Tidy Finishes

I guess you could really reduce all sewing jobs into one of three categories:

1. sewing that joins pieces of fabric together
2. sewing that tidies up raw edges of fabric
3. sewing that decorates fabric

Yesterday I got back to the task of finishing off a sleeveless summer top, since I'm off to visit friends in Queensland tomorrow. The top was all put together--a couple of months ago--and all that it needs to be wearable is a hem at the bottom and some sort of finishing at the arm-holes and neckline. So what I need is a dose of #2--sewing that tidies up raw edges of fabric.

The hem is easy--just like the hems for the skirts and shorts--zig-zag the raw edge, fold a couple of cm up and stitch. Can do!

The armholes and neckline are not so straightforward, since they are curved edges. Folding in a couple of cm on a curved edge just makes a bit of a wrinkly mess.

One option would have been to make a facing. A facing is like a bit of lining--the same shape as part of the garment, but in the case of a facing, not the complete garment--just enough to sort out the raw edge problem and sit neatly on the inside out of sight. There's the catch. For a start using a facing means you end up with a double thickness of fabric. Great for something tailored, but not really what I want for a "light as possible, just enough to be decent when it's terribly hot" top. And then there's the challenge of getting the facing to sit nicely on the inside of the garment. It can be done, but it's not the solution I would choose for this top.

Here's what I decided to use:

It's bias binding. Great stuff for going around corners because it's not cut on the straight grain of the fabric. It's cut on the bias. The straight grain is the direction in which the fabric was woven. It's the direction the fabric wants to hang. It's stable. The bias is as far away from the straight grain as you can get--45 degrees from the straight grain. It's the most unstable, stretchy direction of the fabric. In this cas that's exactly what I want. What's more, bias binding comes pre-cut and pre-folded, on a card, like this, or off a roll.

So here's the plan:

• stitch one raw edge of the bias binding to the raw edge of my garment
• fold it around to the inside of the garment
• stitch it down on the inside
• I need to fold back the beginning of the bias binding and overlap the end to finish the circle off nicely.

There are various ways of doing that, and various widths of bias binding you can buy, and, and, and . . . but that's the general idea. I'll get to work on it.