satin stitch and darning stitch are all classed as straight or flat stitches.

In sewing, a zigzag stitch is a machine stitch in a zigzag pattern. Tightly spaced zigzag stitches are used to emulate embroidery stitches such as satin stitch, and to reinforce buttonholes. A zigzag stitch is also used as a non-structural seam, to temporarily hold two panels together edge-to-edge (and eliminate the ridge that would "x-ray" through). This is done when another panel will overlay the seam and provide support.



Quilting

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