I haven’t got a cough, I really want to talk about hems. Or at least let somebody else talk about them .
Colette Patterns Hawthorn Dress
You know that moment when you’ve made something and you can’t wait to wear it (or give it away or throw it in the bin depending on how the project has gone for you *bitter experience talking*) and then you remember you have to hem the thing. What a faff.
Anyway, the lovely people at Colette Patterns have been doing a ‘Sept – hem -ber’ (enough with these puns!) on their blog and showing you multiple ways of finishing off your hems to a high standard.
They have kindly produced a free hemming guide as an E-book and you can download it for free here. How generous!
Do you do anything fancy with your hems or do you just try and get it over with as quickly as possible? Do you have one of those puffer things to mark the hem level? – seriously, I’m thinking of getting one and want to know if it would be worthwhile, bearing in mind I haven’t got a level floor in my whole house.
Tialys 
#1 by katechiconi on October 2, 2014 - 10:45
I go for the two extremes: either an industrial hem, with visible stitching, or carefully hand stitched. It depends on the garment. As for the puffer, it’s fine so long as you have a human being to operate it while you wear the garment. Doing it on a dummy doesn’t work. With the best will in the world, dummies don’t exactly match our ins and outs and you end up with a correspondingly wavy hemline. I find a Husband on his knees is useful for placing pins at exactly the same height all round, according to my steel metre ruler.
#2 by tialys on October 2, 2014 - 10:57
Drat! I thought you could puff yourself. However, a husband on his knees sounds like a good idea – I’ve only had mine pin me into a dress down the back seam before inserting an invisible zip. Why do all these things sound like euphemisms??
#3 by createnic on October 2, 2014 - 12:19
thanks for the tip on the book. I overlock and fold over once with the measuring tape laboriously! But love to learn some new techniques!
#4 by tialys on October 2, 2014 - 12:54
That’s what I usually do too – unless it’s a knit fabric and then I use the double needle to finish but I wanted to try some different ones too.
#5 by lovelucie1 on October 2, 2014 - 15:19
Hate hemming! Enough said.
#6 by tialys on October 2, 2014 - 16:48
Aah, but now you are making clothes, it must be faced!!