Love to Sew

We interview Patrick Grant, Great British Sewing Bee judge, former director of Savile Row house Norton & Sons, and owner of sustainable brand Community Clothing! Patrick takes us behind the scenes of revered bespoke tailoring houses and discusses what it takes to become a Savile Row Tailor. We also chat with him about his journey to where he is now, buying fewer but better things, and the amazing vibe on the Sewing Bee set!

The transcript for this episode is on this page at the end of the show notes.

Show Notes: 

Find Patrick Online:

Patrick’s Books:

Patrick’s Other Projects:

Community Clothing

The Great British Sewing Bee

Other Mentions: 

Transcript:

Caroline: We are recording today on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish and Kwakwaka’wakw peoples, including Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, Musqueam, and K’ómoks first nations. Hello and welcome to Love to Sew. I’m Caroline, the owner of Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns.

Helen: And I’m Helen, the designer behind Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co.

Caroline: We’re two sewing buds who love to sew and it’s literally all we want to talk about.

Helen: Today we’re talking with Patrick Grant, one of the judges on the Great British Sewing Bee. Patrick joins us to talk about his new book, The Savile Row Suit, and take us behind the scenes of a day in the life of a Savile Row craftsperson. We also chat about his ready-to-wear brand, Community Clothing, and 10 seasons of The Great British Sewing Bee.

Caroline: If you love to sew, this is your show.

Helen: Hello, Patrick. Thank you so much for coming on the show today.

Patrick: Hello, ladies. My absolute pleasure.

Helen: We can’t believe we get the opportunity to chat with you, Patrick. Truly, we’re so excited. Can you please introduce yourself to our listeners?

Patrick: my name is Patrick Grant. I am a British clothing designer. And I’m probably best known as one of the judges on the excellent BBC series, The Great British Sewing Bee.

Caroline: Ahh! Oh my gosh, our listeners are gonna be thrilled.

Patrick: Hooray! Whoops and screams.

Caroline: Yes. Indeed.

Helen: Yeah, I think our listeners are going to be so thrilled to get a chance to hear a little bit more about you today. So can you take us way back and tell us how and when you first learned how to sew?

Patrick: Well, I didn’t do an awful lot of sewing when I was little. I did lots and lots of other sorts of making, right the way through school. I was really lucky at school. We got woodwork and pottery and metalwork and all sorts of fun things, but I didn’t do much sewing. I did a bit, so what I did was I would alter my trousers and do a little bit of alteration just to make clothes fit me better. And, you know, if I, if I had trousers that weren’t quite skinny enough in the period when sort of skinny trousers were a thing, I would alter them and I would just hand sew them. And then I sort of, wasn’t really making clothes, but I would, I would alter and print on things. And I was always really into clothes. But I would spend days trawling through the charity shops and secondhand shops trying to find things. And then I would adjust them and sometimes dye them and print on them to kind of make them the way I had. But I didn’t do an awful lot of making, really, until I started work at Norton & Sons, which was only 20 years ago.

Caroline: Wow. So what was the catalyst, the inspiration, like, what gave you that interest in Norton & Sons and, and acquiring that business and, and tailoring and all of that?

Patrick: Well I mean, I had, I had always loved clothes, even as a very young kid I was massively into the clothes I wore and making sure they looked neat and tidy and always presenting myself in a very particular way. I remember, my mum tells a story about me going to a wedding. And I’d been sort of dressed up as a page boy in this outfit, this sort of sailor outfit that I really didn’t like. So I threw myself in a fountain so that they’d have to get me changed because I didn’t like what I was wearing. And then on my first day at school, there’s a photo of me standing in front of the house in Edinburgh and I’m sort of beaming from ear to ear and I’ve got my school uniform on, I’ve got, my shoes are really nice and shiny, my socks are perfectly pulled up, my tie is perfectly tied and sitting right in the middle of the V in my jumper. And I really, really wanted to make such a good impression on my first day of school that the night before, I’d actually given myself a haircut in the bathroom with my mum’s pinking shears or something. So my hair looked like an absolute dog’s dinner. But I looked, and my, my mum and dad were like, “Well, off you go, son.” You know, “You look lovely. See you later.” But I looked absolutely so pleased with myself. And I was always just really interested in clothes: how they looked, how they were made, the stories behind them, where they came from. And you know, as a teenager, very early on, I told my parents that they weren’t gonna buy my clothes anymore. So really, I think before I even became a teenager, I was vetting everything that was bought for me as clothing and I had a very strong opinion on it and, and that continued right through my teens and into my twenties.

So I’d always loved clothes and I’d actually particularly really quite liked tailored clothes. Then in my early twenties, I sort of worked out what I thought really worked for me in terms of my own personal style. And that was kind of what I did. I was like, “Right, I’m done with trainers. I’m done with jeans. I’m just going to wear tailored trousers and nice knitted sweaters and, you know, maybe some jackets. And that’s my thing.” And I was also really fascinated with handmade stuff. So whether it was pottery or wooden artifacts or clothes or whatever it was, things that were handmade have always held a really huge fascination for me. I’ve always been fascinated with the kind of lineage of craftsmanship, the different ways in which different people in different parts, even of the same country, make things. And so the craftsmanship side of what was happening on Savile Row was, was always really fascinating to me. And then it was the stories. So, the history of these houses, the stories of the people that had passed through them, the stories of the characters that worked there. There was always something really appealing to me about old brands that had great stories.

And so when you looked at Savile Row, you had all three of those things. You had exceptional clothing, beautiful, stylish clothes; you had wonderful craftsmanship; and you had stories. And, you know, if you drew that sort of Venn diagram of those three things, right in the middle would be Savile Row. And so I was finishing up a post grad degree and I came across an advert in the back of the paper. It was the back of the Financial Times. It was a section called “Businesses for Sale.” You know, a bit like the sort of Lonely Hearts. I kind of couldn’t believe it. And I wrote, I wrote them a letter, and this little advert just said, you know, “For Sale, Tailors to kings, emperors, and presidents,” you know, “Write to Mr. Granger.” And I, so, you know, it wasn’t that long ago, but there was no email address or anything technically advanced like that. So I wrote him a letter and he wrote back and sent me this information. And I went to see the place and I fell in love with it. And it was, I couldn’t believe that an actual real Savile Row tailor’s was for sale in the back of the paper. And that was it. I decided I wanted to buy it. I decided that that was what I was going to do. You know, all of my classmates were off to earn millions running hedge funds and being management consultants and I bought a knackered old tailor’s on Savile Row.

Helen: It’s such a beautiful story. It feels almost like a fantasy. I love this tale. I would read a novel about this story of you buying this business, taking it over. It’s just so whimsical and interesting. And now you’ve written this incredible book, which we’re here to talk about today, The Savile Row Suit. And we just want to tell our listeners that this book is absolutely gorgeous. It’s like a big coffee table style book with a linen binding and beautiful illustrations, lovely paper. It’s so nice to touch, but it’s also an incredible reference book for sewists. There’s so much information about technique in it. Really, you’ve outdone yourself. So we are so excited to chat with you about it today. What inspired you to create this book about Savile Row and everything that goes into a Savile Row suit?

Patrick: Well, we, we actually talked, I did a talk about the book, at Hatchards bookshop on Piccadilly, which is just around the corner from Savile Row. and A couple of the other people who helped me write the book were at the talk. And I sort of said, well, we’ve been, we’ve been thinking about this for a while, for a couple of years. And this voice at the back goes, “How about seven years?” And it was like, I think we’ve been talking about writing this book for a really long time. Because there isn’t one. There isn’t a Savile row reference book. And, there’s a book by The Tailor, and there’s a, there’s a set of books by, by the Tailor that were

And I also felt that it was important. I still think it’s important that we have a historical record of this craft for the sake of posterity. And, you know, there have been lots of books written about the history of Savile Row from the front, from the kind of customer-facing side. You know, there are lots of great books where you can go and find out which general and which king and which duke had what made at what house. And that’s all fascinating stuff, but nobody had ever really written a book that celebrated what the real heart of Savile Row is, which is the people who make the stuff. And I’d read a book by a lady called Dorothy Hartley, who had gone ‘round England in the 1930s, maybe 40s. And she had documented all these amazing English country crafts. And she had very painstakingly interviewed lots of people about, you know, wheelwrighting and scythe making and all this amazing stuff and she put it in a book. And I read that last year for the first time and I was like, “It’s amazing, this book, and it’s such a beautiful record.” And, again, it sort of further reinforced in my mind the need to put down on paper the absolute intricacy with which all of this stuff is done. And I also, you know, I’ve worked with the tailors who helped me make this book for a long time. And, you know, I’ve enormous and unstinting respect for them. You know, I am not a Savile Row tailor, you know, to be a Savile Row tailor, is a life’s work. You know, you, you apprentice for a number of years. You know, in the case of coat making, it might be four years, and in the case of being a cutter, it might be five years. You do that 40 hours a week, every week, full time, you know, and then you start making for yourself, and then 20 years later you can call yourself a master. You know, I never did that. I learned the rudimentary basics. I knew how to make a pair of trousers. I knew how to make a coat. I learned how to make shirts. But that was it. I ran a business and I worked in the workshop and I helped tailors do their work. To begin with, you know, I was the undercutter, under our head cutter, John Kent. I would do all the striking, the trimming, the marking out. Occasionally I’d get involved with, you know, basting the odd collar here and there, but, you know, my job wasn’t, I wasn’t a Savile Row tailor. But I loved working in a workshop with these brilliant people, and I wanted to tell their story, and to give people also a flavour of actually what it feels like to be in a Savile Row workshop, to go through the process of learning it, and how it all works as an ecosystem, because it’s a very singular and quite unusual ecosystem. You know, you have cheek by jowl along one little street, you have about a dozen businesses that are all doing the same thing, that are all competing with one another for business, in a sense, but who all understand that the continuation of the community only will happen if we all succeed. We all train, we all…you know, without the kind of strength in numbers, and the numbers are quite small now compared to what they were a century ago, Savile Row would not survive. And so it is a completely unique community of craftspeople who all know one another extremely well. You know, we are popping in and outta one another’s shops all the time. The tailors, as I explained in the book, sewing tailors work for multiple houses. The cutters might train and work for a house for a decade and then they’ll go somewhere else for a decade. And so everybody knows everybody and everybody knows everybody’s business. And the cloth merchants spread the gossip between the houses on a daily basis. And everybody gets along in a way that is, I find it’s utterly charming and unique. And I felt like I wanted to tell that story as well.

So in the book, there are a number of chapters that I’ve written. I mean, I’ve written a tiny little foreword and then I’ve written, almost, the story of my personal experience, you know, quite short, but my time working on Savile Row, how I got, you know, how it was to start there. And then there’s this chapter about how it is to live amongst this ecosystem, how it all works, what the jobs are, what the trotters do, what the trimmers do, what the undercutters and the coatmakers and the coat finishers and all of those people, and how they all interact, which I hope is as interesting to people on the outside as it was to me when I came to it. And I think there’s a danger when you live inside and work inside a community like this. For so long, you become immune to the, to the absolute charm and, and, and idiosyncrasy of everything that goes on there. And so I wanted to make sure that I captured that. And then there is a little chapter that is the story of the proper houses on Savile Row as I see them. And then there’s a, there’s another story about how we came to have such an amazing cloth industry in, in the UK. You know, a sort of historical narrative from the beginning to now of what is one of Britain’s greatest industries and what in the past was an industry that employed a huge proportion of our population. So incredibly important to both our social and economic history. So there was all of that.

Then there was the technical manual. And the way I wanted to do the technical manual was very particular. So every tailor on Savile Row is taught by a master, and that master will have been taught by a master. And so there is a sort of lineage of craft that stretches back 700 years. But each branch of the tree will have diverged very slightly. And so amongst the community on Savile Row, there are, there are lots and lots of different ways of doing the various steps within the making process. And what I wanted to do was capture, in completeness, one person’s method. And so I chose three tailors who I’ve known pretty much all of my career on Savile Row. So Chris Ktori made the trousers for the first suit I ever had, and I’ve worked with Chris since the very first day I started on Savile Row. And Felicity, who is one of our waistcoat makers; she has been our waistcoat maker the whole time. You know, I, I, I didn’t meet her on day one, but you know, the first time we made a waistcoat, or I made a waistcoat, probably a month or two into my start, I worked with her. And then Rachel Smith came to us as an apprentice and, and completed her apprenticeship at Norton’s and worked for us as a coat maker and made lots of things for me as well as making lots of things for our, for our customers. And so these are people that I’ve both an enormous respect for and a great admiration for, but also a great deal of fondness for, personally. And I really wanted to celebrate them and to celebrate the particularity of the way that they do things.

And then Riki, who wrote the technical sections, was an amazing young cutter. So when you train to be a cutter on Savile Row, you first have to learn how to make. You don’t have to learn to make to the same standard as a trouser maker or a coat maker or a waistcoat maker, but you have to learn to make well enough so that, when you’re cutting and fitting, you understand how the whole thing goes together so that your cutting and fitting makes sense. So Riki had, through his apprenticeship, he won a thing called the Golden Shears, which is a competition run, I think, biannually, for young tailors. I was a judge on it one year. But he was a lovely young tailor, he trained at Gieves & Hawkes, and he had, I was looking for somebody to help me write the technical sections, because it’s quite a skill to write technical sewing instructions. It’s, it’s not my forte. I’m not really sure what my forte is, but writing technical instructions for sewing is probably not it. Definitely not it. But we actually started with somebody else, and this other person has written several sewing books, and I had worked with them before, and we signed a deal that they were going to write the technical bits. And after one day in the workshop with Chris, our trouser maker, they phoned me up and they said, “I don’t, I don’t think I can do this. I don’t understand, because there is so much that isn’t just ‘Take this piece and put it on that piece and sew it together.’ There is so much where, the little finger might be lifting and putting a little bit of tension on here while the other hand does something different.” She said, “I’m failing to get the nuance of what’s happening here.” And so I was in a slight panic because we’d already started writing the book. But luckily, somebody suggested Riki to me. In fact, Rachel suggested Riki to me. And we spoke and he said, “Well, I reckon I’ll give it a go, but I’m not sure I can do it.” But he actually did an incredible job doing it. And because he had been through it himself, he had enough understanding that when he didn’t quite follow something, he was able to say to Rachel or, or, or Chris or, or Felicity, “What is it that you’ve just done there? I’ve sort of missed that bit.” But he knew there was a bit there that he’d missed. He knew enough to know that he’d sort of missed a step. So he was actually, I think, the perfect person to write that. And then the illustrations were something else. I mean, the shirt section I wrote, because actually shirt making by, by contrast, is relatively easy. And the method I was shown to make shirts was actually very, very similar to Lizzie’s method. And so when I went to Emma Willis’s workshop, actually, you know, it also is a lot more, it’s more straightforward. You know, you are just putting pieces together and sewing them in the right order, in the right place. Whereas, you know, with, with tailoring, you are working and shaping and doing all of this additional stuff that is quite sort of mind boggling, I think, for, for maybe beginning sewers.

Caroline: Yeah, I mean, one of the things that we love about this book is that you do go into so much technical detail. It’s not really dumbed down. There’s so much great information in there. And I was wondering if, for our listeners who don’t have the book in front of them and who maybe aren’t super familiar with the Savile Row suit and that process; on the podcast, when we say “tailoring,” we usually mean, like, that whole process of fitting, cutting, making a garment, but that’s not really how that term is used in Savile Row. So can you explain, just quickly, the difference between cutting and tailoring?

Patrick: Yes. So, in Savile Row, there are, two ways that you can build a career. Well, there are other ways, but in, on the making side, you have two routes. You can choose a tailoring route or you can choose a cutting route. And if you choose a tailoring route, you will learn either to make waistcoats, which is considered probably the simplest; to make trousers, which is a little more difficult; or to make coats, which is the most complicated and takes the longest amount of time. But those are all making jobs. So if you work in a workshop on Savile Row and you are a coat maker, somebody will put on your board, your workstation, a package of cut-up bits of cloth along with a bunch of trimmings: chest canvas, body canvas, collar canvas, a bit of domette, a bit of silesia, a bit of linen, buttonhole twist. That will arrive on your desk and you will take those pieces and you will sew them together. That is your job. You will first baste them together and then, later, once they’ve been fitted, you will properly sew them together. But you won’t do the final finishing because that is another person’s job. So you have a coat finisher and you have trouser finishers, who are different people from the people that assemble or tailor the jacket, or the coat, or the trousers. Waistcoat makers do the whole thing, but in trouser making and coat making, you don’t do your own finishing. So once you’ve made the coat, you pass it off to a finisher, and the finisher will edge stitch it, fell the linings, hand sew the buttonholes, but they won’t put the buttons on. That will then go back to somebody else to be done because that’s, that’s done back in the workshop. So that is the making route. So you can either be a coat maker, a trousers maker, or a waistcoat maker. You are a tailor.

The other route you can take is into cutting. And the cutter is the person who cuts the patterns and fits the customer. In some houses, smaller houses, the cutter will also measure and sell the customer his fabric or his suit. But cutting is considered by some to be more important, because without a good cutter you can’t get a good result. But really, without a good tailor you can’t get a good result. But the cutter is also in charge of the workshop as well. So, you know, the cutter is in charge of the overall suit or jacket or trousers or whatever it happens to be. So to be a cutter, as I said before, you would learn to make to a certain level and then you would learn to cut patterns. You would learn to cut patterns to begin with. Once you’ve learned to cut patterns, you would learn to fit. So you come into the, into the fitting room with your master, and you will be present while they fit. And then, eventually, you will learn to fit yourself and you will take over. And those are two very distinct routes.

The other difference between those two roles is that the cutter is employed directly by the tailoring house. So, you know, Martin, who is the head cutter at Norton & Sons, is employed by Norton & Sons, and he only works for Norton & Sons. But our sewing tailors, who might be in our workshop, are self-employed. So most of the sewing tailors within every workshop on Savile Row will work for at least two houses. So you might have walked into Norton & Sons and ordered a suit from us. And the coat might be made in our workshop, but the trousers might be made downstairs in Henry Poole’s workshop. You might go into Huntsman and order a suit from them. And the jacket might be sewn in our workshop by a different tailor. So it’s, the sewing tailors are freelance and always have been. And we have this amazing system, called the universal log system, that sets a minimum tariff for all of the making jobs. And it sets a minimum tariff for a single breasted jacket, a double breasted jacket, a double breasted jacket for a man that’s quite big, you know, a single breasted jacket for a man that’s quite big, which is extra. If they’ve got extra pockets, it’s this much more. If it’s an overcoat, then it’s even more again. If it’s a dinner jacket, if it’s got a shawl collar, all of these things are extras. If you’ve got a poacher’s pocket inside, if you’ve got bellows on the outside pocket, there’s a…so this, this, there’s this thing that’s agreed every year between the tailors’ unions and the association of the houses that sets this thing called the universal log rate. And that is the rate that the sewing tailors are paid. And it’s, it’s a standard across all of the houses on Savile Row. So those guys, it’s a brilliant system, because it means that if one house is quiet for whatever reason, you don’t ever have to hire or fire your tailoring staff. You, they, you know, if, if we’re busy, you know…Huntsman’s might be quiet. But Norton’s might be busy. So, you know, we would give work to the guys that are sitting in the Huntsman workshop And vice versa. And it’s always been that way and it works incredibly well. It sort of evens out the capacity between all the houses.

But all of the houses, all the proper houses, are all trained. So, you know, we’re training. At the moment we have one apprentice at Norton’s and and we almost always have had at least one apprentice in the workshop at any one time, because we all understand that you’ve got to, you know, you’ve got to keep this thing going. So, but yes, so there are two jobs. But also, you know, the cutter almost never does his own cutting out. So that is done by, by an undercutter, and cutting out is what we call striking. So when I worked, I worked for a guy called John Kent, an amazing, amazing cutter, had the, he had the Royal Warrant of the Duke of Edinburgh himself for years and years, made the Duke’s clothes forever, had an amazing history on Savile Row. John would cut the patterns, and then he would give the patterns to me, and then I would take the cloth and lay it out, smooth it out, chalk round it, cut it out, cut all the inlays, bundle it, trim it, so, you know, in the bigger houses there would be a separate trimmer, who’s the person who cuts all the canvases and bundles those up with the cloth before giving it to the tailor. But all of those, again, in the smaller houses, you know, you would have one undercutter maybe who does all of this stuff. You might have the apprentice doing it, But in the biggest houses you know, you’d have cutters, undercutters, you’d have strikers, you’d have trimmers, you know, you’d have all sorts of people in there. And even to the extent you might have people called trotters who would run the stuff backwards and forwards to the workshops that are on the other side of Regent Street. So yeah, it’s an amazing ecosystem of different, different jobs. And you pick a lane, you know, you pick a lane, you either become a tailor or you become a cutter and you almost never swap between the two once you’ve started down that route.

Helen: It’s so fascinating to get a peek behind the scenes of everything that’s going on in Savile Row, and what comes to mind for me is, I’m wondering about the pace of the work. Are people running around with patterns and fabric, and are they yelling? Is there tension between the cutters and the tailors, or is everything very slow-paced? Because obviously you’re doing this like really intricate, slow work. So it does take time.

Patrick: Well, the truth is the sum of all of that. There are definitely times when there are tensions between, between tailor and cutter. Particularly also because, you know, the, the cutters and tailors don’t always work at the same workshop. So in our workshop, there are times that when, as I say, you know, our tailors in our workshop will be sewing a job from a cutter in another house and they’ll be “effing” and “blinding: and “so and so” and “this sleeve doesn’t go in this arm hole” and “this is an absolute,” you know, “this and that.” So there are, you know, there’s, there’s plenty of that going on. They’re very, you know, they’ll be very quick to call out bad cutting. Likewise, you know, there are times when the cutters will be on the case of the tailors, very rarely because the work is bad, because they’re all brilliant, but actually, often just because they haven’t got something done on time; a customer will show up unexpectedly and, and, you know, and the job won’t be ready and then all hell will break loose. But I mean, it’s, it’s important, in terms of the time it takes to make, because the tailors are self-employed. Their time is their own and they will work at the pace that suits them. So what is really really important is that every tailor is afforded the time to do their work to the absolute peak of their skill. You know, there is never anything that is done on Savile Row that in any way hinders the ability of the craftspeople to do their job properly. And I think that’s fundamentally important to the way that we work. It means that every single job is done to the most extraordinary standard. Or to the absolute pinnacle of the, you know, the standard that a, that an individual tailor or cutter can do it to.

And that is really important because I think there are so many jobs today where people are frustrated because they would like to do the job better, but because of time pressure or money pressure, they are prevented from doing the job to the standard they would like to do it. And that, of course, makes them frustrated and unhappy. And I think what’s lovely about the way we do it is that everybody has the opportunity to work to the absolute best of their ability. And it’s also fun work. I mean, they are so good. I mean, this is mesmerizing. I wish you could, you know…sitting, occasionally, you know, I’ll be sitting, having my lunch, you know, I’ll be eating a sandwich off the sewing machine at the back with a cup of tea, and you’re just watching somebody pad a canvas on the chest of a coat. And just the rhythm, the speed, and the accuracy with which they’re sewing, you know…they are picking up one tiny thread on the cloth underneath the canvas as they’re sewing it, But they’re sewing it with such speed. It’s absolutely mesmerizing to watch. And as I say, it, for me, it was such a privilege to be part of that world and to be able to spend time in it. And there is sort of rivalry amongst them, you know, there are certain tailors who think they’re the best coatmaker on the street and, you know, and I can think of two or three that in the 20 years I’ve been there,

Caroline: How long does this process take from start to finish? Like if I were to walk in with my husband and order a suit tomorrow, when could he get that finished suit?

Patrick: Well, I mean, it depends on whether he is an existing customer or a new customer. If he’s a new customer, obviously we have to start by measuring him and taking his figuration. So, you know, we don’t just measure, we also look at a figure of somebody. And you know, you can run a tape around somebody’s chest and measure 42 inches. But those chests could be completely different. You know, somebody could be huge in the front and skinny at the back. They could be broad and flat. They could be completely round. And so, just taking a measurement of somebody’s chest doesn’t give you a chance to make them a coat that fits them very well. So we take a lot of measurements, but we also take, you know, we have this shorthand system for recording people’s figure. And some of it is sort of code for things that you wouldn’t want to say in front of them, because quite often, the cutter or the undercutter, whoever is measuring, sometimes the salesperson will be measuring, somebody else will be writing down. So you’ll have things like “RB”, or “SB,” or “SBL,” or, you know, “SBL” being “slight bandy legs.” And, you know, this sort of uh, “HB”, which would be “hunched back.” And, you know, even the, even the position of your, your head versus your shoulders. So you can be “head forward” or “head back.” You know, we, we record all of that because that makes a difference to the way something’s going to fit.

And so, that process, you know, you, you, you come in and you probably spend an hour in the shop choosing a fabric and going through the detail. I mean, Some customers are brilliant at making a selection, some are less brilliant, and some are downright awful. And, you know, sometimes you’ll spend an hour and a half, two hours with somebody who stares at, you know, the same two blue cloths for like an hour and a half. And then it’d be like, “Oh, I’m going to come back tomorrow.” And then you come back and he brings, bring his friend or he brings his wife or girlfriend. And then you’ve got people that come in and spend three and a half minutes and go, “Yep, that’s the one. Crack on.” So you, you do that, but then you choose, I mean, the ditherers, you know, then you, then you’ve got to choose a lining and then you, I mean, it’s a process, but you, you learn how to manage these people in a polite but firm way. It’s like, it’s, it’s only two shades of blue that are about a nano, a nano wavelength off each other. You know, they’ll both be great. Just, you know, give yourself a break. So then the cutter will cut a pattern and it will normally take him a, you know, an hour or so to cut a pattern. They cut a pattern from scratch, from the measurements. Then we work out how much fabric we need. So we call, you know, and then we ring the cloth merchant and say, right, we need 3.4 meters of this. Or if it’s a check, it’s more, and if it’s a big check, it’s even more. And then, usually the following day, the cloth will arrive. And if you’re, you know, if the workshop is running properly that day, it’ll be chopped out, it’ll be struck, it’ll be trimmed, and it’ll go to the tailor. And then usually the tailor won’t, you know, won’t crack onto it straight away. But usually if the, again, the workshop is in balance and everything’s working well, within a week to 10 days, maybe a fortnight, that first fitting will be ready. So you get, you know, you loosely assemble it, you’ve powered the canvases in. You don’t put a top collar on it, no pockets, no nothing. It’s all just, the sleeves are basted in.

And you phone the customer and you say, “Right, we’re ready for a fitting.” Now, at this point, it’s entirely up to the customer whether they pop in that day or the following day or whether they don’t come for six months. So, you know, as long as the customer comes in, we would fit them. We then completely take the suit apart again or the jacket or the trousers. We completely rip it down. Smooth it flat again. We re mark it, re-cut it, and then it goes back to the tailor, usually to be re-basted. Second baste, sometimes you’ll put a top collar on it. It’s a little easier for the customer to see how it looks if there’s a top collar on. But you do that normally a couple of times on the first suit. And then you would go to a forward finish and then, finally, once it’s all done, you’ll cut the buttonholes and sew it out completely. So it normally requires four visits for a for a new customer and that might take, on average, two to three months. Again, sometimes it takes six months, because the client is always traveling or it might be a client from overseas who doesn’t come to London very often. But, you know, normally, normally, we can normally do it 10 to 12 weeks, something like that.

Caroline: Incredible.

Patrick: But if you’ve already got a pattern and the pattern is a good pattern, and we’ve made making things for you regularly, you can ring us up and say, “Right, I need a pair of grey flannel trousers.” I can show you a picture of it on my phone and you’ll go, “Yup.” And we can get it in, chop it out, straight finish it. So we don’t, we wouldn’t do any fittings. And we can probably get it done in three or four days. So it really, really depends. It, you know, I, I haven’t had a fitting on a pair of trousers in 15 years because I know my trouser pattern is absolutely spot-on. But sometimes you don’t see a customer for 10 years, and so you’d always have to do a check on something like that. But you know, it’s not quick, but if you come in and you tell us that you’ve been invited to some white tie event on Friday and it’s Monday and you’re an existing customer, we can probably sort you out.

Helen: Ooh. And I know you get to work with all sorts of amazing people and celebrities. And there’s so many great stories in your book, as well, to read. But one of the things that strikes me, listening to you talk about this process, is just that it’s in such stark contrast to how we acquire clothes these days, and fast fashion. And I know that you’re a big advocate of sustainability. And you have a sustainable ready-to-wear brand called Community Clothing. So can you tell our listeners a little bit about that?

Patrick: Yes. No, you’re absolutely right. I think what is really interesting about the way that a business like Norton & Sons or any of the bespoke tailors work is that it is actually a really, really good way to have clothes made if you want to live in a sustainable, low-impact kind of way. We only make the clothes that are needed. You know, every piece of clothing that our customers order from us is something they have thought about really carefully. You know, you don’t go in and spend 6,000 quid on a suit without thinking about whether you’re going to wear it. So every purchase is incredibly considered. And because of the process that you have to go through, selecting the fabric, choosing all the details, having the clothes made and fitted, you have a real connection with that garment. And, of course, we use the best materials on the planet and we sew things in a way that means that they can be repaired. And we do repair our clothes for life, you know. You pay for it, but we will look after your piece of clothing and we will try and extend its life absolutely as far as it is possible to make it go. And we will never try and convince you to buy a new one when you don’t need it. And, you know, we don’t have new collections every season. Also largely sewn by hand. So almost the, you know, the tiniest carbon footprint. So actually, in terms of the way the world of clothing works, it’s a beautiful solution. Just that it’s kind of eye-wateringly expensive. So that whole philosophy is very much the philosophy that we take to Community Clothing.

Community Clothing, I started in 2016. It was set up to try and do two things. Firstly, to make really good quality clothes affordable to most people, but also, secondly, to sustain and create jobs in our textile industry here in the UK. And both of those things are really important to me, but, you know, the philosophy behind Community Clothing is very much the same as that at Norton’s. We don’t want people to be artificially churning through their clothes. We want to make beautiful clothes that you feel connected to because you know where they’re made and what they’re made from. We want to make clothes that you enjoy wearing for a very, very long time. Clothes that are worth repairing. Clothes that will get better with age. And we want to make them in a way that the people who make them are well paid and enjoy their work and are proud to do the things they do.

And Community Clothing has been extraordinarily successful over the last four or five years. You know, we’ve built a good business. I mean, we’re in Britain, you know, by American standards, probably very small. But we count the number of hours of work we create. So far, we’ve created close to 400,000 hours of work here in the UK, which is a pretty amazing number. And the clothes we make, I’m wearing them all today, are amazing quality. And if you were to buy the clothes that we sell from any normal premium clothing brand, they would cost you at least three times as much. So our business model is built around all sorts of things that take out all the cost of normal business in the clothing industry. We give the money to the makers. So normal clothing, if you spend a pound, about 25p or less goes to the people who’ve made that clothing. So that 25p Is the people who grow the fiber, the spinners, the dyers, the weavers or the textile knitters, the garment sewers or knitters, all of those people between them get less than 25% of the price of the clothing you make. And that, to me, feels wrong. In our model, the people who make the clothes get 65p in the pound. And we, as a brand, take a little tiny slice. We’ve also, in this country, we have VAT. So, you know, 20p goes to the tax man in either case. But in our model, we are giving, basically we’re saying that the way that clothing should be made, and sold, should reward the people that make it, not the influencers, the marketers, the people organizing the parties, the people getting free stuff, all that stuff. Those people can swim. The way that this has to work is that the people who make it get the most money, and the people who buy it get a really, really good product that lasts a long time, that is worth fixing, that’s worth selling secondhand, that is going to give them a long and enjoyable relationship with this piece of clothing, because it’s been beautifully made by people who care about making things well.

Helen: I mean, your passion and appreciation for the craftspeople involved in every step of the process really comes across. And I’m sure it’s something that our listeners can relate to as sewists. Of course, we know all of the hard work that goes into creating a garment from start to finish and can truly appreciate that process. So it’s really cool to hear what you’re doing with Community Clothing. And you had another book come out this year called Less. I mean, how many books are you planning to write this year, Patrick?

Patrick: Well, no more, is the answer to that. But yeah, I wrote, I actually wrote them both…well, I finished Less this year. I wrote Savile Row Suit last year. I actually finished writing Savile Row Suit like halfway through recording Sewing Bee. And then I started writing Less in earnest as soon as I finished writing that one. So I, I was writing books for a long time and it was, you know, getting up really early in the morning before I started work, writing, coming home from work, writing, writing all Saturday, writing all Sunday. You know, filming Sewing Bee; we’ll do a challenge and it’s back to Esme and I’s dressing room and I’m typing on my thing and she’s, you know, asleep with a, you know, doily on her head or whatever. But yeah, I’m so happy, because both have turned out. And just, you know, you hope when you start doing something like this that the result will be brilliant. And I’m so pleased that you like the way that Savile Row Suit looks, because it’s the second book that I’ve done with Gestalten, and the reason I chose to do it with with them was because I knew they would make a beautiful book and they would take the time to make it look wonderful and be something that people can treasure. And it’s very different from Less, which is all about the writing, and I’m super pleased to say that it’s selling very well. I made the Sunday Times bestseller list. And, and I’ve had such an extraordinary amount of incredible comments from people about Less. It’s been so heartwarming and I’ve, I mean, I get letters through the post from people who say that, you know, I’ve articulated so many things that they’ve been feeling themselves and it’s changed the way they think about all objects and their consumption and the way things should be made. And, you know, every day people are posting on social media a picture of the book and, you know, why they loved it. And. And honestly, the whole thing has been so, so heartwarming. I mean, I’ve really, really worked hard on both books.

And, but, Less is a, it is a plea for a change to the way we consume. And it is about trying to remind people that living with fewer, but better things can make us really happy. And not just make us happy in the ownership of these things, but as everybody who, who makes things, whether it’s clothes or furniture or pottery or anything knows, making something makes you feel good. And so in the past, in this country, over 35% of the country used to make things for a living. And that was, you know, whilst plenty of people would have, you know, grumbled…generally, they enjoyed the work and the work was good for them, both physically and mentally. It gave people purpose. It gave them a sense of pride. It bound communities together. It gave identity to places in a way that nothing else seems to have done in its wake. And the loss of all of those jobs, I think, is very hard felt. Right now, both of our countries are deeply divided. And you know, we have a large population of this country in, in the UK that feels deeply disenfranchised. And I think a large part of that is the loss of a sense that their life can have a meaning through doing work that is meaningful to them. And I think the loss of those jobs, those making jobs that were so important in large parts of our country, has contributed to the sense of unrest and, and despondency that is deeply felt by so many people. And I think that the way that our economy has moved to, you know, make it cheapest, sell the highest volume, is deeply depressing, and, and it needs to be reversed, and it can be reversed by us, as consumers, by choosing to buy things differently. Choose to buy things from somebody who makes something well, just choose to support businesses that make just one thing. You know, most of the things I own are made by people whose job it is just to do one thing. If they can’t do that one thing really well, they won’t survive. But they are, you know, they are committed to making extraordinary quality things because that’s what they’ve always done. And those, I think if we can go back to a society that values makers, values quality, and understands the importance of that to all of us as a society, I think we’d be much, much happier.

Caroline: Yeah, absolutely. I think that’s a great takeaway from the book and all of the work that you do. And we’re really happy to hear that the book, Less, is doing well. So we want to encourage our listeners to go and check that out. I do want to switch gears for a minute before we wrap up, because I know that our listeners love The Great British Sewing Bee, and we just have to ask you a few questions about it. First of all, is being a Sewing Bee judge as much fun as it looks? Because it looks like so much fun.

Patrick: I mean honestly, I can’t believe I get paid for doing it. It, I shouldn’t say that, but it’s, it is the most fun thing I do all year. Because it is incredibly fun, but everybody that works on that show is so brilliantly professional. Everyone knows their jobs so well. We choose brilliant contestants every year. We set fun challenges, difficult challenges, but, you know, we try and intersperse the difficult challenges with challenges we know they’re going to really enjoy doing. And, you know, I’ve worked with Esme for…seven series with Esme. We’ve had the most brilliant presenters throughout. We’ve had amazing contestants. And it’s just really fun to be in the room and see them do what they love doing. And sometimes they struggle, and sometimes they make things that are hilariously bad, but very rarely, sadly. But they also continuously make things that really just inspire you and make you feel just great about being part of this whole world.

It’s funny, the atmosphere on the show has always been one of incredible positivity and celebration and support. There are so many shows on TV that seek to entertain, in inverted commas, by ridiculing people. And we, as a show, have always taken a completely different tack. We believe that, actually, what people want to see is a celebration of the love of making or the, you know, the, there are difficult times. And, you know, as a as a judge, I’ve always been very straight with the contestants, but in a way that isn’t trying to belittle people or undermine the effort, because we know how difficult all of this is. You know, we’ve made clothes, we know how tough it is to do this. So when things go wrong, we tell them because, you know, that’s the job, but we tell them in a way that’s like, you know, “That’s just, that’s just how it goes sometimes. Things go badly sometimes.” And as a result, I think we’ve created an atmosphere on The show that is quite unique to TV. And I think partly it’s, you know, it’s, it’s also down to the brilliance of the casting team, who find from the thousands and thousands of people who apply every year, find people who are not just technically good, not just creatively good, but also lovely people whose stories you want to hear. And you know, I don’t know, I don’t know how you guys watch it, because it’s officially not supposed to be out in America, but I’m sure you find a way, through various nefarious means.

Caroline: We won’t, we’ll never tell.

Patrick: Yes. What sort of piracy are you up to? But we, but I’m delighted that you do. I can’t, I don’t really know why the show doesn’t go out in America, because it goes out in Australia and New Zealand and Japan and, and, well, who knows? Who knows? It seems a real mystery to me.

Helen: Who knows? it’s everywhere!

Patrick: Yeah. But no, we love, we really love it. We love it. I mean, we’re, we’re just about to start, weirdly, what are we now? So in about three weeks time, we’re gonna film the Christmas special. And then just after that, we’re gonna start recording Series 11. We’ve done all the challenges. The challenges are all set. They’re being tested now. people ask about the challenges a lot. And actually, this year there was a lot of, “Ooh, these challenges are too hard,” or “People haven’t got enough time.” But you know, the way we set the challenges has always been the same. You know, we come up with an idea. We create a pattern, we create a set of instructions. One of the professionals in the team will go away and test it. And then we’ll all look at it, and then we’ll, you know, they’ll tell us how long it took them to make, And then we’ll go, “Ooh, that’s too long.” So we’ll take a few bits off, we’ll, you know, we’ll take the lining out, or we’ll remove the cuff buttons, or we’ll do a few bits just to kind of simplify it a little bit. And then we redo it, and then we give it to a team. We give it to a team, we have like a, a crack squad of former Sewing Bee contestants whose job it is to test these things. And they’re not all, you know, series winners. So we give it to people who’ve gone out in early rounds, middle rounds and, you know, and later stage, and they go away and test it.

So we know all of these challenges are doable, but you know, sometimes we get contestants who like to talk a bit or take a long time to wander around the haberdashery and just kind of, you know, they think they’re out shopping at Liberty’s, but they’re, they’re not. They’re in, you know, the clock is ticking. And, but also sometimes, you know, this season for example, I dunno if you guys have managed to catch series 10, but you know, some of the contestants this year are really quite novice. Some of them have only been sewing for a few years. And so they just haven’t the experience of working with patterns and pattern instructions. And so, some of them struggled. But, on the flip side, their creativity was like nothing else we’ve ever seen before. So we’ve had contestants who are brilliant at everything, but most of them will have something they’re stronger at than others, and every year we, we go, “We can’t possibly come up with another 30 challenges.” And then every year we do, and we think, you know, “Wow, these are even better than the ones we had last year.” So yeah, we’re really, we’re getting ready. I haven’t met the contestants yet. I haven’t seen their bios. But apparently they are amazing. I, again, I get really excited because, you know, we get to hang out with these guys for, you know, for 20-odd days and see what they’re going through, see what they make and talk about what they make and give them a bit of a hug occasionally when things go badly and laugh about it. But it really, I mean, it’s genuinely an absolute joy to do.

Helen: Your excitement and your love for it really comes across, and I think you’re an excellent judge. You deliver criticism really well, and both you and Esme are very positive with the contestants, and I think that’s part of the reason why the show has been so successful. It’s very relatable for home sewists, I feel like. Everyone could imagine themselves on the show making the projects and watching things go wrong. I mean, that’s a huge part of the sewing process. Things go wrong for us all the time. So nobody wants to watch somebody do something effortlessly every time, right?

Patrick: Well, it rarely happens. So you’re all in luck. But I mean, sometimes it goes spectacularly wrong. I mean, there are a few times when things have gone really badly awry. But, but yeah, no, no, you’re absolutely right. But then the other thing, of course, you know, in the real world, you’d just unpick it and have a cup of tea and sit and have a deep breath and then do it again. But sadly, we, you know, we also, you know, we’re making a TV show and we can’t spend three days making a shirt. We’ve got three challenges to fit into two days and we’ve got to crack on. So, but you know, that is the, that is the joy of it and sometimes the downside of it, that we’ve got to keep moving along. And it is a competition. So, you know, if everybody did everything brilliantly, it would be really, really hard for us to separate them. And sometimes it’s really hard for us to separate them anyway. I mean, like the semi-final a couple of years ago, we genuinely couldn’t decide which of the four should miss out on the final. And so, in the end, we called the BBC and said, “Can we have them all in the final?” And happily, they said yes.

Helen: Oh, that’s wonderful. I mean, one of the things that strikes me after our whole conversation is your work in custom tailoring, making these bespoke suits at this high end, you know, the peak performance of these craftspeople, and then spending a lot of time with home sewists, also celebrating their skills and projects and achievements as well. And we were wondering if you had any advice for home sewists who want to take their sewing to the next level, maybe want to gain some of those skills of the folks on Savile Row.

Patrick: It’s very hard to get to, to really get the skill that you would, you would learn on Savile Row without putting the time in and having the direct mentorship. So I think you have to find a good tutor. You have to find a good tutor and you have to put the time in because do not forget that, you know, if you are going to learn to be a coatmaker on Savile Row, you are going to spend 40 hours a week, 48 weeks a year, for four years doing that. You are going to spend six months putting collars on. You’re going to spend six months doing sleeves. You know, it is a painstaking process. You have to put the time in. But you need to have a patient and skilled tutor who can guide you through the process. That, really, I think, is the only way. I mean, you can buy my excellent book, but you will probably still, you know, and I, and I hope it is, it is followable because if you’ve got the basics, I think you can certainly work your way through it. And it might be that you have to kind of do it a couple of times. But I think, you know, the great thing about the world we live in now is that there are wonderful experts online who will gladly share their experience. There are lots of people who are, who think they’re experts who will gladly share misinformation online, so you do have to take things with a pinch of salt. But here in the UK, sewing classes are popping up all over the place. Sewing schools are reopening, you know, the courses that are being offered are increasingly sophisticated. There are more and more great people teaching. And, I think, most big cities will have lots of great options if you want to learn. So I think that is the way, you know, you’ve got to find somebody good to help you through. You’ve just got to put the time in. You’ve got to, also, don’t forget, not, I mean, we know, you know, not everybody who comes to Savile Row to do an apprenticeship will succeed. There is a level of manual dexterity that is required that just not everybody has. So don’t beat yourself up if you can’t do things as well as some people. Firstly, some people will have spent a lifetime learning it, but also just, you know, we’re all, we’re all different. We all have different things that we’re good at. Not everybody can be brilliant at everything.

Caroline: Mmhmm.

Helen: Mmhmm. And that’s why people specialize.

Patrick: Yeah.

Helen: I do think your book is very approachable. I loved all the technical illustration and information. And even if I wasn’t going to sew along with it and maybe make my own pair of bespoke trousers, just reading it was a pure joy from a sewist’s perspective, because I love everything sewing. And if I can’t be sewing, I want to be listening to people talk about sewing or reading about sewing.

Caroline: Or watching sewing…

Helen: Or watching sewing, exactly. So, such a great book. We encourage our listeners to go get a copy, The Savile Row Suit, and also your other book, Less, sounds very interesting. I’m definitely going to be reading that one next. Patrick, where can our listeners find you online?

Patrick: I mean, you can follow me personally through my Instagram. I am @patrickgrantism on Instagram. Community Clothing is also online. And obviously, if you want to get sort of regular stuff from me, I write a weekly newsletter for Community Clothing and a monthly newsletter for Community Clothing which goes out with our parts… so we change our newsletter, we do a print newsletter. If you buy anything from us, you get that month’s newsletter in your package. We do actually ship to the US. We don’t ship to Canada at the moment; we only started shipping to the US relatively recently, and just because a few people were asking. And I’ve worked in the US for ages, and some of the things that we sell through Community Clothing were things that I sold when I did e-torts before. But yeah, you can, you can, our newsletters are kind of fun and they’re mostly, you know, they’re mostly, we try and talk about the world that we, we work in, which is the world of manufacturing beautiful clothes, manufacturing lovely textiles. Also, some of the stories and the interesting bits and pieces, you know, we did a piece last week about the Paris Olympics because the Paris Olympics before this one was 1924, which, of course, was the, the, the Olympics that spawned the great Chariots of Fire, which if you are a clothes lover, you have to watch, because the costumes in that film are extraordinary. But that Olympics, you know, every, the clothing worn by the, the athletes in that Olympics were so different to the clothing worn by the athletes in the Olympics today. And so, you know, that was what we wrote the newsletter about. We make sportswear that has no plastic in it at all. So we do a completely natural, organic sportswear collection, which is exactly what the athletes in ‘24 were wearing, whereas today’s athletes wear 100% synthetic, 100% oil based. But also, you know, there are so many, so, that’s what, you know, we will, we will write you little stories that, you know, when there’s something interesting to say, I’ll write a little thing about it, and that goes out in the Community Clothing newsletter. But that’s it. You know, I mean, I occasionally say things on Twitter, but not very often. @paddy Grant on Twitter/X. I did record the audiobook of Less. I don’t think we’re on sale in physical copy anywhere other than the UK just yet. We’re only out in hardback in the UK. But you can listen to me read the whole, almost 12 hours of it.

Helen: I would love that.

Caroline: That sounds wonderful.

Patrick: So if you’re not already bored of my voice, you could put yourself to sleep for weeks on end with me rattling on in your ear hole. So there you are. There’s a treat for all of you.

Caroline: Oh wonderful, we will link everything up in the show notes. Thank you so much, Patrick, for joining us today. It was such a great convo.

Patrick: My absolute pleasure. Thank you so much. It’s been a pleasure talking to you both.

Caroline: Okay, bye!

Helen: You too. Take care. Bye.

Caroline: That’s it for today’s episode of Love to Sew. You can find me, Caroline, at Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns, and Helen at Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co. We’re recording in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.

Helen: You can support Love to Sew and get access to bonus content by subscribing on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. You even get access to the back catalog of bonus episodes. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew! Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or check out our podcast page on Apple Podcasts for more info.

Caroline: You can head to lovetosewpodcast.com to find our show notes. They’re filled with links and pictures from this episode. And if you’d like to get in touch with us, leave us a message at 1-844-SEW-WHAT. That’s 1-844-739-9428. Or send us an email at [email protected].

Helen: Thanks to our amazing podcast team. Lisa Ruiz is our creative assistant and Jordan Moore of The Pod Cabin is our editor. And thank you for listening. We’ll talk to you next week.

Caroline: Buh-bye!

Helen: Bye.

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In this episode, we answer YOUR questions in another installment of the Sewing Help Line! We talk about cutting off-grain, sun-protective fabrics, how to adjust shorts that are two sizes too big, and lots more! Plus, we catch up about our summer adventures.

The transcript for this episode is on this page at the end of the show notes.

Show Notes: 

Come see us at Portland Stitchfest!

This August was the 7th anniversary of Love to Sew’s debut! 

Previous Episodes Mentioned:

Resources:

Where to Buy UPF Fabrics:

Where to Buy Fascinator Supplies:

Patterns: 

Other Mentions: 

Transcript:

Helen: We are recording today on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish and Kwakwaka’wakw peoples, including Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, Musqueam, and K’ómoks first nations.

Helen: Hello and welcome to Love to Sew. I’m Helen, the designer behind Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co.

Caroline: And I’m Caroline, the owner of Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns.

Helen: We’re two sewing buds who love to sew and it’s essentially all we want to talk about.

Caroline: Today we’re answering your questions in another installment of the Sewing Help Line! We talk about cutting off-grain, sun-protective fabrics, how to adjust shorts that are two sizes too big, and lots more. Plus, we catch up about our summer adventures!

Helen: If you love to sew, this is your show.

Caroline: Woo! We’re back!

Helen: We’re back, baby! Welcome to the fall 2024 season of Love to Sew!

Caroline: Yay! Oh my gosh, hi!

Helen: Hi, how are you? How’ve you been?

Caroline: Oh my gosh, I’m so good! I’ve been really good. How have you been?

Helen: Yeah, really good. And I feel like our listeners need to know that on the day we’re recording, this is our seven year podcast-iversary.

Caroline: Podcast-iversary! Yes, of the show coming out, which is wild. Wild, wild, wild! Yes.

Helen: Right? Seven years. Best years of my my life.

Caroline: I know! I’m feeling really nostalgic because I’ve just been going through old photos, because it’s our 10 year Blackbird birthday coming up, and I’ve been trying to find old photos and videos. And I’ve obviously also found tons of old photos and videos of us when we launched the podcast and it’s making me really emotional.

Helen: Oh, it’s so cute. We’re definitely going to share some of it on our Insta the week this episode comes out. ‘Cause, yeah, we look like children.

Caroline: Little babies. Yeah. We’ve come so far, Helen.

Helen: It’s so fun to look back on. I can’t believe you have evidence of that early time. I should go back on my phone too. I’m sure I have some stuff.

Caroline: Oh, I’m sure you do. Yeah. Those things never go away. They’re in the cloud, you know?

Helen: They’re in the cloud. You can grab them anytime you want, like raindrops.

Caroline: Okay, we need to catch up, but before we do, we want to remind you all about the best way to support Love to Sew, and that is by joining us on Patreon or Apple Podcast subscription. If you do that, you get access to bonus content every single month, even on the off-season. And we have so much fun catching up with you all on those more casual bonus episodes. I don’t know. We get to talk a lot more about our personal lives. We talk about what we’re sewing. We talk about what we’re loving. We talk about new pattern releases. It’s just a really good time.

Helen: Yeah. One of my favourite things is getting to hear your recipe recommendations, Caroline, and we also share, like, podcasts that we’ve discovered and TV shows that we’re loving right now. It’s so fun. We just have a good old chat and, of course, lots of sewing talk. So it means so much to us, if you’re able to support us over on Patreon or Apple Podcasts, even if it’s just for a month or two. And if that’s not in the cards for you right now, we totally get it. Thank you for listening and cheering us on for seven years.

Caroline: Oh my gosh. Seven years. Lucky number seven. I like it.

Helen: I like it. That’s true.

Caroline: Okay, this is gonna be a fun episode, but before we start taking calls, we should talk about what we’ve been up to this summer. Let’s catch up! Helen, what’s up?

Helen: What’s up?

Caroline: What’s up?!

Helen: Okay, summer was really fun. Lots of swimming, as always. Everyone probably knows by now how much I love summer swimming. Lakes, rivers, ocean. I’m all about it. So this year we did a ton of that. And I had my new Sunstar swimsuit. So I felt extra fabulous. It was so fun to launch another swimsuit into the collection. And then I got to wear it all summer. I kind of felt like I was cheating on Sandpiper a little bit, because I love my Sandpiper suits too.

Caroline: Sandpiper had its moment, okay? This is the Sunstar era.

Helen: You need both. You need both. You know, you need a sporty look. You need a fun, flirty look. They’re both great suits. I had so much fun in both of them this summer, swimming, living my best swimming life. And Sam and I managed to visit nearly all of our friends and family, which was a feat. Like, we went to islands, we went to the interior of our province, BC, we went to Vancouver, we…like, all over the place, got to, like, touch base with everybody, visit everybody. And that was really fun. So, I basically spent June, July doing that. And then August has been pretty chill and I’m feeling ready for fall. I’m, like, craving more indoor hobby time. Sewing tends to take a backseat sometimes in the summer. So I’m just looking forward to getting back into my sewing studio and having long rainy days, just escaping the weather and quilting and things like that.

Caroline: Oh my gosh, it seems like you had such a great summer, and you did your whole tour, and you did your Hornby trip too, which you do every year, and that looked amazing.

Helen: Yeah, it was. It was so good.

Caroline: Yeah, I’m happy that you got to get out there and do all the things, and it must have felt so good to be able to see all your friends and family. We got to see each other too, it was great.

Helen: Yeah, I know, right? Yeah, you’re on the list, baby.

Caroline: Oh yeah! I am not ready for fall, but I hear you. I acknowledge what you’re saying and I reject it.

Helen: That’s totally fair. And you know what? It’s like, it’s August 21st today. And so I really shouldn’t be talking about summer being over yet because it’s not officially over until, like, later into September. We have many weeks of beautiful weather ahead of us. So what am I doing? I don’t even know why I’m talking like this.

Caroline: What are you doing, Helen? No, I, we’re coming up on our one year wedding anniversary, and I just keep thinking about our wedding weekend and how hot and beautiful and sunny it was, and I’m holding on to that. I’m just like, “It’s gonna be nice until mid to end September, and then we can have rain.”

Helen: Yeah, that’s true. September usually is really beautiful. So I need to snap out of it.

Caroline: No, but it makes sense. You’ve been going around all summer, doing all kinds of fun things. You totally, like, filled your cup with all the swimming that you wanted to do, and now you’re, like, ready for your quilting and your crafting and your sewing. And that is very fair.

Helen: Right? Quilt season is coming! Okay, Caroline, I want to hear a little bit more about your summer. What’s been going on with you and Blackbird and BF Patterns and all that.

Caroline: It’s funny because you said that sewing took a backseat for you this summer. Sewing did not take a backseat. Sewing was in the front seat for me this summer. I had, like, a major sewjo boost and I did a ton of sewing, which was super fun. And I just really love it when I get that little burst of sewing energy. So I made a lot of things, lots of linen dresses, and I still have a few things in my queue that I want to sew up before the end of the summer. I went to the farmer’s market a ton. That was like, major focus this summer. I was like, “I want to go to the farmer’s market almost every weekend.” Like basically any weekend that I was not busy on the farmer’s market day I would go. And I went with my sister-in-law a lot of the time, and once my niece was born, my niece came along too. So that’s been really nice. But yes, so, lots of farmer’s market, lots of cooking, lots of being at home this summer because we’ve just had a little bit of a slower summer. Especially with my new niece coming, I wanted to kind of, like, be around so that I could, like, help them out after the birth and like bring food and just, like, be a support system for them because we live so close. But yeah, that’s kind of like the biggest news of the summer, is that my niece Naomi was born.

Helen: Yay! And you’re an auntie times three now.

Caroline: Yes, auntie thrice. And I keep whispering in her ear, “I’m gonna be your favourite aunt,” because I get to see her all the time.

Helen: It’s true. She’s so much closer than your other niece and nephew, which is, must be such a nice treat for you to like, just get to be there all the time. Yeah.

Caroline: Yeah, and I have managed to not have to change a diaper yet, which I’m quite pleased with. I know it’s coming, but I’ve managed to avoid it until now. But yes, my mom came and stayed with us for a couple weeks after the birth, which was really nice to spend some quality time with her. And yeah, It’s been, like, a really good, chill summer. The weather’s been really nice here. I’ve managed to get to the beach a couple times, went up to the lake to see Shea’s family and do some paddle boarding. And we’re going to squeeze in some things this fall, actually, that didn’t happen in the summer. So we’re doing, like, a little anniversary trip. We’re doing some camping in September. And you and I have a trip to Portland coming up, which is really fun.

Helen: We’re gonna be at Stitchfest. I’m so excited.

Caroline: Oh my gosh. It’s been a really long time since we’ve done, like, a podcast-focused trip, basically since pre-pandemic. So I’m really excited. I love Portland. It’s going to be so fun.

Helen: I know. I can’t wait.

Caroline: Yeah. And then I have, like, lots of people coming to visit this fall as well. So it’s going to be a busy fall. And, like I mentioned, we’re celebrating 10 years of Blackbird in September, and we’re planning lots of fun stuff. So that’s been kind of trippy to think about, like, the fact that I’ve been doing this for a decade. I just can’t believe it. Like I was telling you before we got on this recording, like, who let 25-year-old me have a business? I don’t know. Like, I was such a baby, and looking back at like the photos and, I don’t know, it just has been crazy to see all of that and think about how far we’ve come, and like, just all the milestones. It’s pretty wild. So that’s been really fun to kind of take a moment to acknowledge and celebrate.

Helen: Yeah. It’s been an amazing journey. I can’t wait to see what you have in store for us, sharing some of those behind-the-scenes moments from the early days. I’m looking forward to that for sure. And we mentioned Stitchfest, that’s hosted by Seamwork in Portland, and I’m not sure if tickets are still available, but if you want to come, come by and join Stitchfest, go check that out on the Seamwork website and we’ll be there.

Caroline: Yeah. And we’re going to do, like, a live podcast recording for Seamwork Radio, right?

Helen: I know. I’m so excited for that. That’s going to be great. Our first ever live podcast recording!

Caroline: I know, I know.

Helen: After seven years.

Caroline: Oh my gosh. Yes, hopefully that goes well. Well, I’m excited. Not nervous at all. It’s gonna be great. Yeah, I just have to think about what I’m gonna sew for that, because I have to wear a new outfit, right?

Helen: Obviously.

Caroline: Yeah, obviously.

Helen: Yeah, I know. It’s going to be so fun to get dressed for that event. For the whole weekend, really. And I feel like we need to make an effort to record some stuff together while we’re on this trip. We always forget.

Caroline: Yes, 100%. We will do that.

Helen: We will do it. We’ll do it. Well, we hope you all had a great couple of months as well while we were off for our summer season, whether it was hot or cold in your hemisphere, and we’re so excited to be back for our fall season. We have so many amazing things in store. We’ve got some amazing guests that…we can’t wait to share the interviews with you all and, of course, lots of fun episodes all about sewing. But today, we’re ready to solve your sewing woes on our Sewing Help Line! Jordan, can you patch in our first caller?

Emily: Hello, Helen and Caroline. My name is Emily, and I live in Bellingham, Washington. Thank you both for the encouragement to call into the show. I think it’s really fun. I have two questions today. My first question is about Caroline’s Style Arc Mildred Jumpsuit. I want to make one and add a zipper like you did. Could you describe the steps you took to add the zipper? Even though I’ve been sewing for about four years, I’ve only put in an invisible zipper once, and I’ve never hacked a garment to include one. So, I’m a pretty zipper beginner here. My second question is about sewing space organization and design. I just finished three years of graduate coursework, and my sewing space is neglected and disorganized. So, I’m treating myself to a sewing room makeover, and I’d love to know: what are the top things you recommend I do to revamp my setup? For a little context, it’s a tiny windowless room in a rental. So there’s some limitations in what I can do, but I’m excited to hear what you recommend. Thank you both so much. Bye Bye.

Caroline: Okay, I love these questions! First of all, Emily, thank you for calling, and congratulations on finishing your graduate coursework. That’s a big deal!

Helen: Absolutely amazing. Congrats, Emily.

Caroline: Okay, let’s do the first question first. I want to mention I actually used a regular zipper when I added the zipper to my Mildred Jumpsuit. I added it because I graded between sizes and I could no longer pull on the jumpsuit with my change of having, like, my bust smaller than my hip size. But we’re going to share tips for adding an invisible zipper because I think it’s really similar, and it sounds like you want to do an invisible zipper, which will totally work, so we’re going to do that. So, hacking the Mildred Jumpsuit to add an invisible zipper would actually be super easy. It is a pull-on jumpsuit. So there’s no zipper at all in the pattern right now, but because an invisible zipper fits really seamlessly and smoothly into a seam, there’s no need to add or subtract anything from the pattern the way that you would if you were adding, like, a lapped zipper or a fly or something. So you’re going to cut out your pieces as usual. And then choose the seam where you want the zipper to go. I think a side seam is a classic choice. It’s a little bit easier to reach. But I did the center back, which you can do as well. But say you choose the left side seam. First, you want to finish the side seam edges of the left front and the left back pieces. It’s going to be tricky to finish them after you insert the zipper. And then, next, you’re going to mark out the placement of your zipper. So make a mark ¾” from the top of the pieces. And this is where your top zipper stop goes. Marking it out is going to help you make sure the zipper lines up evenly. It’s also super helpful to mark out the seam lines. The seam line is where your stitches go. So if your seam allowance is ⅝”, the seam line will be ⅝” from the edge. And then these markings are going to show you where to line up the teeth of your invisible zipper. And then from there on, it’s just like inserting any other invisible zipper. It’s kind of hard to describe on a podcast. So we’re going to link a step by step tutorial for you, for the rest of the steps, in the show notes. And go check that out. You can totally do this. And if you’re doing a regular zipper, you can look up a tutorial for that online and just follow those steps. You can do it!

Helen: You can totally do it. Zippers are really intimidating if you’ve never sewn one before, if you’re not regularly sewing them. But they are very doable. You will definitely get it done. It might not look perfect and that doesn’t matter because people are not going to be looking at it. It’s fine if it looks a little wonky.

Caroline: A hundred percent.

Helen: Okay, now for the second question. Love that you’re doing a sewing room makeover! And we do have a few ideas. A peg board is such a nice addition to a sewing room. You can hang all your frequently used tools from it: scissors, rotary cutters, rulers. And you can hang little buckets from it to hold, like, your marking tools, pincushion, sewing clips, anything that you use on a regular basis. Using vertical space is a game-changer for storage. And it’s so helpful that everything is visible, too. IKEA has good, affordable pegboards and accessories that go with them, but you can also get stuff like that from, you know, Home Depot or a hardware store. And I know that function is the most important thing about a sewing space, but decorating it a little bit can really change the feel in a good way. I like to hang some of my quilt blocks in progress on the wall. Or smaller mini quilts make really good wall art. I have a few little string lines set up because my sewing room is in a garage and so I have a big ugly garage door on one side. So I hung a bunch of string lines on it and then I can clip my quilt blocks up there and they become art and kind of disguise the garage door a little bit. You can also make a sewing machine cover out of a cool fabric from your stash. You could hang up some art that inspires you. Make it a space that feels cool and creative and has those visual moments of creativity to inspire you.

Caroline: And like, I love your quilt block lines because you switch them out. So whenever we do video calls I’m always, like, excited to see what’s in the background. And you’re always, like, adding to them and stuff, so it’s nice to have that ability to sort of evolve that if you have, like, hooks on the wall where you want to hook your, like, works in progress or something. I think that could work, too, if you’re making garments. But yeah, that’s a really great tip.

Helen: I was thinking that too, or like, maybe installing, like, a really beautiful towel bar where you could drape fabric that you’re thinking about using.

Caroline: Or, like, a ladder up against the wall. Yeah, a ladder. Yeah. The only thing with that is, just be careful not to hang it in direct sunlight, because you might not use that fabric for a while, and then they could get sun damage.

Helen: So make sure that it’s somewhere…

Caroline: But there’s no windows in this room.

Helen: Yeah. Oh, good point. You’re lucky. You have no windows.

Caroline: Yeah, so you don’t have to worry about sun damage. And also, there’s like, so much wall space to work with because you’re not working around windows, so.

Helen: That’s true. Okay. I wanted to add here that I love home decor and I love decorating my space. And I get questions from friends and family about decorating quite often. Like, “Oh, Helen, what should I do with this room? I don’t know what to do here.” And it’s just not intuitive for a lot of people. It can be really hard to choose things to decorate a space. So I always tell people to try adding three things to their space: a decorative area rug, a house plant, and fake is totally fine. Try to get a nice looking fake one, but that’s, that’s cool. Fake is great. And artwork. And I know that sounds really obvious, but a lot of people feel intimidated by choosing and hanging artwork. It doesn’t have to be fancy or, like, real. It can just be a poster. It could be kid art. Like, it can be really anything. It’s just, having something framed on the wall makes such a huge difference in a space. And then lastly, also lighting, I think, makes a big difference too. Warm light bulbs, people. Warm.

Caroline: Yes, warm light bulbs, and like, more small lights than you think you need, because that really adds to, like, the vibe. So if you have, like, a sewing table, you can have, like, a little work lamp and you can have maybe like a cute little, like, shelf that has, like, a lamp on it and some decor or something just to, like, add to the warmth of the room. I think that makes a big difference. I love that you approach this from, like, a more decor side and I thought about like, “Okay, what are the, like, more functional things that I love about my sewing room?” Because I think you kind of need both in a sewing room. Like, you want it to be cute and inviting but you also need it to work for the craft that you’re doing. So for me, like my favourite things about my sewing room space are my scrap organization system. So I have these, like, little bins where I separate my scraps by type. You can do it by colour. It doesn’t have to take up a lot of space, but just some way to manage your scraps, because you will have scraps throughout your sewing process. And I also love having my, like, dedicated wastebin. So I have, like, one for recycling, for like, paper, when I’m cutting out paper, I have one for garbage and I have one for scraps that are too small to reuse. So I know that I’m going to need to figure out how to, like, bring them to a fabric recycling facility or something. And then I also have zones for my different tools. So I have my little bag where I keep my, like, ironing tools, and then I have, like, my little drawer where I keep my like sewing machine tools, and then I have a little bin where I keep my cutting tools. So I know, even if I’m cutting in a different room, I can, like, grab that little bin and go and I have all that stuff together. So I like that too, if you’re not going with, like, a peg board setup, or if you have enough space to like, have little zones set up, having those tools in those designated areas so that you don’t have to go hunting for them every time, I think, really helps me to just, like, get going with my sewing.

Helen: Yeah. A little caddy is so smart, especially if you don’t have a dedicated space.

Caroline: Oh, yes, a caddy. I used to have a caddy when I had that tiny little sewing space and it was great because you could just wheel it around. So nice. And then, I personally love having a fabric shelf where I can see all my fabric. I know there’s that risk of sun damage, but I try to, like, rotate them around and hope for the best. But since you’re in a windowless room, it might bring some, like, inspiration and light and fun vibes to have some of your favourite fabrics on display, even if it’s not all of them. Some way to have, like, a few things out so that you’re, like, feeling inspired and you’re seeing what you have. I think that really adds to a space. I also really love having, like, a spot to pin or, like, tape ideas or sketches or post-its, even, with, like, a sewing queue so that I can, like, visually see what I want to be working on. it doesn’t have to be a bulletin board. It can just be, like, a little, I don’t know, spot on your wall that you’re like, I’m going to tape stuff up in this area. Yeah, I find that really helpful too.

Helen: Yeah, I love that idea. It’s great to have your plans laid out on the wall so that you don’t get distracted by new and shiny things.

Caroline: Yeah, totally. And because you have a super small sewing space, it can calm the space visually to store at least some of your fabric stash in like closed storage. It doesn’t have to be in your sewing room. Even if you want to use, like, storage ottomans or under bed boxes, drawers, armoires, those are all good options. You can have your fabric stored, like, in other areas of your house to clear up some of that space in your small sewing area. And we have a couple of episodes that you might like to listen to if you haven’t heard them yet. So you can check out Episode 185, which is all about fabric stash organization. Episode 130, where we have a bunch of community members write in and talk about their sewing spaces. But yeah, have fun making over your sewing room! And P.S., I really love this segment. Are we designers now, Helen? Should we do this more often?

Helen: I think we should be. Oh my gosh. We could go into people’s sewing rooms and revamp them and we could film it and put it on, like, HGTV.

Caroline: Oh my gosh. HGTV, call us please. We’re, I’m available.

Helen: We’re ready. Speaking of calling us, we have our next caller: Natalie.

Natalie: Hi! My name is Natalie. I’m calling from Humboldt County, California, and I am always wondering how important it is, when you’re cutting a pattern, to align the pattern pieces the way that the patternmaker suggests, like, along the grain line. I’m often sort of ignoring that, because I just want to fit as many pieces onto as small a piece of fabric as possible, and I would imagine that, like, it depends on the fabric and probably the pattern, but I’m just wondering, like, how important is it that I align those pieces directionally the way they say. Is it okay that sometimes I don’t do that? Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. Okay. Bye bye.

Helen: Hi Natalie! Thank you for calling the Sewing Help Line. To answer your question, is it okay to cut pattern pieces off the grain? I would say cutting on grain is pretty important in sewing. It’s one of those things that is going to make a big difference in your projects. I think cutting on grain is something that beginners should learn how to do and should focus on when they’re making their garments, at least in the beginning, because it will help them to get a really nice result. But if you’re happy with how your projects are turning out, not cutting on the grain, then of course it’s okay. You know, we’re a you-do-you kind of podcast. So if you’re happy with the way things are working out and you’re finding success cutting the way that you’re cutting, then you can absolutely do that. Little rebel, you. But let’s talk a little bit more about fabric grain and bias so that you have a bit more info about how it might affect your makes moving forward. So in woven fabrics, the grain is an imaginary line that runs parallel to the selvage of the fabric, so down the length of the bolt of fabric. And if you try to stretch the fabric on the grain, it will have almost no give. So it won’t stretch at all. Perpendicular to the grain, that’s the cross grain, and the cross grain has a little bit more give than the grain. But still not much. And then if we change the angle again, and you try to stretch the fabric on a 45 degree angle from the grain, a diagonal from the selvedge, you’re going to find the true bias. And that has the most give. You’ll actually find that it’s shockingly stretchy in that direction. And that’s why bias tape is something that we use in sewing, because it has so much stretch and the ability to, like, follow the curve of an armscye or a neckline.

Caroline: And pattern pieces usually have the grain direction marked on them so that you can make sure the grain of the fabric is going up and down the body. If you choose to cut pieces off grain, you might run into some issues with how your garment hangs. Some pieces might stretch out when you sew them or handle them a lot. They might hang lower on one side than the other. This is because you’re cutting them on the bias or slightly on the bias. So the closer the pattern pieces are to being on-grain, the fewer issues you will have. If you ever, like, have a pair of pants that, like, twist in the leg, that’s a really good example of how, like, cutting something slightly off grain can just affect the way that something fits or feels or hangs on your body.

Helen: Totally. And if you find that you’re running into these kinds of issues in your makes but you still want to make sure you’re using every bit of fabric, we have a few suggestions for you. You can cut on a single layer instead of on the fold. There is some wasted space in the on-the-fold cutting layout. So Tetris-ing your pieces together, you’ll definitely save some fabric. You totally don’t have to follow the designer’s diagram. We’re often trying to find layouts that work for multiple sizes because we don’t want to fill multiple pages of a booklet with a layout for every single size. And we also don’t like to put pieces too close together because there’s some variation in width of fabric. Some fabrics are 56 inches, some are 57, some are 58. So we can’t necessarily squeeze a little pocket piece in the nook of, like, a shoulder or something, because that might not fit for everybody. So there’s always tighter ways to lay things out and cut things out. And you can even print your pattern pieces first, make your own custom layout, measure the exact amount of fabric that you’re going to need, and then order that fabric rather than buying the fabric first.

Caroline: Yeah, 100%. It’s kind of fun to be able to, like, tetris things together and see how you can get your garment out of as little fabric as possible, and very satisfying when you can fit it into less fabric than is required, sometimes.

Helen: Oh, definitely.

Caroline: One tip is that if you can’t fit all of your pieces cut on the grain, cutting cross grain would be the next best thing. A lot of the time if you have, like, a really long piece, cutting it cross grain works better, depending on, like, what the original grain was on the piece. if you do feel like you have to cut a piece out on the bias, you could add interfacing to help stabilize it so that it doesn’t stretch out. You could also patchwork some pieces together. So for example, you can add a center back seam to a T-shirt if it makes that cutting layout easier for you. Or you can cut some pieces out of different fabric, making things like facings or pocket bags, yoke linings, out of scraps from your stash. Great scrap busting idea. But yeah, once again, you make the rules, ya little rebel. Do whatever works for you, but we would officially recommend that you try to cut on grain as much as possible.

Helen: Yes, I would agree with that.

Caroline: Next caller, please.

Sara: Hi, this is Sara. I’m calling from Brooklyn. I am calling with a sewing question. So I was just making a pair of shorts that were supposed to be for a beach trip. Well, I didn’t finish them completely, but I tried them on and they were way too big. Like, way too big. I don’t know what I did in terms of measuring or how I got this so wrong, but they’re way too big. So now my question is: what do I do? Should I just take them apart and recut each piece in, like, one or two sizes smaller? Can I just take the sides and the crotch in? Any advice would be really appreciated. Thank you!

Caroline: Hi, Sara. Thank you for your call. Okay, we can’t say for sure what you should do without actually seeing the shorts, because I think it’ll depend on, like, some of the design details and the actual fit of the shorts, but we can help with some info that might help you make the decision on how to move forward. So if the shorts have an elastic waist, you can probably fix them by altering them. Try one alteration at a time and try them on after each one. So here are some that you could try: you could just baste them up the sides. You could pull them up higher on your waist to see if you should take some length off of the rise as well. If the crotch needs taking in, pinch out fabric from the crotch curve and pin or baste it to see if it fits better. We’ll link an article about how to make this alteration. Basically, you’re going to make a stitch line that starts at one inseam, goes up into the fabric, crosses the crotch seam, and goes back down the inseam of the other leg. But that could work too.

Helen: Yeah, I like all these ideas. This is where I would start for sure. If something is too big, I always just take it to the machine and start basting here and there and trying them on over and over again and seeing what effect that has and if I’m getting anywhere with that. And a lot of the time you do. And basting is so low-stakes. Like, you just throw some basting stitches in there. You can take them out. It’s so easy. That would be my first port of call. And if your shorts are more fitted, you might be able to fix them by pinching out and basting until you’re happy with the fit, but you might not. Like, if you have a zipper fly and, like, some side pocket situation, things might be a little bit further along and it would be harder to change things. So if you try it out and decide that it’s not going to work, here’s the next thing that I would do: make a muslin in a smaller size and see if that fixes it. Once you’ve made the adjustments and you have a pattern that fits you well, you can lay the pieces over the original shorts to make sure you have enough fabric. And if everything looks good, you can recut and remake those shorts. Or maybe you’re just letting those shorts be a trial run and you’re moving on to the next pair of shorts in a new fabric. And these might not make it on this vacation, which is so sad. I understand your frustration. But it’s still a project that you can continue with when you get back. And you’re still going to want shorts next time.

Caroline: Yeah. Totally. It’s a learning experience. And there’s definitely lots of options here. One more tip we have is that, if your alterations make your shorts too short, you can make hem facings using your fabric scraps or a lighter weight fabric with the same fiber content. And that’s gonna let you maximize the length of your shorts because you’ll only need like a ¼” at the shorts hem to attach the facing to. It is hard when you make something and it doesn’t fit, especially when it’s for a trip. Right?

Helen: Yeah. A trip or an event or something where you’re on a deadline and you’re kind of rushing and hoping for the best. And then, of course, sometimes the best doesn’t always happen, but I think it’s really cool that you’re not giving up on these shorts. It can be really energizing to go back, redo or fix a garment. It’s like bringing something back from the dead. Like, “It’s alive!”

Caroline: Alright. Hello, caller. What’s your sewing woe?

Tamara: Hi Helen and Caroline, this is Tamara from Australia. My question relates to doing a simple sewing project, but using complex, possibly completely mismatched fabrics. I want to make a simple zipper pouch but, stay with me because, I want to use a nubbly boucle fabric on the outside and something like silk or satin or like a beautiful Chinese-style brocade fabric on the inside. When I tried to do this, I ended up with a lot of frayed edges. Bits coming apart, chunky seams, and it really just made me feel very sad. So I thought I’d ask for your advice when you’re trying to bring together two very different fabrics, even if it’s a simple pattern. Thank you.

Helen: Hi Tamara! Okay. This is a great question. Tricky fabrics really do make simple projects complicated. But you’re on, like, a great path here because it’s a good opportunity to experiment with these different fabrics before making, say, a full garment. So we do have some tips for your next zipper pouch attempt. Boucle and silky satiny fabrics both have issues with fraying, as you experienced. This, combined with the fact that a lot of zipper pouch tutorials call for quarter inch seam allowance, is just a recipe for disaster. So try increasing your seam allowance and then trimming it down only just before you finish your seams, or as you finish your seams on a serger or something. That’s going to give you a little bit more wiggle room and will prevent your seams from coming apart.

Caroline: And interfacing your boucle will give your pouch body and strengthen the seams as well. You can block interface your pieces with fusible interfacing. Just keep in mind that nubblier boucles might get flattened by ironing. Or you can use, like, a tightly woven fabric like lawn or organza for sew-in interfacing. Make sure the interfacing goes over the seam allowance. Part of the reason it’s there is to take the stress off of the boucle, so it’s okay to stitch over it.

Helen: And sometimes the sewing method for a zipper pouch is to put the lining and main fabric together and treat them as one. But because these two fabrics, boucle and satin, are so different, I would avoid this method. Instead, it would be better to sew the lining separately and then kind of tuck it inside the bag and hand sew it in afterwards. It’s going to give you a really nice finish. You’ll have a lot of control over the situation and it’s going to reduce the bulk of your seams a little bit.

Caroline: And to avoid your silky lining fabric coming apart, you can sew a second line of stitches ⅛” outside of each seam. It’s also a good idea to finish your seams with serging or a zigzag rather than leaving them open, even though they’ll be hidden. I hope this helps. If you make another attempt at this zipper pouch, we’d love to see it. It sounds really cute. And definitely tag us on socials or email us a pic, please.

Helen: It does sound cute. I want to make a little boucle satin pouch now.

Caroline: Me, too.

Helen: All right, we’re ready for our next caller. Hello, this is the Sewing Help Line. How can we help?

Lindsey: Hi, Helen and Caroline! This is Lindsey from San Mateo, California. I just listened to the Swim Cover-Ups bonus episode on Patreon and really loved it and I had a follow-up question: I am wondering if you all know of anywhere to buy fabrics that are sun protective. I am a person who needs a lot of sun cover-up, and so, I have actually never sewn my own cover-ups because I always end up buying cover-ups that are supposed to be SPF 50 or whatever. Anyway, I’m wondering if you know of anywhere to buy fabrics that have SPF ratings, or maybe other fabrics that would be better at blocking out sun? We’re at the end of the season, so you won’t get this until fall, so not as relevant, but who knows? Maybe it might be relevant for listeners in the southern hemisphere. Anyway, yeah, thank you for taking the call and I can’t wait to keep up with the show in the off-season as a subscriber. Take care!

Caroline: Lindsey, first of all, thank you so much for supporting us on Patreon! Yeah, we sometimes wonder if people listen to the bonus mini-episodes and we’re so glad that some people do.

Helen: Yeah, we don’t have stats on that, and it’s really frustrating! We just kind of put them out there, out into the abyss, and we’re like, “Hopefully people are listening.” Lindsey is listening!

Caroline: Lindsey’s listening. Let us know if you listen. Okay, no, but let’s talk about sun-protective fabrics. The most reliable indicator that a fabric is sun-protective is when it has a UPF rating. UPF stands for ultraviolet protection factor, and this is to fabrics what SPF is to sunscreens. However, unlike sunscreens, you don’t have to reapply UPF fabrics. Bonus! And they are specially engineered and or treated, which is why they’re almost always synthetics.

Helen: Yeah. And even if the fabric is lightweight or light coloured, it can still be sun protective as long as it has that UPF rating. One of my favourite technical fabric stores is Discovery Fabrics, and they offer UPF-rated fabrics in knits and wovens, as well as lots of great swimwear fabrics and outerwear fabrics if you’re looking for more technical stuff. They’re definitely my go-to. And in the USA, Rockywoods also has a nice selection, too.

Caroline: Yeah. So UPF-rated fabrics aren’t the only option for protecting yourself from the sun. Here are some factors that make fabrics more sun protective according to the Skin Cancer Foundation: dark or bright colours absorb light rather than allowing it to penetrate the fabric. Densely woven fabric or heavier fabric lets less light through. So if you hold a fabric up to the light and you can see through it, then it’s also letting light through to your skin. Unbleached cotton has natural lignins that absorb UV light, and shiny fabrics like satin reflect light away from you, so those 70s satin caftans are actually super smart. And finally, garments that stretch tightly over your body usually offer less UV protection than looser garments, since the fabric opens up when it stretches. Wet clothing also usually stretches out and lets in more light, so that’s something to keep in mind.

Helen: Totally. Also, I feel like a summer umbrella is just a really great fashion statement.

Caroline: Mmhmm, yeah, hats, umbrellas…

Helen: Oh, a hat! Yeah, I’m a real shade seeker. I love summer and I love swimming, like I’ve been saying, but I have to find shade regularly. I get overwhelmed in the sun, so I feel you. And this is a lot to remember. We’re going to link the article about where to get this info so you can reference it and the stores that we mentioned. It seems like, in general, if you choose a natural fiber fabric in a tight weave, in a bright or a dark colour, that would be a good starting point. I also like that test where you hold it up to the light. That makes a lot of sense to me. And then, of course, those UPF fabrics are going to take you to the next level.

Caroline: Mmhmm, I think, like, any fabric is better than nothing? Right?

Helen: That’s true. Should I just, like, slather myself in oil and run around naked outside?

Caroline: Okay, let’s get to the next caller. Hello, this is the Love to Sew Help Line!

Sara: Hi, this is Sara from Rohnert Park. I’m a pretty new seamstress, I’ve made a few garments now, maybe three or four, and in a recent podcast Helen convinced me that I could make a quilt! So I found a quilt-along and I’m working on the Standing Tall Quilt and it’s coming along. I’m just beginning to sew my rectangles together. But Helen, I’m used to your patterns holding my hand through the whole process, and I read through my pattern, and the end says “Now use your preferred methods” and then there’s, like, four sentences! To finish a quilt! I’m a baby quilter. I don’t have a preferred method. So, I’m curious, is the best method to just search the Internet and see what I find, or if you have any other recommendations for the preferred way to finish the quilt. Thanks! Bye.

Helen: Sara, you crack me up. I love this voicemail so much. I’m so excited for you to start quilting! I’m glad I hooked one, Caroline, I got one! She’s in. And it’s really awesome that you joined a group and you jumped right in, doing this little sew along. And a big difference, as you’ve noticed, between quilting patterns and garment sewing patterns is that quilting patterns are typically only for the patchwork part. So only for making the top part of the quilt or the top layer of the quilt. Quilters generally have their own favourite or preferred methods for the actual sandwiching, basting, quilting, binding, all of those finishing steps. So they might be, you know, a little bit, not annoyed, but just like, “Why do I need this extra information at the end of the pattern?” Quilt patterns are typically a lot shorter, sweeter, and then they do just have that final page where it’s like, okay, now you go ahead and you finish that baby however you want. So this is what you’ve encountered in this pattern. But don’t worry, I do have you covered. I actually did include all of the finishing steps in detail in our other free beginner pattern, the Playful Placemats, which is where I wanted people to have a reference. If they were going to start quilting, they could start with that pattern, do a small project, and have all the information at their fingertips for how to finish a quilt. So you can download that one for free and that will help you as a reference for finishing your Standing Tall Quilt. So that’s one place you can get that information. But I’m going to give you a quick overview of my favourite methods today. So, many quilters actually don’t do the quilting step themselves; they pay a long arm quilting service to do it for them. I love my long armer, Shelly from Ma Tante Quilting. I send her my quilt top, my batting, my backing…actually I don’t even send her the batting. She does the batting part. I send her the top, the backing, she basic quilts it and sends it back and then I finish it off with the binding. And I get to choose the design for it and she can help me pick a thread colour. Now, this is definitely an investment, but it gives a really beautiful result and it lets me focus on my favourite part of the quilting process, which is the patchwork, pieced top. And then I just know that it’s going to be beautifully quilted and it will last forever and become, like, an heirloom, you know, which is part of the reason why people do invest in long arming. But a lot of quilters do really enjoy the quilting part. So it’s really all about your personal preferences and what you like to do. I don’t send all of my quilts to the long armer. I do quilt them on my machine or by hand, sometimes. My hand quilted ones are smaller because it can take a very long time. And if you suspect you would love doing a bunch of hand quilting, then definitely go for it. But I would recommend starting on a small project and maybe not doing hand quilting for your very first quilt because you want to just, like, push through and get this one done.

Caroline: Yeah, hand quilting is a marathon, if I understand correctly.

Helen: Yes it is, and a lot of people really enjoy it. It can be really meditative and nice and, you know, just taking pleasure in every little stitch. I struggle with it personally, but I am working on one and it’s, it’s taking a while, but it is getting there and it looks really beautiful. But for machine quilting, there’s a few steps involved. So, you’ve finished your Standing Tall top and it’s all beautiful and ready to go. The first thing you want to do is mark out your quilting lines on the top of your quilt. You can test out your marking tool on your fabrics to be sure that it’s removable before you go ahead and mark it all up. And if you just plan to follow the lines in the quilt, you can skip the marking step. So for Standing Tall, a really easy quilting design would be to sew, say, a quarter inch away from each seam vertically. This would go really nicely with the linear design of the patchwork. And your batting that you’re using will actually tell you on the packaging what the maximum space you can have between your quilt lines is. You don’t want to have huge gaps where things can kind of get bunched up. You want to have a good amount of quilt lines. Ooh, Caroline’s raising her hand. What’s your question. Caroline?

Caroline: I have a question! Why is it more common in quilting to do your stitch lines like, away from the seam and not, like, stitch in the ditch?

Helen: So, stitch in the ditch is also a really great approach and people do do that in quilting. But I wouldn’t recommend it for beginners simply because it’s hard to stay in that ditch, you know, line after line after line after line, following your patchwork, trying to stay in the ditch. You’re bound to wobble in and out, especially if you’re new to sewing. So it’s actually easier to do ¼” or ⅜” away from the seam because then you can use your foot as the guide, and you’re going to end up with a straighter line, and you’re not going to have to worry about, like, hitting that ditch every time. But stitching in the ditch is a good option, too. Great question.

Caroline: And if you go off, like, a millimeter or two, it’s less obvious than if you’re, like, veering out of the ditch.

Helen: Exactly. Yeah. And it adds a little bit of extra visual interest, texture, to the whole project rather than…a stitch in the ditch really just brings out the patchwork design. There’s so many different things you can do with quilting, stitching the top of the quilt, so I mean it really, I’m just still in the early stages, I feel like, of experimenting with this myself, but for beginners I definitely think, like, vertical, horizontal, diagonal lines are the way to go, and not trying to do anything too fancy or too complicated on your first try.

Caroline: Mmhmm.

Helen: And then, of course, you need to make your little quilt sandwich. You take your backing, batting, and your quilt top, you make them into a smooth, even quilt sandwich, and then you’re going to baste that together. I like spray basting, which is just spray glue, and it’s so simple and effective because you can just actually stick all those layers together and then they’re not going anywhere. But many people do use safety pins or quilting pins, which are like little safety pins with a little bend in them. You don’t want to use regular pins because it’s such a big project. Regular pins can fall out, regular pins can stab you as you’re working with it, you have this big massive thing in your lap at your machine and as you’re quilting along the last thing you want is like a bunch of pins stabbing you in the legs.

Caroline: Mmhmm.

Helen: So that’s why quilting pins are really important to use for these projects. And then you’re going to sew your quilting lines through your quilt sandwich, and like I said, simple designs like straight lines, or as Caroline suggested, a stitch in the ditch is great. And you want to start with a line in the middle of your quilt and work outwards to avoid any bumps or bubbles. It’s kind of like when you’re applying a sticker, you know, you don’t want to start on the outside and work in, you want to start in the middle and work out so you can smooth it out as you go. And lastly, you’re going to square up your quilt and trim off all that excess batting and then bind it. And there’s lots of methods for binding too, which I won’t get into today, but truly, as you said, Sara, it is kind of a google-it-and-see-what-you-like.

Caroline: Mmhmm. I have, like, some beginner, not really questions, but like, comments. One thing I want to say is, if you’re using pins, you’re not, like, removing them as you sew like you do in garment sewing…like, those pins or those safety pins stay in the quilt, right? When you’re sewing? And then you take them all out at the end?

Helen: It does depend, because if your quilt line design is really dense, you might have to remove them as you go to get them out of the way of your stitching. But if you’ve strategically pinned in between your stitching lines, then you can leave them in and you don’t have to take them out until the end. So some people like to take them out as they go. Some people wait till the end. And it kind of depends on how dense your quilting is.

Caroline: Okay, my other thing I wanted to say, which you kind of touched on when you were talking about, lik,e going from the inside out when you’re stitching, but: always stitching in the like, same direction makes a big difference. Because if you go, let’s say like, inside out and then you, like, turn it around and go outside in, like, that’s gonna backfire because it creates these like, almost like roping lines where, like, your fabric gets, like, skewed, which is a mistake I made when I was quilting, like, a little baby blanket once. And I was just quilting on the diagonal and I wasn’t going in the same direction and I had to end up, like, unpicking because I was like, “This isn’t working.” It was, like, getting all skewed and weird, so.

Helen: Yeah, it’s really tempting, with small projects especially, to stitch to one end and then just, like, flip it around and stitch back the other direction. With a larger quilt it’s actually harder to do that because it takes so much effort to spin the thing around. It’s easier to kind of get to the end, undo it from your machine, and then just slide it back to the beginning and do the next line, which is what you want to be doing, because as Caroline said, you get roping, which is like diagonal folds in between your stitch lines. It doesn’t look great. If you are getting roping despite all your best efforts, a walking foot really helps with quilting. A lot of quilters use a walking foot. I have a Pfaff that has a little built-in walking foot, their IDT system, and I find it works quite well. I don’t have an additional walking foot. So that’s something you want to look into if you’re having issues. Okay, each of these steps could, I feel like, literally be an entire episode of Love to Sew. Or Love to Quilt, my spinoff podcast that will never happen. But it could be several episodes to go through all of these things. So another reason why quilting patterns don’t walk you through it is just that the instruction booklet would be huge and it would be a little bit repetitive. So what I would recommend is that you go to our former guest Suzy Quilts’s blog. She has a section of the blog called “Quilting 101” and it has a section for each quilting step. So start with the basting section, read a couple of articles, baste your quilt, then move on to the quilting section, read a couple articles, quilt it, and then binding will be the last section. Try not to overwhelm yourself with all the information at once, but Suzy Quilts really does have, like, my go-to directive articles about quilting. They’re just really well-written and really well-photographed.

Caroline: Mmhmm. Oh my gosh. So much information, Helen.

Helen: I know. Sorry, Sara. I feel like I let Sara down, but hopefully I made up for that with the answer to this question.

Caroline: I don’t think you did. It seems like that’s really the standard in quilt patterns and it makes a lot of sense that there would be so many different ways that you can go. You just can’t lay it all out there.

Helen: Yeah, I debated doing that with my quilt patterns because really detailed instruction booklets is my thing, you know, and it is what Helen’s Closet is known for. So when I started Cedar Quilt Co., I was really on the fence about whether or not to go that route and make them a little bit more robust than some of the quilting patterns that I’ve seen out there. And I think that they are more robust than, say, your average quilting pattern, because they are digital. So it’s easy for me to add a few pages and explain some extra things. But all of those finishing steps really do take up a ton of space and would be difficult to explain. And people have really, like, specific opinions, strong opinions about how it should be done. So I don’t want to be the one telling people how to do it, you know? I’m still new to this.

Caroline: I would also venture to say that the quilting world is even more, like, saturated with tutorials and articles and support online. So you shouldn’t have trouble at all finding the information that you need to help you finish this quilt. And yeah, just get out there on google and find what you want and try some different things and you’ll figure out what is the best method for you. And then you’ll have your own strong opinions and you’ll be like, “Helen, don’t tell me what to do! I know what I want to do!”

Helen: “I know what I want to do!”I’m so excited for you to finish your first quilt. Like you mentioned, you’re a new garment sewer. You’ve sewn a few garments. So for you to tackle a quilt at this stage, I’m so proud of you. And finishing your quilt is going to be, like, such an amazing feeling. You got this!

Caroline: Aw! Alright, that’s enough about quilting. Next caller, please!

Hannah: Hi, Helen and Caroline. This is Hannah from Nelson, B. C. I was just calling to see if you had some sewing machine recommendations. I’m currently using a Baby Lock Joy, and it’s a little bit below my level at this point. I’ve had it for a couple years, and I love it. it does great things, except it really sucks at buttonholes. So I’ve actually been hand sewing buttonholes since I got this machine, which is not my favourite part of making any projects. So any recommendations on maybe, like, lower-cost, as I’m still a student, and also, planning a wedding at the moment, sewing machines would be incredible. Love the pod. I hope to hear from you soon. Bye.

Caroline: Hi, Hannah! Thank you so much for calling in. And I am so sorry that you’ve been hand sewing buttonholes. RIP, like, your fingers. That sounds really frustrating.

Helen: Oh my gosh, does it ever.

Caroline: How many buttonholes? I’m, I need pictures. Like, I must know more. That’s…what a slog, but good for you for your commitment. First off, I want to say, before you give up on your Baby Lock Joy, I want to suggest troubleshooting the buttonhole function. There are a few different factors which can mess up buttonholes, and you might be able to save hundreds of dollars if you can figure out what’s going wrong. Also, side note, expensive sewing machines can mess up buttonholes too.

Helen: So true.

Caroline: In my experience, even the really high-end sewing machines will give you trouble with buttonholes, so it’s not unique to your machine. And I think you’ll gain some great skills if you can figure out how to actually troubleshoot this issue. So first, are your fabrics well interfaced? Sometimes buttonholes get wonky if there’s not enough structure in the fabric for them to hold on to. Typically, button plackets have a couple of layers of fabric, plus interfacing. But just make sure that that area that you’re putting a buttonhole into is nice and stable. Second, have you tried adjusting the tension? So, buttonholes can look super weird if the tension is off. So give that a try. Maybe try playing around with that a little bit on some scraps of fabric and see how that goes. Third, have you followed the instructions in your manual step by step? This might seem obvious, and if you can’t find your manual you can probably find it online, but our assistant Lisa told us that back in the day she thought her machine couldn’t do buttonholes; it turned out she wasn’t pulling the buttonhole lever down. So give that a look. And finally, if you’re unhappy with the tightness of the stitches on your machine, you can sew your buttonholes twice to get a thicker, more secure result. Another thing I find a lot of the time with buttonholes: you have to grab the threads when you start sewing so they don’t get, like, taken up into the buttonhole and, like, all knotted at the back. So holding on to those threads as you start the buttonhole might help. I’ve also found that sometimes, like, the fabric just needs, like, a little bit of help moving it along. Like, it can sort of get stuck and crunched up in there. And if you just give it, like, a little bit of nudge with your fingers and just, like, help it through those feed dogs, that can make a really big difference. You don’t want to like, pull it or push it through, but just, like, a little bit of a nudge can help just get things going. The reason I’m suggesting troubleshooting the buttonhole function is that the Baby Lock Joy actually has a good reputation. In fact, Dan and Marty from The Sewing Machine Shop recommend it as one of their top machines in the under $550 price range. So I don’t actually think you’re going to find a better machine that’s still affordable. But if you are still having trouble with your buttonholes, you also might want to reach out to Baby Lock, see if they have any insight into the issue. It might be a known issue. There might be a fix for it. And finally, if you’d rather buy a new machine, we’re going to link up an article with Dan and Marty’s top picks in our show notes. We also talk a lot about sewing machine models in our episode all about sewing machines, So we’ll link that up in the show notes too. Yeah, I would say, don’t give up yet, Hannah, because there might be hope for this buttonhole on the machine that you have.

Helen: We’re gonna hold out hope for you. And you’re totally not alone. Like Caroline said, everyone struggles with this on their machine, whether they have an entry-level machine or a really high-end machine, things can go awry with buttonholes. I used to sew my buttonholes just with zigzag stitches when I first started because I didn’t know how to do it any other way. So I would just do, like, a really tight line of zigzag stitches down the side, either side, and then a slightly wider one at the top and bottom. And honestly, that works, especially if you stick some fray check on there to really, like, cinch it all together and make sure that it doesn’t come apart.

Caroline: It’s kind of like a bar tack, right? You just, like, use the bar tack setting if you have one or just do like a really really dense zigzag. That totally works.

Helen: It’s like a build-a-buttonhole.

Caroline: I would totally do that before hand sewing buttonholes.

Helen: Yeah. Same. Honestly.

Caroline: We need, like, a buttonhole support group or something. Buttonholers Anonymous.

Helen: Maybe that exists. Yeah. I love the buttonholes on my Pfaff, Expression, Expression 710, I think is what…you have that one too, right, Caroline? That machine. Yeah. And honestly, it makes really beautiful buttonholes. Like every once in a while, you know, it’ll snag or something. Like, the thread will get tangled. But for the most part, I really do love the buttonhole function on that machine. For what that’s worth.

Caroline: Totally. Okay, we’re ready for our next caller. Hello, you’ve reached the Love to Sew Help Line!

Jan: Hi, it’s Jan from Montreal, Canada. Can you help me with doing a wedding hat or a fascinator? Like, where to buy the supplies, how can I do it? And by the way, I love your podcast. Bye! Have a nice day.

Helen: Hi Jan! This is such a fun question. It’s more of a fabric and notions question than a sewing question, I think, and I will start off by saying that I have not made a fascinator before, but we did look into this for you, so hopefully we can help you out. So to start off, I think the best thing to do is to buy a base for the fascinator rather than to make your own. These bases are blocked by the manufacturer, meaning that the felt, straw, or other material is formed into a shape with moisture and/or heat. So even with small fascinators, I don’t think you’re going to be able to get as good of a result by doing it yourself. The good news is that it’s easy to buy fascinator bases nowadays. There’s an amazing shop on Etsy called Petershams, which is based in the UK, They stock tons of hat bases, plus everything you would need to trim it, including things like flowers, ribbons, feathers, and veiling. Greedy Peasant, who’s an amazing follow on social media, by the way, he gets all of his hat bases from Sun Yorkos. And if you want to do your own search for materials, it can be helpful to search for “millinery supplies” or “fascinator bases.” If you’re buying a fascinator base, you may need to hand sew it to a comb or a fabric covered headband to actually get it onto your head.

Caroline: Yeah, and the next part is the best part, which is trimming your fascinator. You can use netting, wide horsehair braid, tulle, faux flowers, ribbons, feathers, and more to make your fascinator look amazing. To inspire you, we have a couple of tutorials we’ll link for you in the show notes. One is by Melissa from Polka Dot Chair and the other is by Nancy from Nally Studios. It does seem like hot glue is heavily involved in these tutorials, but of course, you can sew them in instead. I love a hot glue project, though. Honestly, it’s a nice relief from sewing.

Helen: I feel so inspired. I’ve never thought of making a fascinator before. I mean, I think I would need some sort of an event to wear one to, but if I had such an event, like Frocktails or something like that would be a great place to wear a fun fascinator. I think this project would be a blast to make. It’d be so fun.

Caroline: Yeah. Like, I wanna know where you’re wearing this fascinator to, Jan. And we would love to see the finished fascinator if you end up making one. They are so much fun.

Helen: Alright, we’ve got one last caller. Hello, this is Helen and Caroline!

Jeannine: Hi, Helen and Caroline! My name is Jeannine and I’m from Iowa in the United States. First off, I wanted to say, I love your podcast. I’m a Patreon subscriber and I just love how inclusive you guys are, how friendly you are, and just overall listening to your podcast. My next thought was on, a little bit on social media but just overwhelm and sewing. I’m a physician, and like many other people, I don’t have a whole lot of time to sew. I really like to try and keep up on fabrics and patterns and podcasts, but it’s really hard for me, especially when I have to keep up with so much stuff with my job. So my question is: how do you guys deal with overwhelm in the sewing realm? There are so many patterns to keep up with, there are so many tutorials that are amazing, there are so many podcasts to listen to, sometimes it just feels like, “Wow, I have so much to do that I’m just so overwhelmed” and it’s a bit not very fun. So what do you guys do to deal with that? How do you guys set boundaries for yourself and how do you guys keep up with it all? Again, thank you so much for everything. I love listening to you guys and I can’t wait to hear more. Good luck with your businesses! Bye!

Helen: Hi Jeannine! Thank you so much for your call. Oh man, I can so relate to this question. I often feel really overwhelmed by the amount of sewing content out there. And the trouble is that it’s all amazing. Like, I truly want to consume it all, but I also know that I can’t. And honestly, I don’t think there’s anyone out there who keeps up with a hundred percent of what’s going on in the sewing world. It’s such a big community with a lot of people making content and tutorials and patterns and tips. And it’s only grown since we started this podcast seven years ago. It’s grown so much. So I just try to get positive things from it when I spend my time online engaging with the community and try to let go of the rest, all of the things that I know that I’m missing or not seeing. And you know, as a physician, like, you keep up with what’s going on in the medical world so that you can ease people’s suffering and save lives. But the stakes with the sewing world are so much lower. So I think you can easily kind of let that go and not worry too much about it.

Caroline: Yeah, I think we’ve both had our own journeys with, like, boundaries with social media and, like, consuming a lot, consuming a lot less, taking breaks, getting back into it, like, feeling really overwhelmed. Boundaries are super important and I think, like, it’s kind of different for everybody. But with that said, we do have some ideas for cutting down on the amount of sewing media you consume. Think about which sewing websites and social media accounts give you the most information. So check on those once a week, kind of like a personalized sewing digest. And if you’re interested in new indie pattern releases, we cover them in our monthly bonus episode. And The Fold Line also does really good coverage of new patterns. So you can check them out if you want to get updates on, like, what’s new out there.

Helen: You can choose a couple of your favourite fabric shops, ahem, Blackbird Fabrics, ahem, Helen’s Closet, and sign up for those email lists so that you know about fabric drops and sales. And then you can unsubscribe from the rest of those emails, the ones that you’re not opening on a regular basis. They’re always going to be there. You can go back to them. And I don’t take it personally when people unsubscribe. I know people come and go and it’s not a big deal. But honestly I think email is a really great way to kind of stay up to date without having to necessarily dive into the world of social media and the online sewing community over there because that can be really instantly overwhelming. So just following a few people that you really like via their newsletter can be a little bit more like a, like a little magazine read in your inbox.

Caroline: Yeah. And also remember, like, you don’t need to know everything about everything right away. You can only read tutorials and tips about the project that you’re working on. Like, if you almost never sew zippers, there’s really no need to learn how to insert them perfectly. If you decide to make something with a zipper down the line, you can look at the tips and tutorials then. And if you see an article that you think might be useful for you in the future, just bookmark it. Read it later when you’re working on that kind of thing. And you can also decide which kind of podcast episodes are your favourite and listen to those first. And if you run out of those, you can always listen to the other ones afterwards. But not with our podcast. You should listen to every episode of our podcast.

Helen: I, I choose to believe that she is, because she called in, you know?

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: I think it’s so cool that you really want to stay up to date with the sewing world. It’s obviously something that you’re passionate about and I think a lot of our listeners can relate to that desire and also the feeling of overwhelm. I do think it’s possible to get all the biggest news without running yourself ragged trying to read and listen to everything that’s out there. I mean, having too much good sewing content is a great problem to have, right?

Caroline: Yeah. I’m definitely glad we have so many amazing creators and designers and small businesses in our community. There’s also a lot of platforms now where you can interact with people. So if you’re finding that, like, Instagram is maybe not making you feel good, like, try TikTok or try Pattern Review, try joining another forum. Like, experiment a little bit, try just doing newsletters, like, maybe you’ll find a lane that you really enjoy and that you feel like you get a lot out of. You don’t have to do everything and participate in everything. It’s always gonna be there if you want to catch up, you know?

Helen: Yeah, I was going to say that next, is that: it’s not going anywhere. The few times that I have taken breaks over the years from social media and given myself a little breather so I can just, like, catch my breath and focus on my, you know, IRL life, my real life, it’s always there when I go back and it’s still happening and it’s still amazing and I don’t feel like I necessarily missed much, you know. So you definitely can take breaks. And we’re always going to be here.

Caroline: It’s so true. And also, like, you don’t know what you don’t know. Like, you don’t know what you’re missing. And it’s probably really healthy to, like, spend that time IRL and, like, remember that, like, those in-person relationships or actually working on the craft that you love is maybe more important than, like, scrolling and being, sort of like a slave to the algorithm and making sure that you’re always up to date on everything. Like, it’s okay if you’re not. That’s actually really healthy.

Helen: Definitely. Yeah. Good advice, Caroline. I needed that.

Caroline: Okay, on that note, we are closing the phone lines for today. And we just want to say thank you to all of our callers for their questions, because this was really fun. And we love you all so much for listening. And I can’t believe we’ve been doing this for seven years. Oh my gosh.

Helen: Yes! If you’ve been with us from the beginning, like, just so much love. So much love to you. Thank you so much. It’s been an amazing seven years. Big hugs.

Caroline: Big hugs.

Helen: We’re so excited for this next season and we’ll talk to you next week!

Caroline: Yeah. Thanks for listening. Bye!

Helen: That’s it for today’s episode of Love to Sew. You can find me, Helen, at Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co. and Caroline at Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns. We’re recording in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.

Caroline: You can support Love to Sew and get access to bonus content by subscribing on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. You even get access to the back catalogue of bonus episodes. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew. Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or check out our podcast page on Apple Podcasts for more info.

Helen: Head to lovetosewpodcast.com to find our show notes. They’re filled with all the links and pictures we mentioned in this episode. And if you’d like to get in touch with us and leave us a voicemail, like our callers today, you can call us at 1-844-SEW-WHAT. That’s 1-844-739-9428. Or send us an email at [email protected]. We accept voice memos. We accept snail mail. I mean, we accept it all.

Caroline: And a huge thank you to our amazing podcast team who make all of this come together for us. Lisa Ruiz is our creative assistant and Jordan Moore of The Pod Cabin is our incredible editor. And thank you for listening. We will talk to you next week.

Helen: Buh-bye!

Caroline: Bye!

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We want to hear you brag! In this episode, we share our listeners’ proudest sewing moments. And maybe we’ll brag a little bit, too! Plus, we answer a question about sewing machine servicing and share feedback from our Long-Time Sewists episode.

The transcript for this episode is on this page, at the end of the show notes.

Show Notes: 

Previous Episodes Mentioned:

From the Listener Feedback and Questions section:

Our Proudest Sewing Moments:

Listeners’ Proudest Sewing Moments:

A post shared by Heather • Sewing tips + Pattern Hacks (@_heathermade)

Sewing Patterns:

Other Mentions:

Ruth Collins’s Instagram: @ithacamaven (The Top Down Center Out Fitting Method)

A post shared by Ruth (@ithacamaven)

Transcript:

Helen: We are recording today on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish and Kwakwaka’wakw peoples, including Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, Musqueam, and K’ómoks first nations.

Hello and welcome to Love to Sew. I’m Helen, the designer behind Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co.

Caroline: and I’m Caroline, the owner of Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns.

Helen: We’re two sewing buds who love to sew and it is the only thing worth talking about.

Caroline: Today we are sharing your proudest sewing moments. Hey, we asked for it! And we want to hear you brag. Maybe we’ll brag a little bit, too.

Helen: If you love to sew, this is your show.

Caroline: Hi, Helen.

Helen: Hi, Caroline.

Caroline: How are you?

Helen: I’m doing well, thanks. How are you?

Caroline: I am doing so well. I really enjoyed reading through all of our listener feedback for this episode. It’s such a feel-good feeling to be bragging about sewing.

Helen: Oh my gosh, I couldn’t agree more. It was so fun to hear everybody’s proudest sewing moments, from little things to huge projects. Really runs the gamut, so we’re so excited to share today. And I also wanted to say that this season was so much fun. I had so much fun recording it with you and we had so many great guests and it was just a blast. So I hope y’all enjoyed it too. And this is our last episode for this season, but we will be back in September with another season of Love to Sew. And of course, you can catch us over on Patreon in the summer months if you want to keep up with us.

Caroline: And Apple Podcasts! I also really enjoyed this season. I loved recording it and I’m really proud of us. We did some fun guest interviews and we talked about some really great topics. I don’t know how we managed to always come up with new ideas every season, but somehow we do.

Helen: We do! We’re overflowing with sewing ideas. It is literally all we want to talk about.

Caroline: It feels like it’s literally all we’ve been talking about for the last few months.

Helen: But I love it so much. And I’m sure we’ll have a great fall season as well. I can’t wait to brainstorm about that one.

Caroline: I know! It’s going to be great. Okay, should we get into some feedback?

Helen: Yes, let’s start today’s episode with feedback from Beth. Beth sent us a voicemail.

Beth: Hi girls, it’s Beth Stell from Winnipeg, Canada, @sewinginmycloset, and I just listened to your podcast on long-term sewists. And the woman at the end, whose home ec teacher accused her of having her mother do her work…My mother, who’s 84 now, has never been a gifted sewist, and I have no idea where I got my sewing genes from, but when she was a young girl and taking home ec class, she actually snuck her apron home for her mother to sew it for her because she was felt that her sewing skills were horrible. And at the end of the day, my mother got a B on her apron and my grandmother was terribly, terribly upset with the grade she got. So this story, of course, was a secret for a very long time. And in fact, my mum’s sewing teacher eventually became quite a good friend of the family and went to our church. And finally, one year I said to my mum, “Why don’t you just ‘fess up that you took your apron home to Mrs. Wilson?” And, you know, Mrs. Wilson at the time was probably in her 80s and my mom was in her, kind of, 60s or 70s. Well, she finally did ‘fess up and she told her that her mum was very upset with her grade. It’s a funny moment. My voicemail is probably not really good for the show, but I thought I would pass it on because it just brought back that memory. Have a great day. Love the podcast.

Caroline: Hi Beth! This is too funny. And I beg to differ; I think your voicemail is perfect for the show. I think it has a certain quality of, like, gossip where it’s like, “Your mom told my mom that she’s mad that…”

Helen: I love that, like, literally 60 years later, they’re still thinking about it and talking about it.

Caroline: You’re like, “Just admit it!”

Helen: “Just admit it already!” I was also thinking about how we’ve talked about, like, generational sewing on the show before, and sometimes, sewing skips a generation. That sounds like that’s what happened here with you, Beth, so…

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: Maybe you didn’t get it from your mum, but maybe you got it from your grandma. I mean, a B on a finished apron. I just feel like all finished sewing projects should get an A++.

Caroline: I know. Come on. This is home ec. I would definitely be furious if I got anything less than an A on the apron I made, especially if it was for somebody else and I was doing them a favour. Come on.

Helen: I can relate. I definitely sewed some pajama shorts, some boxers in my home ec class for some of my classmates when I was in home ec.

Caroline: Did you really?

Helen: Oh yeah, I definitely did. I did it for a little cashola under the table.

Caroline: No way! Oh my gosh, did Mrs. Orchard ever find out?

Helen: I don’t think so. I don’t, I’m not entirely sure. Maybe she’s listening. Sorry. Sorry! I should have waited another 50 years before telling her.

Caroline: Star student no more. You’re accepting cash under the table.

Helen: It was, like, one time, okay? I was exaggerating a little bit, but still…

Caroline: I love it. I love it.

Helen: The entrepreneurial spirit runs deep.

Caroline: Oh my gosh. Thank you so much for sharing this with us, Beth. We had a real laugh with this one. Okay, next up we have a question from Lindsey.

Lindsey: Hi Helen and Caroline and the rest of the Love to Sew team! This is Lindsey from the San Francisco Bay Area. I sent a couple questions your way recently, so apologies in advance for one more, but you seemed like the right people to ask. My question is about sewing machine service and maintenance. I inherited my grandma’s Bernina. I don’t know the last time she used it. I’ve had it for probably at least a decade. I used it very infrequently for maybe the first five years that I had it and then I got into sewing about three years ago and have been using it very regularly since. I try to do a good job of oiling it and cleaning it frequently, but I have never had it serviced since I have owned it. I haven’t noticed any issues with it, like any weird tension things or stuff like that. But I’m wondering how to know when I should service my machine, like, should I wait until there’s a problem, or should I take it every few years for a tune up? Are there specific things I should look for that let me know when it maybe needs a little bit more professional help? Any perspective you can provide on this would be so appreciated. Thank you so much for what you do with the pod. It’s my favourite podcast. So thank you so much for making so much wonderful sewing content.

Helen: Oh, thank you so much, Lindsey. It always warms our hearts to hear that people’s favourite podcast is our podcast?! Can you believe?

Caroline: No, I still can’t after all these years.

Helen: I know. It makes me, honestly, so so happy. And this is such a great question. I’m sure a lot of people can relate to this feeling of like, “I’m supposed to get my machine serviced, but like, when and why and how and how often” and all those questions. So, I mean, first off, if you’re happy with how your machine is working, you’re not having any issues, I don’t think there’s any rush to get it serviced. You don’t need to run out tomorrow and do it. The main things, of course, are to keep it clean and oiled. It sounds like you’re doing that. More recent machines, more modern machines are self-oiling, but vintage machines need to be oiled to run well. So we’ll link a couple of tutorials for how to do it yourself in the show notes. Take caution here. You don’t want to be pouring oil in there. Go light on the oil at first and just see if that makes a difference.

Caroline: My Bernina is, I would say, a more recent one. I think I got it, like, maybe 12 years ago. And it does need to be oiled, but they have very specific instructions on how to do it in the manual. So definitely take a look at that. Even machines that are still stitching can benefit from getting serviced. A servicer is going to make sure everything’s properly cleaned and aligned, and they’ll check all the parts so you can replace anything that’s, like, showing too much wear. And they’ll also make sure the timing is running perfectly so that there’s no jamming up that will happen. And they can also improve the tension of the screws, discs, and gears.

Helen: So let’s say, for example, that your machine is running fine, but your needle alignment is maybe a millimeter off. That means that each seam that you sew is going to be two millimeters off, which can add up over the course of a bunch of seams around the body. And it might be something that you’re completely unaware of.

Caroline: Mmhmm. And getting your machine serviced can also save you headaches down the road. If your machine’s timing is going off, it could mean that it starts jamming a lot and stops sewing at all. And then you could be in machine repair territory instead of machine service territory. Or if a belt is wearing out and needs to be replaced, it’s nice to know so that the belt doesn’t snap when you’re working on an outfit you planned to wear the next day. Hard relate.

Helen: Yes, and we’re not talking about the kind of belt you wear with your outfit; this belt is inside the machine. It helps to turn everything. It can also be an option to do some of the service steps yourself. The YouTube channels Vintage Sewing Machine Garage and Andy Tube have some really great videos about it. But again, be warned, it’s a bit of a deep dive into a specific skill set, and if you’re not interested in learning a lot about machine maintenance, it’s probably better just to take it to a technician regularly and just get it serviced.

Caroline: Yeah. And we should also mention that some machines are actually not designed to be serviced. You can always email a servicer to ask if your machine is okay to service or not. It’s mostly just modern machines at those, like, really low price points that tend to just not be serviceable.

Helen: “Sorry, your machine is not serviceable.”

Caroline: Repairable, but not serviceable.

Helen: Yes. And as for how often you should get your machine serviced, Brother Sewing Machines recommends getting it done every 1,000 to 1,500 hours of sewing. So if you do 10 hours of sewing a week, that would be every 2 to 3 years. If you do 5 hours of sewing a week, that would be every 4 to 6 years. I’m kind of on, like, an every, um, couple year schedule personally, probably so like 10 to 20 hours a week. And then I do some basic maintenance myself, like dusting it off and brushing out all the fibers and things like that.

Caroline: Yeah, I have to say I’m really glad that Lindsey asked this question, because I feel lied to. I have been feeling…

Helen: You thought you were supposed to do it more often?

Caroline: Yes! because when I bought my Bernina machine, the dealer put a little sticker on it that was like, “next service date” in a year. So I was like, always thought that I had to get my machine serviced every single year. And I’ve been feeling really guilty because I have not had my machine serviced in years. And I think it makes so much sense that it would be dependent on how often you use it, how many hours a week you sew. And yeah, I’m just feeling a little bit better about myself, to be honest. So thank you, Lindsey.

Helen: I mean, you totally can do it that often. It’s like car maintenance too, right? Like, they put the little sticker in your window and that’s when you’re supposed to do it. And sometimes that doesn’t always happen. And of course, it’s an added expense that you might not be able to afford at any given time. So waiting until you can afford it is obviously something that you might have to do. But again, like a car, you don’t want to not do it at all because you will run into issues and then they’ll be more serious. Like we said, you don’t want to be into repair territory. I recently took my machine to be serviced because it stopped sewing properly. It was like, barely moving along the fabric. Like, the feed dogs were not grabbing and it was just, like, sewing at like a tiny little stitch length, no matter what length I set it on. I was like, “There’s something wrong with this machine.” So I took it. “Of course it’s not me. Couldn’t possibly be me.” So I took it to the Pfaff store and I got it serviced and the technician was so nice, so lovely, but she was like, “This machine had so much fiber jammed down underneath the feed dogs that they couldn’t actually, like, move down anymore” because it was like a thick…

Caroline: What?

Helen: Like, completely compressed, like, wadded up mat of fiber down there. Because I didn’t realize that I could get under that part of the machine and clean it. She’s like, “You’re supposed to clean this.” And I was like, “What?” So she, like, showed me where I was supposed to clean it. So now I know, now I know I’ll clean it, but that was pretty funny. So that’s the situation I got into where, yeah, it stopped working. And of course, you know, I’m running a business here. I’m like, “My machine’s not working!” Like it’s stressful, so…

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: Definitely better to stay ahead of things like this. And I would say, Lindsey, it sounds like you’ve had this machine for a while. Someone had it for a while before that. I think it’s probably time. I think you’re safe to, to go and get it serviced and give it a little love.

Caroline: Yeah, totally. I want to circle back for a second on something you said about cars. Not that this is a podcast about cars, but I do think that you should listen to the sticker on your car about changing your oil. Because it can really damage your car if you don’t do that.

Helen: Oh no, this is true! Yes, yes. My apologies. You absolutely should.

Caroline: Like, I’m not a car expert, so I…

Helen: And I do, I do totally, I’m totally, like, on top of it with the car. Dentist, you know, similar kind of vibe, not so much…

Caroline: Yeah, no, dentist, I think… Oh my goodness. I hate the dentist. Let’s not even get into that.

Helen: All the servicing that needs to be done in our lives.

Caroline: Okay. Wait, let’s, let’s recap. I feel like we’re, we’re veering off track. If you’re happy with how your machine is running, then you can probably get away with just cleaning it and oiling it. Just make sure that you’re figuring out how to clean it, uh, unlike Helen, who had a lot of lint buildup.

Helen: Do all the parts.

Caroline: If you can afford it, I think it would be great to get it serviced, though. And you will probably be super happy with how it runs after you get it serviced and you won’t have to wonder if, like, a nasty surprise is waiting for you. So think of it as sending your machine away for a spa day.

Helen: Absolutely. Okay, shall we get into the episode?

Caroline: Yes! Helen, are you ready to get braggadocious?

Helen: I’ve never been more ready. I need to redeem myself after my Pfaff sewing machine story. No, this is going to be so much fun. We did ask on social media for listeners to brag about their proudest sewing moments. We got some amazing responses, emails, voicemails, all that jazz. You’ve definitely earned the right to brag. And make sure you check out the show notes for this episode, because we have so many pictures of all the amazing stuff that everyone has made.

Caroline: Yes. Okay, before we get into all the voicemails and letters that we got, Helen, I want to hear you brag. Tell me what your proudest sewing moment has been.

Helen: It was really hard to choose just one, but there is a project that stuck out in my mind when we were doing the prep for this episode. And that is my Sewaholic Minoru jacket. This was one of my very first sewing projects that I decided to tackle when I got back into sewing in 2014. Like many folks, I was really into it as a teenager, and then I took a little break when I was doing post-secondary and getting a job and finding a place to live and all that stuff. So when I got back into sewing, this was one of the first things that I decided to make. And it was a step up in skill level for me, for sure. I did not know what I was doing, but I followed the instructions and I was able to muddle through it. And some things I look at and laugh about now. Like the fusible interfacing is not fully fused. So the front’s all like lumpy, bumpy. And there are places where I sewed the top stitching with basting stitch length, ‘cause I forgot to reset my stitch length. And even though I noticed it after I sewed it, I was like, “It’s fine. Too late now!” But there are also things I look at and I’m like, “Wow. Like, I did that?” Like I did a bias binding finish on the inside of the hood pocket. I mean, I sewed a hood pocket?!

Caroline: Wow.

Helen: Like, I made little inner pockets on the lining. I, like, fully lined a jacket. I mean, it’s honestly kind of crazy when I think back on it now that this was the project I chose and that I was able to do it. And so, overall, I’m just so impressed with my former self for taking on this project. And I didn’t know how to make a lined jacket. Not even close. But I just went for it anyways, and it really sparked an interest in sewing and pattern design that has led me here to where we are today. So it’s an important project in my sewing history. And if you want to check it out, I do have a blog post all about it on my blog.

Caroline: Oh, this is so heartwarming. I was excited to hear what you were going to say because I feel like you’ve had so many proud sewing moments in your sewing journey and you are often challenging yourself to try new techniques and garments and quilting and you’ve just done so much! So going back to 2014, this is really fitting because it did really inform the next, like, 10 years of your life, so, so exciting. Yeah.

Helen: Yeah, I thought it was the perfect one because I was really proud of myself at the time, and I’m still really proud of myself for doing that project, so it felt fitting. Okay, I want to hear about yours, Caroline. Brag to me.

Caroline: This is a tough one because I was thinking, obviously, my wedding dress is a huge proud moment for me, but we did a whole episode about it. So I don’t want to dwell on that one too much because I’ve already bragged about my wedding dress. I am going to say my maid of honour dress that I made for my best friend’s wedding. And I think it’s because it was a mix of, like, sentimentality. and challenge. So it was a satin fabric, it was like a lightweight viscose satin. The dress pattern that I chose had lots of, like, darts and tucks and interesting details. It was very high-pressure because I was the maid of honour, so I was giving a speech and I walked down the aisle and I was going to be photographed, all eyes were on me. And I knew that I really wanted it to be perfect and I agonized over what to make and I still love that dress. I love the, kind of like, heartfelt meaning behind it because my best friend Sarah got married and I got to wear this dress for her wedding. And I also feel really proud of the finished result. It looked really good and it was really polished and I didn’t, like, mess anything up. And if I remember correctly, I don’t think I made it the night before I had to leave. So that was a win.

Helen: That’s a proud moment.

Caroline: And I’ll just cherish it forever. It’s still in my closet and I hope I have an opportunity to wear it again. So yeah, I, I will say, sewing makes me feel proud fairly often and that’s one of the things that I love about sewing is that you get to have these, like, little wins along the way where you can, like, pat yourself on the back and be like, “I freaking made this, like, with my hands and I am a rock star!” Because I can, it kind of makes you feel like you can do anything, you know?

Helen: Yes. It’s so true. And sometimes I think we pass up opportunities to brag about our sewing because it can feel a little uncomfy…don’t necessarily want to have, you know, the spotlight on you. Um, but when people compliment things that I’m wearing that I made, I try to take that moment to be like, “Thanks, I made it.” And then it sparks this great conversation about, “Wow, really? Like, that’s so cool.” Like, this happened to me at the hairdresser the other day when I was checking out after I got my haircut and somebody complimented my Orbit Bag. And I was like, “Thanks, I made it.” And they were like, “Oh my gosh, I love it.” Caroline, get this. This person just joined the sewing community. They were so excited about sewing. They were like, “Really? Is there a pattern for that?” And I was like, “Yeah! I’m a pattern designer.” And I was telling her all this stuff. And then she says, “Have you heard of the Bestie Bag?” And I was like, “Yes. Oh my gosh. That’s my friend’s bag!”

Caroline: Oh my gosh!

Helen: “We have this podcast together!” And like, it was just so fun telling her about all of our stuff. And she was, like, pretty new to the community. So she was just finding her footing and learning about all these designers. And like, she hadn’t heard of our podcast yet. She was so excited. It was just, like, such a fun moment. And then she’s like, starts calling over all the other people who were at the salon, like who weren’t busy and be like, “She made her bag.” I was like, “Yeah,” I stepped back and I was like, “And I made my jacket and my top. And my jeans.” And they were like, “Whaaat?”

Caroline: Oh my god.

Helen: there’s like this, like, semi-circle of people around me just being like, “No, you didn’t.” Like, “Are you kidding me?” It’s so amazing. And it was just fun. Like, yes, I was fully bragging, but it wasn’t in like a, I don’t know, like a pompous way. It was just in a nice, like, communal way. And I was trying to get them excited about sewing. I’m like, “You can do it too!” Yeah. I’m that person.

Caroline: Yeah. I do think it’s so important to allow yourself to just brag once in a while about your sewing and, like, spread the love and like accept those compliments and feel proud of yourself, which is why I’m so excited about this episode, because we got some amazing voicemails and messages from our listeners So I think it’s time to share your proud moments, everyone.

Helen: Yes. Okay, our first letter is from Malena. “I’ve worked as a pattern maker for 15 years now and, unfortunately, when I started working as one, I lost sewing as a hobby. A few years ago, I became a freelancer and wanted to create a product of my own. My knitting sisters told me all about PDF patterns. I’d never heard about them, so I instantly started to do some research. Found your podcast pretty quickly and discovered a whole new world of home sewing. So much had happened while I’d been away. When I sewed back in the days, Burda was the one and only pattern resource I had. I basically used your show notes as research material and started to create my own patterns as a side business from my freelance work.” Ooh, I love this story.

Caroline: I know, me too. “Fast forward a few years and I’ve now released eight PDF patterns. And now to the bragging part. Oh, wait, we’re not there yet. Together with Johanna Lundstrom, we have just launched a sewing and fitting book. It’s called Fit for Knits and it’s all about how to sew and fit knitted garments. I’m so proud of it. And I actually have you guys to thank for it being written. Can you guess how I met Johanna? I heard the episode when you interviewed her, and since we both live in Sweden, I thought, “I need to contact her.” So I did. And since then, we’ve been helping each other out with different projects. And now we’ve written a book together! So thank you so much for introducing us and for your fabulous show notes. It’s really made a huge difference for me.”

Helen: Oh, Malena, this is such an amazing achievement. It amazes me that Love to Sew had a part to play in you starting your PDF pattern business and meeting Johanna, who is amazing, obviously, but really I think you’re not giving yourself enough credit. I mean, you designed your patterns and you started your business and you reached out to Johanna and you wrote that book with her. It’s so, so, so cool. And for anyone out there who wants to check out this pattern company, it’s called Hazelhen Patterns. Hopefully i’m pronouncing that correctly. “Hazelhen,” one word.

Helen: We’ll have that and the book Fit for Knits all linked up in our show notes.

Caroline: Ooh, thanks, Malena. Okay, next up we have a voicemail from Ellen.

Ellen: Hey, Love to Sew, Helen and Caroline. My name is Ellen. I am calling you from Texas. And I wanted to say that I had a really proud sewing moment just this last weekend. One of my daughters, who is almost 10, had requested a dress, and I knew just which patterns to combine to make it. But when I got down to it, I was like, “I’m just going to do it quick and dirty. I don’t have time to figure out how to combine these and make a nice clean finish on the bodice and everything.” However, when I got to those steps where I would normally do a, follow the instructions for a nice clean finish inside with a fully lined and enclosed bodice, I thought, “You know what? I bet I can do this. Just trust yourself, Ellen.” And I did, I just trusted myself. And sure enough, 20 minutes later, I had a beautifully enclosed bodice for this dress and I didn’t have to use any instructions. I just trusted myself. And that was a really proud moment for me. Thanks for your show. Bye!”

Caroline: Thank you so much for calling us, Ellen. I live for these voicemails. And this is such a beautiful moment when you stop underestimating yourself and start realizing that you’ve got everything you need. The skills, the brains, and the patience to make something really beautiful. You did it, Ellen. You had the tools! Amazing job!

Helen: There’s nothing more satisfying than realizing how capable you are, you know?

Caroline: Yeah, totally. Mmhmm.

Helen: That “I got this” moment.

Caroline: Mmhmm. Yeah.

Helen: Incredible. Our next letter is from Stephie. “I saw your story where you asked your followers to brag about their projects, so here I am. It’s my boy’s baby blanket that I sewed while I was pregnant. It was also my first quilting project after I had exclusively sewn garments. I must say, it was so much fun, even though I still don’t know how I got the diamond edge to work, but it does. I’ve decided not to bother about it anymore and just be happy and proud every time I see it. Love your podcast. It’s accompanied the making of this blanket. Love from Leipzig, Germany.”

Caroline: Hi, Stephie! Oh my gosh, this baby blanket is absolutely beautiful. We got to see some pictures and…chef’s kiss. Gorgeous. I love it.

Helen: Yes, I particularly love the colour palette. Like, the fabric in the center has a print of a little neighbourhood with houses and trees and animals. And then it has that gorgeous pieced diamond border. Soft, warm yellows and oranges with these blue accents. It is so, so cozy looking. Amazing that this is your first quilt. I still haven’t done a diamond border and I’m intimidated. So, kudos to you.

Caroline: Ooh. Oh my gosh.

Helen: I also just love to hear about garment sewists trying quilting and loving it. I mean, I can relate just, just a little bit.

Caroline: Just a bit.

Helen: Just a little bit.

Caroline: Okay, next up we have a brag from Susie. “Sometimes I look down and realize everything except my socks and underwear are all me-mades and I feel so empowered. Nothing fancy, but I’m proud of making clothes I love.”

Helen: Oh, yes, I love this so much. I feel so powerful when I have this thought. But I have to disagree about the “nothing fancy” part. I mean, having a handmade custom wardrobe in fabrics that you love and chose is absolutely luxurious. So you are fancy, even when you’re wearing those handmade sweatpants and a t-shirt. You definitely deserve to brag about it.

Caroline: You fancy! For sure.

Helen: You fancy! We are all fancy, all the time.

Caroline: It’s so true, it is so exciting when you can really wear, like, head-to-toe me-made and feel proud of it. So good job, Susie.

Helen: Right? Down to the underwear, down to the socks, if you knit, I mean.

Caroline: Imagine. I haven’t gotten there yet, but one day. One day.

Helen: Jane wrote in to say, “I made my nurse friend a scrub top and every time she wears it, she sends me a pic! And she looks so awesome in it.”

Caroline: Oh, this is so sweet. It is the best feeling when someone really appreciates something you’ve sewn them and your friend sounds like an amazing hype woman. And you seem like a wonderful friend to have, too. I think that’s majorly brag-worthy.

Helen: Totally. I also think scrub tops are so cute. I just love the, I don’t know, I love the vibe. And like, they’re often in these really fun prints and things like that. At least, some people wear those fun prints and I’m here for it.

Caroline: I feel like they’re also a good option for like, quilting cottons, because they tend to be quite, like, boxy, so would work really well in all kinds of quilting prints. Anyways, we’re getting off track.

Helen: Yeah, a good like, beginner project, too.

Caroline: Love to Sew Scrubs. No, kidding.

Helen: Yeah. Oh my gosh. Sewing Scrubs, a whole episode. Let’s do it.

Caroline: Okay, earmarking for next season. All right, I think it’s time to take a quick break.

Love to Sew is made possible by listeners like YOU! We are so grateful for the support of our amazing patrons and subscribers. If you love Love to Sew and you want to help support the pod, we have a new option for you.

Helen: You can now become a paid subscriber on Apple Podcasts! Subscribers get access to our monthly bonus episodes. It’s so convenient; if you already use Apple Podcasts, the episodes are right there in your feed!

Caroline: So, what are the bonus episodes? Well, we do a chatty catch-up on what’s been happening in our lives, share about the realities of running a small business, discuss new indie pattern releases, and talk about what we’re sewing right now! Many of our subscribers say these fun bonus episodes are their favourite, and if you subscribe, you get access to the full back catalogue. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew! We also do a mini-episode that deep dives into a specific topic. We get to discuss so many fun sewing techniques and answer specific subscriber questions about sewing!

Helen: And we are still on Patreon! If you subscribe over there you can get access to the bonus episodes, behind-the-scenes photos, and a special 15% off discount code at our superfan patron tier. That discount applies at Helen’s Closet, Cedar Quilt Co., Blackbird Fabrics, and BF patterns. If you shop with us regularly, it basically pays for itself!

Caroline: If you’d like to try out Patreon or Apple podcast subscriptions and check out our bonus content, you can sign up for a free 7-day trial. And, of course, you can help support the show by listening, just like you are right now. You can also leave a review! Reviews really help our show to get discovered by new listeners. We know that financial support isn’t always possible and we want you to know that we love you for listening!

Helen: Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or visit our show’s page in the apple podcast app to become a paid subscriber. Thank you to all of our listeners, patrons and subscribers – you’re the best!

Caroline: And we are back from our break! And our next brag is from Alisa. “So we scored tickets to the Taylor Swift concert, which is a story in itself. I was at home, having canceled all clients so that I could be ready to buy tickets. My husband was in Vegas for work doing presentations. While I’m staring at my screen waiting for my chance, he was doing a live presentation when he made it to the front of the line (the ticket line, that is). So he bought the tickets during his presentation. I never got a chance.” Okay, this is already the best story ever. I love this so much. so much.

Helen: I love this story.

Caroline: “Anyway, I asked my daughter, the devoted Swiftie, what she wanted to wear. She showed me a pic of the heart dress from the ‘Me’ music video. I tried a pattern. It wasn’t working. I found a different pattern with a plan to hack it. I have no idea how to hack a pattern. No clue how to alter anything. I don’t know how many toiles I made. 10, maybe? I dreamed in sewing. I started in February and was still sewing finishing touches the night before the concert in July. I had it completely finished and just had to sew on the heart and hem it, and then I hemmed it too short. I had to remake the skirt. I sewed that heart on with different hearts and different pearls several times. The heart is the thing that threatened to steal my soul. I still find a pearl every now and again because I spilled them on the floor, not once, but twice. My daughter cried, I cried, but I felt like I could do absolutely anything when it fit. I made so many mistakes, I learned so much, and I will brave new and hard things again. This is the only thing in my life that I’ve given this much patience to, perhaps with the exception of the aforementioned daughter. I don’t know if it’s age or just the nature of sewing itself, but I am committed to the process of learning.” Oh my gosh, this is incredible.

Helen: Alisa! you have to go to the show notes, you guys, you have to, this dress is so stunning. It is just like, mm! Amazing. It looks absolutely incredible. I can tell the amount of work that I went into this. Sounds like a real odyssey: literal blood, sweat, tears, major triumph in the end. It’s a pink sequin mini dress with a stand collar, short, sheer sleeves, and in the middle of the bodice there’s that red sequin heart, and it’s all edged in pearls, but it fits the bodice, like, perfectly. Kind of a 60s style, truly an advanced project. And you did such an amazing job, so it was all worth it. And I can’t wait to hear about your next amazing sewing project.

Caroline: Mmhmm. I’ll be waiting for an update when the next tour happens. Your daughter is super lucky.

Helen: Yes! And also congrats on, on seeing Taylor Swift. That’s, that’s amazing.

Caroline: Oh my gosh. So great. Okay. Our next letter is from Hailey.

Helen: “Last year, I competed in the Skills Alberta provincial competition for fashion technology in grade 11 and brought home a silver medal! Coming from a remote northern community, it was a huge accomplishment due to limited resources. We had 14 hours to manipulate a pattern block, cut out fabric, and construct a moto jacket with a collar, lapel, zipper closure, and multiple welt pockets. In the competition, we were required to keep certain elements the same and had creative freedom with other elements. The pictures of the jacket don’t do it justice, but on the back you’ll find a paper pieced design element that really speaks to me as a designer. I loved being able to include my passion for quilting into my jacket design. Thanks to your podcast, me and my coach were able to learn about many new techniques and just hang out for some sewing chat. The podcast was a great resource for us during that time and still is.”

Caroline: Ooh, Hailey! This jacket is so cool. I feel like we should describe it for our listeners. It’s a black denim moto jacket that is beautifully finished with a full lining. And the coolest part is that the center back piece is a flying geese block, but it’s all in that same black fabric. So you just see the cool seam lines making the shapes. And it also has some really great classic top stitching. It is so neatly sewn. We’re going to post pictures in the show notes. But we are bowing down to you, Hailey. Amazing work.

Helen: Yes. That medal is so deserved for this project. Congratulations. 14 hours?!

Caroline: I know.

Helen: I can’t imagine the amount of stress.

Caroline: It sounds really fun, but also high pressure, right? Provincial competition for fashion technology. What?

Helen: I didn’t even know that was a thing. I want to, I want to play.

Caroline: I know. We’re too old.

Helen: Dang it.

Caroline: Amanda wrote, “I listen to your podcast from sunny Western Australia when I’m sewing. I really love each episode and your gorgeous accents.” Ooh, we have gorgeous accents. I love it. “A dear friend asked me to copy a Zimmerman dress for her to wear to her 60th birthday dinner. It’s made in beautiful linen. I hand stitched the hem using matching thread to each panel. We were both thrilled with the end results.”

Helen: Okay, Amanda sent us a pic of her dress next to the inspo dress, and she did such an amazing job getting the vibe of the original. This dress is made of eight panels, plus four panels on each sleeve. Each panel’s a different colour. Not an easy garment to pattern or sew. And all the patterns are joined with yellow binding. So it’s such a pretty dress and an awesome gift for a friend. Absolutely love it.

Caroline: Yeah, the thing I can’t believe is the changing thread for each panel with the hemming. Like, that is commitment. I don’t think I would have done that, but I feel like it must give it such a, like, couture high-end look. I love it.

Helen: Yeah, I love this idea of copying, like, a ready-to-wear inspo dress that you find and just figuring out how to make it happen. Um, really like a fun, creative design challenge.

Caroline: Yeah, love it.

Helen: Leah wrote in to say, “I completed my first ever garment I’ve made for myself this weekend, a Cielo Top in white linen. The part I’d brag about is that I finished the inside with French seams. I definitely sewed the French seams on the outside on my muslin, but I took my time with my real fabric. And I’m so proud of the final product. I also finished the neckline facing with Hong Kong seams. And I learned so much by trying and hope to inspire other beginners that they can do it, too.”

Caroline: Wow. Oh my gosh. French seams and bound facing edges on your first garment ever? I feel like you are knocking it out of the park. Go, Leah!

Helen: Yes. Amazing job. It’s really fun when you’re a beginner to take your time with those details. And you do learn so much along the way when it’s your first time doing things. And a lot, oftentimes, beginners don’t have things like sergers or overlockers. So French seams is a really excellent way to finish your seams. I did it for many, many years. Got quite old hat at it. And it does feel fancy, even when I do it now.

Caroline: Yeah, it totally is. Okay. Next up, Franziska wrote, “I want to brag. I haven’t bought any new fabric this month. Yay!”

Helen: No joke, major accomplishment. One day I hope to be able to brag about this too. But not today.

Caroline: That’s okay. You have a business, Helen.

Helen: The perfect excuse, always. Okay. Now we have a voicemail from Eowyn.

Eowyn: Hi Helen and Caroline, my name is Eowyn, and I’m calling from the South of France. First of all, I just want to say, thank you for doing your show. You two are the best hostesses, you guys are so fun to listen to and I actually learned a lot of sewing-related stuff from you. I’m calling to brag a bit about my sewing successes. What I feel is, like, my best project ever is my wedding dress. Uh, it was a beast of a project. The amount of time I spent on it is just insane. Uh, I had to deal with fabrics I had never dealt with before, such as lace and silk. And I am just so happy that I was able to recreate the dress I had in my mind. It was extremely satisfying, even though the process was overall a real emotional roller coaster. Another project that comes to mind is my first underwire bra. It was actually much easier than I anticipated. I actually never knew it was possible to make your own underwire bras before I got into sewing, so this felt a bit like witchcraft. Thank you for keeping the show going. I wish you all the best. Lots of love.

Caroline: Wow. Hello, Eowyn! Your wedding dress is absolutely gorgeous. We’re looking at the pictures right now. This is haute couture level. The bodice is made from a beautiful lace; I think it might be like a cotton guipure. And it has a V neck and a very deep V in the back going to the waist. The open back is so pretty. And it seems like you used part of the lace to make a kind of waistband detail. The skirt is really drapey, made of layers of what looks like silk chiffon. It is absolutely stunning. And you sent us a super comprehensive blog post of the process of designing and making this dress. It’s in French, but for people who don’t know the language, you could turn on the translate and get quite a bit out of it, I think. So we’ll link that up in the show notes. It’s so finely finished and really unique. Fantastic job. And congratulations on your marriage. Woohoo!

Helen: Yes, this dress is so gorgeous and this blog post is very thorough. I love all the information that you provided. So if y’all are sewing your own wedding garment right now, this is definitely one to check out. And I couldn’t agree more about the bra sewing thing. The first time I made an underwire bra, my mind was truly blown. Like, incredible experience. I don’t really wear underwire bras, so I never got into really sewing them on the regular. Doing it in a class was absolutely incredible and it felt like witchcraft. Like…

Caroline: Yeah! And now you have those skills, right? ‘Cause you can maybe make, like, a corset top if you ever want to do that or other kinds of, like, foundations, and a garment that you want to make that’s really fitted. So learning those skills are valuable.

Helen: Totally. Hana wrote in to say, “I made my 18-year-old a red prom dress. She wasn’t sure if she would wear it and decided to at the last minute and it truly melted my heart. It cost me £20 in fabric, but she looked like a million pounds! Another one is when I made scrubs for my 21-year-old daughter, who’s a medical student. Again, I wasn’t sure if she’d want to wear them, but she was proud to show them off and I was delighted.”

Caroline: Hana, your daughters are so lucky! You have such a range, from formal to workwear. And I’m so glad that your daughters are proud to show off your makes. I hope you’re proud of yourself, too. Love to Sew Scrubs! Come on!

Helen: It is so satisfying when you make something for a loved one and they truly enjoy it and want to wear it and show it off. And I’m sure that your 18-year-old is going to look back on that moment when she decided to wear the dress that her mom made to prom with all the lovey dovey feelings. It’s so special.

Caroline: Totally. Linnea wrote, “I hand sewed an entire medieval dress out of wool! No pattern – lots of things to figure out along the way.”

Helen: I mean, hand sewing a modern dress would be hard enough, but an entire medieval dress? That is so cool. Such an accomplishment. Very, very few people can claim that they have done that. Amazing job.

Caroline: Yeah, so good.

Helen: Next up, we have a letter from Meredith. “My proudest sewing moment happened in my high school home economics class. We were all instructed to make pajama pants and our teacher had us choose and order our fabric from a catalogue. I excitedly picked out a pistachio green flannel with a cute sheep print, just perfect for pajama pants. All my classmates, however, who had collectively chosen a plaid flannel, thought I was nuts and weren’t very nice about my choice. I was a pretty shy and nervous kid in high school, but for some reason that day I stood my ground. My choice of fabric was fabulous and what did my rude classmates know, anyways? Well, the drama did not stop there. I decided to add a pocket to my pajama pants. And no, not pockets, but a pocket. One pocket. My sewing teacher was mystified. My classmates declared it was weird. But I was determined to have one little pocket in my pistachio green pajama pants. One little pocket I sewed. My confidence was growing at an alarming rate. Anyways, years later, when the smartphone came out, guess who had a pocket in their pajama pants to hold her phone? Me. You go, girl! I wore those pajama pants until the crotch blew out five ways. And then I sewed a little pin cushion out of the very worn-out leftover fabric. It reminds me of that confident moment in high school and of the confidence and joy sewing brings me today. I’m currently teaching my daughter to sew her first skirt, and while her choice of pattern and fabric did make me raise my internal eyebrows, I just told her, ‘You go, girl!’”

Caroline: I have so many questions. Like, why do you need a pocket in your pajama pants for a phone? Like, why are you carrying your phone around in your pocket when you’re wearing pajamas?

Helen: Oh, Caroline! I mean…

Caroline: Also, how does a crotch blow out five ways? I love it. I’ve probably done it myself. I just need more details. No, this is so good.

Helen: I relate so hard, because I’m always wearing my pajamas around the house and I gotta have my phone. So when my pajama pants don’t have pockets, it’s annoying. And I’ve definitely blown out the crotch on well-worn pants. So I understand you, Meredith.

Caroline: So it’s not like you have a pocket so that you can, like, sleep with your phone in your pocket. It’s more just like house pants.

Helen: Yeah, when you get up in the morning, where are you going to put your phone? Also, you know, we’re talking high school, like, people will be wearing their pajamas to school.

Caroline: You’re so right. This is making me think of a pair of sweatpants that Shea has that are ready-to-wear, but they only have one pocket. And we’ve always been like, “Why is there only one pocket?” And it’s also too small. Like, it’s really, it’s like an in-seam pocket, but it’s. for a child. The space in the pocket is not big enough for anything. And there’s only one of them. Big questions. Big questions.

Helen: That is very silly. I wonder if this was an in-seam pocket on these pants or a patch pocket. I was definitely picturing, like, a patch pocket on the front.

Caroline: Yeah, a little patch pocket, but only on one side. No, I just love your commitment to following your vision and also how you’re supporting your daughter. I definitely wouldn’t make all the same choices that I made as a beginner sewist, but learning from mistakes is part of the journey and expressing yourself is the most important thing. So you go, Meredith. Great job.

Helen: Yes, great job and great story. Thank you for sharing.

Caroline: Next up is a voicemail from Heather.

Heather: Hi, Caroline and Helen! I just wanted to send through my proudest moment as a sewist. So, I’ve been sewing since I was a small child, about eight years old, on my mum’s sewing machine, making dolls clothes, and I always thought that patternmaking and fabric design were well out of the question for me. So I set myself a challenge. I decided that I would teach myself these two skills, because nothing is impossible. I’m proud to say that I have achieved them. I actually set about designing and releasing my very first pattern, which is called the Florence Jumpsuit by Topstitch Pattern Company, and the other day I received my very first fabric design in a pretty cool apple print in the post on a lovely linen, and I made myself a self-drafted shirt dress. So now I can happily wear it and say that I designed the pattern as well as the fabric and I created a beautiful dress. So yay! I’m so happy that podcasts like yours are accessible to people like me. Um, it’s an endless source of inspiration and I absolutely love hearing the skills and tales and tribulations of everyone’s sewing journeys. So I just wanted to share my own.”

Helen: Wow, Heather, you have accomplished so much! I love this attitude of, “I don’t think I’m going to be able to do X, Y, Z and that’s exactly why I’m going to do it.” And you showed yourself you can learn difficult skills and succeed past your wildest dreams. The apple fabric is so dreamy; it reminds me of a beautifully illustrated book. And it looks wonderful made into that self-drafted shirt dress. If any other listeners are interested in surface design, Heather has some great reels about it on Instagram; she’s @_heathermade.

Caroline: Okay, next up we have a message from @carolasews. “I keep being amazed that I make up something and am actually capable of creating a thing that looks exactly like what I had in mind. (Usually after a lot of ‘Hah, I’m brilliant,’ followed by ‘Why am I such an idiot,’ followed by ‘OMG, I will never be able to wear this,’ ending in “Yay, I’m pretty pleased with how it eventually turned out!’ moments)”

Helen: Best encapsulation of the sewing process I’ve ever heard.

Caroline: Absolutely.

Helen: We’ve all been there. It is very magical when something that used to be just a vision in your head comes into reality, using your skills and a pile of materials. So I don’t think that feeling ever goes away, but hardcore relate to the ups and downs of the sewing process. “Wow, I’m crushing it!” to “What was I thinking?” Thinking, “This is going so badly.”

Caroline: Often when I have that feeling, I just need to sleep.

Helen: Yes. Take a break. Take a break.

Caroline: Circle back.

Helen: Nicole wrote in to say, “Yesterday I cut the collar off an Olya Shirt I didn’t like on me and I did a simple bound neckline using the Elizabeth Suzann Georgia pattern as a guide. It’s now my new favourite shirt and all that time sewing the original has been saved. So proud. It was also dead stock, Bec + Bridge silk cotton, so I’m very glad the fabric was saved.”

Caroline: Ooh, okay. Mending and refashioning always feels like such a win. It only takes a little bit of work to make something you don’t love and turn it into something you do, which I think is totally worth a brag and very inspiring. Now I want to go look at things that I don’t wear as much and just imagine how I could cut them up and make them wearable again.

Helen: Yes, it absolutely is a really fun way to spend a sewing day. I have a little pile of projects in my sewing room for this exact purpose, and sometimes I’ll just go on a tear and refashion a whole bunch of things, and you get a whole new wardrobe.

Caroline: A literal tear, like you can tear things open.

Helen: Ripping them apart. It’s low stakes, because if it doesn’t work out, you know, it’s not like you were wearing it to begin with, so.

Caroline: Totally. All right, Brittany wrote, “I am a jeans queen! No pattern is too scary for me. I will attribute much of my fitting success to Ruth Collins, AKA @ithacamaven’s, Top Down Center Out method. I also have no fear about abusing my sewing machine with layers of denim and zippers. And I won’t hesitate to hand sew a buttonhole. When I’m wearing me-made jeans I will shout it from the rooftops so everyone knows I made my own dang pants!”

Helen: Amazing! Okay, I am making a note to climb on the roof and tell the neighbourhood that I made my own dang pants.

Caroline and Helen: They need to know!

Helen: Everyone needs to know! Jeans are a huge accomplishment, man. I almost made that my brag because I remember the first time I made jeans and, Caroline, I was with you the first time I made jeans.

Caroline: I know, I feel like we have a picture of our butts from that.

Helen: Yes, we have a little video of us dancing in our me-made jeans, because I made Ginger Jeans and you made Morgan Jeans, I think.

Caroline: Mmhmm. Mmhmm.

Helen: Was that, but that wasn’t your first pair, right?

Caroline: No, I don’t think it was my first pair, but still, I remember it being so exciting.

Helen: Yeah.

Caroline: And I wore those jeans to death. They’re dead.

Helen: ‘Til the crotch was blown out out five ways.

Caroline: Yeah. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah.

Helen: Oh my gosh, I’m so inspired by our listeners. We couldn’t share every single letter and comment we got in this episode. I really wish we could. So please know that we did read them all. We were so inspired by you. We loved hearing you brag. And you all have such style, talent and skill.

Caroline: I know, this was such a wonderful way to wrap up the season. It’s been so much fun making this spring 2024 season of Love to Sew. Like we said earlier, this is the last episode for a few months. We’re going to be on summer break on the main feed, but we will still have subscriber episodes coming out. And then we’ll be back with a new, exciting season in the fall. I hope you all have a great summer, or winter, depending on your hemisphere.

Helen: Yes. Talk to you soon.

Caroline: Bye!

Helen: Bye!

Helen: That’s it for today’s episode of Love to Sew. You can find me, Helen, at Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co. and Caroline at Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns. We’re recording in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.

Caroline: You can support Love to Sew and get access to bonus content by subscribing on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. You even get access to the back catalogue of bonus episodes. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew. It’s a great time to sign up. We’re going into the off-season. Get all that content. Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or check out our podcast page on Apple Podcasts for more info.

Helen: Head to lovetosewpodcast.com to find our show notes. They’re filled with all the gorgeous pictures of all the gorgeous makes from this episode. And if you’d like to get in touch with us, leave us a message at 1-844-SEW-WHAT. That’s 1-844-739-9428. Or send us an email at [email protected].

Caroline: Thanks to our amazing podcast team. Lisa Ruiz is our creative assistant and Jordan Moore of The Pod Cabin is our editor. And thank you for listening! Buh-Bye!

Helen: Bye!

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We interview quilting icon Suzy Williams, a.k.a. Suzy Quilts! We chat with her about designing quilt patterns and fabric collections, hear the surprising story of how she learned to sew, and get some great advice about overcoming perfectionism. Plus, we chat about the meditative magic of the quilting process.

The transcript for this episode is on this page at the end of the show notes.

Show Notes: 

Where to Find Suzy Online:

Suzy’s Fabric Collections: 

Some of Suzy’s Quilt Patterns:

From Suzy’s Website:

Other Mentions:

A post shared by Suzy Quilts (@suzyquilts)

Transcript:

Caroline: We are recording today on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish and Kwakwaka’wakw peoples, including Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, Musqueam, and K’ómoks first nations.

Hello and welcome to Love to Sew. I’m Caroline, the owner of Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns.

Helen: And I’m Helen, the designer behind Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co.

Caroline: We’re two sewing buds who love to sew and quilting is all Helen wants to talk about.

Helen: Hey, and Suzy! Come on. Today we are interviewing quilting icon Suzy Williams, aka Suzy Quilts. We chat with her about her design process for quilt patterns, her fabric collections, how she fell in love with quilting, and her highest and lowest moments on her quilting journey. We also pick her brain about running a business and overcoming creative blocks.

Caroline: If you love to sew, this is your show.

Helen: Hello, Suzy. Thank you so much for coming on the show today.

Suzy: Well, thank you for having me. I’m very excited.

Helen: We’re so stoked to chat with you. Can you please introduce yourself to our listeners?

Suzy: Yes, my name is Suzy Williams. I started a business called Suzy Quilts, which is very confusing to most people because my name isn’t actually Quilts. It’s Williams. And I guess I started this kind of unofficially, you know, how things just kind of naturally grow, or maybe the better word is spiral. Well, I started this, I guess, in 2015, kind of as this little, I would always use the word “cute,” cute hobby. I think I would actually use that as a way of, like, guarding myself from people poking a hole in my dream. Because it was a dream. So I would, I would diminish it by calling it cute. But, my degree and my work at the time was in graphic design. I’d been sewing since I was 15, which I guess is 23 years ago. So I, I just was like, “Let’s just, let’s try this cute little hobby and see what happens,” you know? See if anyone would be interested in this. And, and the two really work together, graphic design and quilting. So that’s how I started designing quilt patterns. And, um, you know, that slowly morphed into designing fabric. Now I have thread coming out. I have a subscription to a mini-magazine. And everything I do is digital because I, I feel really passionately about things being available online. I think accessibility is just best when it’s digital. Plus, I don’t have to worry about shipping. Which is…

Helen: Preach.

Caroline: A win-win.

Suzy: Yeah.

Helen: Where are you from, Suzy?

Suzy: I’m originally from the middle of Missouri, middle of the country, uh, you know, all of that. And I traveled, I guess when I was 22, I traveled north to Chicago, which is where I currently live. I moved up here for a boy. I actually had a whole job lined up in Washington, DC, and I was going to move there and then I met, I met my current husband and I was like, “Oh no. Game over.” And so I, you know, I followed him up here and it was pretty fun at the time. We had a lot of friends up here and it was just, like, one big rolling party all the time. And then, slowly, everyone kind of moved away. And I don’t know, got serious. Is that what we call it? Grew up.

Helen: Settled down.

Suzy: Yeah. Yeah.

Caroline: And we’re so excited to chat with you about everything you have going on with Suzy Quilts, but one of the things we ask all of our guests is to just tell us about their sewing journey. So can you speak to how and when you learned to sew?

Suzy: Oh yeah, it was so long ago. I was, I was 15, and I grew up in a relatively small town and a small community in that town. And really if you, if you weren’t into sports, people didn’t really know what to make of you. You know, my brother was the MVP star, soccer, basketball, just loved all the sport things. He was so popular because of it. And I, I really struggled to find a place. At that time I made a friend whose mom quilted, and she was one of four daughters, and none of them wanted to learn to quilt. They thought it was not cool. Well, when I first saw her mom’s sewing room, I thought it was very cool. And I snuck in and I think it was even during a party. So the door was closed and I, you know, I crept in and I was just touching, I was just touching the fabric. And she had three Bernina sewing machines, which I had never actually seen a sewing machine plugged in. I know that sounds weird, but I, I’d maybe seen like an antique sewing machine that was used as a decoration, but I’d never seen one in action.

And I was obsessed. I was just in love. And so I think either the next day or maybe even that night, I nervously asked her mom, if she would maybe think about teaching me how to sew. And you know, my, no one in my family is artsy. My mom is actually completely blind and sewing or crafting was not a part of my world, even a little bit. You know, it was sports. It was like, Sports Illustrateds, ESPN, all the things, you know, that I just could not get into. So Brenda is her name. She was kind of, like, startled by, by my question because she, you know, wasn’t used to anyone really finding her quilting that interesting. So we found each other and we were both very timid at first, but then it just formed this amazing relationship and this mentorship, really. Because, you know, when you’re 15, so many things are awkward and hard. And I would, I would go into, I would call her, this is when we all had landlines. And I would say, “Ms. Winklemeyer,” cause that was her last name was Winklemeyer, I’d say, “I finished my homework. Do you think, um, my dad could, could drive me over and I could sew for an hour?” And she would say, “Oh, of course.” And she would make up these adorable binders of projects for me to work on and skills she wanted me to build. And through all of my high school, I was in her sewing room at her house as much as I possibly could. I mean, it’s all I wanted to do. And she actually bought me my first sewing machine because I didn’t have one. So, I’d have to come over to sew anytime I wanted to. And maybe at some point she was like, “Get this girl out of my sewing room.” But I also knew that I just wanted to sew all the time.

And so on weekends and evenings, it’s what I did. I had it set up in my bedroom, and I remember when I made my first quilt block, it was a nine patch, and it was rough. I mean, it just kind of fell apart in my hands. And it was made, because this is back in 2001 maybe? And the fabric scene in 2001 was very different than it is now. And so I was sewing with Civil War reproduction fabrics. I thought that was so cool. I did. I was just like, I held it up. and it was two different shades of beige, this fabric. And I was like, “Wow, I can’t believe I made something. I made something with my hands” I don’t think, aside from maybe baking with my, you know, my mom, I’d ever made anything, which maybe sounds silly, but it was, like, changed the trajectory of my life.

Caroline: That’s amazing.

Helen: I love this story so much. It might be one of our best “how I learned to sew” stories that we’ve had here on the pod.

Suzy: Okay, let me also tell you how dedicated my quilt mentor was. Because I was not a careful, detailed person. I mean, I was 15, so maybe cut me some slack. But at the same time, I’m still not a detail-oriented person. Making my first quilt, I cut off my finger. With a rotary cutter.

Helen: What? What do you mean by “off?” Say more.

Caroline: Say more.

Suzy: So gross, so gross. Okay. So I’m actually shocked. My, my friend, her name is Kari. It was, uh, Brenda’s daughter. She was the one, she was my gateway into Brenda and she was one of my best friends too. So I wasn’t just using her. Kari, if you ever hear this, I wasn’t using you! It was the night of her 16th birthday party at her house, and I had come over early because I wanted to sneak in some sewing. And I was hurrying, and I was trying to get my cutting done, and I just completely sliced over the top digit of my left pointer finger. And Brenda, to her credit, always kept her blades so sharp. Unlike me, who can have kind of a dull blade. But it was a clean cut and it was so clean, I remember looking at my hand and having this out-of-body moment, because part of my finger was on the table. And then I looked at my hand. And then maybe three seconds later, the blood came. So there was like a three second gap where I was like, “Is this real?” And then it just didn’t stop bleeding. I mean, it was a wreck. And I totally ruined her party because…

Caroline: Oh my gosh.

Suzy: Think about 16-year-old kids. All they think is like, “Oh, blood is so cool. Where’s the finger? I want to see the finger.” At one point, one of the boys was throwing the finger around the room and I think she was crying in the bathroom. I mean, I don’t know how she stayed my friend after that, because I just wrecked her party.

Helen: I wish you could see our faces right now, Suzy, honestly. Also, my hands are, like, balled into fists. I’m like, protecting all of my fingers.

Suzy: Yes! I know, but I think when you hurt yourself like that when you’re young, maybe you have little lobster fingers because my finger looks relatively normal now. They just kind of patched me up, and, I don’t know, I had to take a break from quilting. Brenda, it, it really did traumatize her. She got me this funny chain mail glove…

Caroline: I’ve seen those.

Suzy: Yes, that she made me wear.

Helen: Yeah, which is honestly a good idea if you’re new to a rotary cutter, because it can be dangerous, as we now know.

Suzy: Well, they’re so dangerous. There’s a lot of dangerous tools in sewing.

Helen: Okay, I really want to know: why quilting? Because, as you know, many of our listeners are garment sewers. So what was it about quilting? And also, did you ever try sewing garments?

Suzy: I didn’t try sewing a garment until high school, so it wasn’t that much later. One of my best friends actually is a fantastic garment sewer. Her mom was the chair of the fashion department at one of our local colleges. I just felt like there was a lot of guessing along the way. So it’s almost like every step of the way you have to troubleshoot. And I kind of liked the get all my ducks in a row, figure out what I’m going to do and then just sit back and let it happen, you know? And that’s more of the quilt vibe of, once you figure it out, you get your fabric, uh, you have your plan, you have your pattern, then you just make your quilt. It doesn’t have to fit anyone. It doesn’t have to hang well. Even if it’s crooked, nobody cares. You know?

Helen: I totally agree. It is immensely satisfying, coming from primarily garment sewing, to work on a quilt, because of all of those reasons you just said. And all these meditative moments of you doing things over and over again can be very relaxing.

Suzy: That’s exactly right. And when you’re chain piecing blocks and it’s just hum, hum, hum. I mean, it’s, it’s amazing. It really is. Like you said, meditative. It’s a wonderful moment in your life that you don’t get very often, because so much of adulthood, you’re troubleshooting. And I’m a mom right now, and so much of momming, I’m just like, figuring stuff out, you know?

Caroline: Mmhmm.

Suzy: And with quilting you can, kind of, have a lot of time to not use your brain. You just do the thing with your hands. That’s nice.

Helen: Yes, yes. And you’re making that daily progress, or if you do quilt every day, you’re making daily progress, which can feel so good when you’re struggling to, kind of, keep the wheels on, you know?

Suzy: Yes. And I, I feel, you know, quilts, in so many ways, are timeless, and I can make a quilt, keep it in my closet for a year, and then if the right person comes up, I just give it to them. I don’t ever have to worry about if it’s going to fit, if it’s going to flatter, or if they’re going to ever wear it, you know?

Caroline: Yeah, it’s so true. That’s amazing that you’re actually giving away your quilts. You’re at the point where you have so many that you’re able to just give them as gifts on a whim.

Suzy: I give away almost all of my quilts.

Caroline: Wow. Oh my gosh. What is your collection like? Do you have a ton of quilts in your personal collection?

Suzy: People ask me this all the time, and I don’t know if it’s just my personality, but when I am making a quilt, I usually make one quilt at a time and that is the only thing I care about. It’s kind of like, “Everybody needs to just go away, leave me alone.” And then as soon as I finish, I don’t really even care about the quilt. It could fall out of my car window on the highway and I would think, “Oh, that’s a shame.” And I would completely get over it. So I don’t really care what happens to my quilts after they’re finished. It’s just this process of making it. I step back, I think, “Yes, that was the vision I had.” And then it’s, it’s dead to me. Isn’t that weird? But it’s true.

Helen: I don’t think it’s weird. I can relate to this, because I didn’t try quilting for so long because I wasn’t that interested in the quilts themselves, you know? Like, I never had one on my bed growing up, so it’s just not something I really, like, associated with. Or felt strongly about. And then when I finally tried it, I was like, “Oh, the process of making a quilt is incredible and it feels so good and it’s so much fun.” And then the end product is just kind of like the cherry on top or like a nice-to-have, you know? It’s not the goal, if that makes sense?

Suzy: That does make sense. And I think that goes back to why I personally prefer quilting over garment sewing. It’s the process. The process is magical. I really can’t think of many other things in life that allows you so much time to calm your brain. You don’t really have to think a lot of the time. And I don’t know, that’s making quilting sound like it’s not a skill. It is a skill, but there are lots of moments where you don’t have to think very hard.

Helen: Yeah, especially if you’re working with a good pattern. And we do want to chat with you about your design work, because you have so many amazing patterns. So what’s your process like for designing a quilt pattern?

Suzy: Oh my goodness. I think that’s really changed over the years, definitely. Before I became a surface pattern designer, so before I started designing fabric, I designed almost all of my quilt patterns using solids, because I love solid fabric. Because I love that graphic, bold look. I design on my computer. With my graphic design background, I’m familiar with Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop, all of that. I lay out my patterns in Adobe InDesign, but I design everything in Illustrator. That’s also how I design my fabric, because I’m just so, I don’t know, used to it. I think there’s just so many different things that you…shapes you can explore, different repeats and rotations. Sometimes you just stumble onto something and you think, “Whoa. That’s a cool repeat.” And so you turn that into a pattern. Other times it’s like pulling a tooth. You just kind of have to yank and yank and yank on this idea. And you think, “I really want this specific thing to work.” And so, even if it’s painfully hard for me to yank a good idea from this one thing, I’m going to make it happen. And sometimes I put those on a shelf and I come back to them. But a lot of times, the quilts that were the hardest to create, the hardest for me to really pull together into a cohesive design, those are the ones that I like the best. They’re not always my most popular, but those are the ones that I think are the most fun. To see other people make, anyway. ‘Cause I know the struggle behind it.

Caroline: I feel like that’s really relatable, as a designer. Often the ones that you love the most are not necessarily the most popular, but you still believe in them, you know?

Suzy: And also, with quilters, I don’t know if this is the same with garment sewers, but quilters love a simple pattern. They don’t like certain techniques, like Y seams or even sewing curves, and they hate applique. And those are some of my favourite things. I’m currently working on an applique project right now, and so I already know if I really dive into what I love, it’s just going to be a bit of a dud of a sale. And that’s a weird balance between nurturing your own artistic self and being a business owner. It’s a weird, weird balance. Sometimes you have to, you know, step fully into being a business owner, and sometimes you just give yourself a break and you just say, “This isn’t going to sell well. Here you go.”

Helen: Oh my gosh, it’s so true. But I do love following those creative threads when you have them. And I love your analogy of pulling a tooth for designing something. I’m going to think of that when I’m struggling with my next design.

Suzy: It’s painful. It really is, when you just know it’s gonna get there, but we’re not there yet.

Helen: Yeah, totally. Well, you had a theme for your 2023 quilt patterns, which was “Look to the Sky.” So do you always have themes for your patterns, or kind of ideas, realms that you’re working in?

Suzy: I started themes during COVID. As you know, the craft industry in general just took this weird, explosive turn during the pandemic. We were all at home. We were all online. We were all kind of twiddling our thumbs, like, “What are we gonna do?” And so I came up with four quilt patterns. And so that was…Thrive, Grow, I don’t even remember. It was more or less like, “We’re in this together.” You know, which has, we, we used that phrase so many times that it feels cliched, but in 2020, it didn’t feel cliche. We really had to hold onto that. And so after that, I thought, well, let, let me challenge myself to design each year with a theme. So last year it was “Look to the Skies,” and I had a butterfly pattern and a couple star patterns. And I did incorporate Y seams into one pattern, which I, as I was making it, I thought “This is so cool and no one is going to want to make this.” And I did it anyway. I just did. I did it for myself. I did it because I wanted to. And it, you know, it didn’t sell well. And that was just, that was weirdly disappointing to me because I knew it wouldn’t. But sometimes you think, “But maybe…”

Helen: “Maybe people are ready.”

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: Well, I think it’s so fun to have you on Love to Sew, in part because some of our garment sewing listeners may not know you, may be interested in trying your patterns. And you cannot scare off a garment sewist with a Y seam or a curve. Like, we sew sleeves and collars and plackets, so we got it. We’re good.

Suzy: I love that. A garment sewer taught me how to use a tailor’s clapper and it’s my favourite tool to use.

Helen: Oh, yes, incredible.

Caroline: Ooh, cool.

Helen: Well, at the time of recording this, your newest pattern is Planetarium, and it has these really fun giant blocks. It’s so gorgeous. Can you tell our listeners a little bit more about it?

Suzy: Yeah, so again, this one has some curves in them, and I knew that was going to scare people. Again, this was a pattern where I just thought, “Maybe the design is cool enough that people will want to, want to make this.” And also, with quilting, I know if I ever do a slightly tricky technique, I have to include so much education. So I recorded tutorial videos and we’re doing a sewalong and I’m in the Facebook group all the time answering questions and, you know, I have a team of people also answering questions because, again, quilters are very different than garment sewers. I think garment sewers go into a project knowing they’re going to be troubleshooting the whole time. And so they see this mountain and they think, “Let’s do it.” Whereas quilters see a hill and they’re like, “No, no, no, no, no. I’m going to go for a gentle walk on my flat surface and I don’t want a single curve,” you know? And any kind of troubleshooting is going to wreck their simple meditations that they were banking on for their quilting process. So I have to really hold hands and ease worries, do a lot of talking about it. Yeah.

Anyway, so this one, it’s, it’s a modern representation of the moon and stars. And the way we, we make these kind of slices of the pie of these, I guess in quilting, the traditional block is called a Drunkard’s Path, where it’s a quarter circle, it’s a square, and then one corner of the square is a quarter circle. And that, in this pattern, is sliced in half. So, but we don’t, we aren’t sewing the quarters, we’re sewing rectangles together and then using a template to cut it into a drunkard’s path. So I think that made it, it makes it easier for people. But again, you have quilters who see the finished design and they think, “That’s hard. I’m not going to make that.”

Helen: Well, it is so pretty. I especially love the circular, like, radiating quilting that you did on your primary sample. It looks so good. It’s very, like, orbit-y, it makes me think “space.” It’s gorgeous.

Suzy: Thank you. That one of the things that excites me the most about quilting, is pulling from the heritage of quilting. So I hand quilted that. I used a really fluffy high loft wool batting so you can see all the hand stitches. It’s very puffy. It’s very cozy. I used a flannel backing. But at the same time, the actual patchwork itself is rather modern. So you have this juxtaposition which I think really flows well together and is exciting because, you know, we’re not quilting in the 1800s. We’re quilting in 2024. So things do need to evolve. I don’t need to be sewing with Civil War reproduction fabrics still. And I know there’s a lot of quilters that don’t want things to change. They want quilting to stay traditional. And I think that’s lovely because history is so cool. But for people wanting to come in, you know, younger people who get excited by fabric motifs, by colours, uh, maybe they want, they really want to decorate their home with this quilt. It’s exciting if you think it’s going to vibe with the rest of your modern home.

Caroline: And do you have a theme for your patterns in 2024?

Suzy: Um, no.

Helen: That’s okay.

Suzy: You know, 2024, I’m having a baby, the first week of April. And, I, for the most part, designed the quilt patterns to go with the fabric that I have out. Only three are coming out, because four just seemed like a lot, plus a baby, who’s like, “Oh, that’s too many launches, launching too many things in 2024.” Yeah, so there’s not really a theme that, you know, I think I’m, I’m always trying to shake things up because if I am like, “Alright, let’s do another theme for 2024. What’s the theme for 20…?” I get bored. And as soon as I get bored, I think everyone else is getting bored too.

Caroline: For any of our listeners who maybe aren’t super familiar with your work, and obviously, folks, we will be linking everything in the show notes, but could you describe your design aesthetic in three words?

Suzy: I don’t know how helpful this is going to be, but I would say: traditional, minimal, modern. Is that helpful at all?

Helen: Ooh, yes, I like that. I do think that your designs blend that tradition and the modern aesthetic really beautifully. I definitely think of your patterns as modern and I think in part that’s because of the fabrics that you’re using. And I was wondering if you had any tips for quilters who maybe want to make their quilts look more modern?

Suzy: Honestly, an easy way to make any pattern look modern is to just use solid fabric, solid colours. That just makes it pop and makes it so bold. If you even just take a really traditional nine patch, like the first block I made in all beige, and you make that in a stark, let’s just say, blue and white. I mean, bam, that’s a, that’s a striking modern-looking quilt, because really, fabric wasn’t typically solid when quilters were, you know, first making patchwork. They, they were repurposing clothes, you know, there were different prints going on. A lot of fabrics were more muted. There’s, like, a whole history to that, which I’m sure, I’m sure you probably even covered on your podcast. So to have like a punchy, bold, solid fabric is really just an easy way to make it look very, very modern.

Caroline: Okay. Beginner, or maybe, non-quilter over here question. Sorry if this is a stupid question, but, for anyone else who’s wondering, what is a nine patch? What does that mean?

Suzy: Oh, sure. Oh my goodness. You know, I have, I’ve done a handful of podcasts, and it’s always, they’re quilting podcasts. And so I never want to insult anyone’s quilting intelligence, but why, why would you know what a nine patch is? It’s nine squares. So it’s three by three by three. And let’s just say it’s two different fabrics. We’ll call it light-dark. The corners and the center are typically dark and then the other four are light. If you put a bunch of nine patches together, and you use that same light-dark motif, you get a traditional Irish Chain, and it, because the squares look like they’re chaining together. So people use a lot of nine patches as, like, a setting for maybe a central motif quilt block. And that, that’s a very traditional thing to do. So a lot of traditional quilt patterns, even if you’re not thinking about making a nine patch, it incorporates nine patches as just, like, a background setting.

Helen: Mmhmm. There’s also four patches, which is just four squares together. Also very common. Um, Caroline, I know you’re a huge fan of checkerboard. So this is how you get your, your dream checkerboard quilt. Yeah.

Caroline: Yes, thank you. Perfect. I’m taking notes over here.

Suzy: And nine patches are wonderfully easy to make. There’s a lot of really fun, you sew strips together, and then you slice up the strips, and then you sew the, the, the strip sets together. So it’s not like you’re sewing little squares. So people love them also because of the unique way they get to be assembled.

Caroline: Yeah. It does feel very approachable, just sewing squares together, especially for a beginner quilter, so yeah.

Helen: Yes. Exactly. No angles, no curves.

Caroline: No curves. No Y seams.

Helen: That is, honestly, one of my favourite things about quilting, is all of the little, I don’t know, they’re almost like productivity hacks or like, special ways that you can create multiples of things, or just make, like, a really interesting block with such simple techniques. It’s, like, truly magical.

Suzy: It is. It really is. And it’s a mathematician’s dream, because if you are at all into geometry or, you know, trigonometry, cause you’re, you’re figuring out the angle of things, you can do some really cool stuff. And you wouldn’t believe how many engineers get into quilting because of that.

Helen: Yeah.

Suzy: Yeah, and so you can get a lot of people who are very detail-oriented who like quilting. And then you can get people like me who kind of you know, ehh…

Helen: There’s something out there for everyone. There’s, like, painterly quilting and then there’s very organized quilting. I mean, it really runs the gamut. And I think in the garment sewing community too, we have a lot of engineers, mathematicians, scientists. It attracts a certain kind of mind, wanting to puzzle and piece together this three-dimensional object.

Suzy: I bet. Oh, and you all, after you finish a garment, I bet you think how you could have made it a little bit better or fit better or, yeah.

Helen: Oh yeah. By the end of this interview my goal is to have you wanting to sew a garment, Suzy.

Suzy: I do. I do want to sew garments. It’s hard to pick up a new skill when you have little kids.

Caroline: Okay, I want to circle back to fabric, selfishly, but you had mentioned that your patterns coming out in 2024 work with your fabric collections. And I want to know just a little bit more about your process for designing fabric. Your newest fabric collection with Art Gallery Fabrics is called Evolve. It is so gorgeous. And we just want to know, like, what was on your mood board for this collection?

Suzy: So, this collection was designed for quilters. And with that said, quilters typically gravitate toward lightweight quilting cotton, which is sometimes called broadcloth. It’s really easy to quilt with, because we have, we have a lot of seams in our patchwork. And so you don’t typically see us quilting patchwork with thicker fabrics, like even linen, linen can be kind of fussy and we don’t get the precision we like. You know, flannel quilts, although they’re so cozy, they can make some bulky seams. So, you see, quilters are basically using broadcloth, which we have just taken to call quilting cotton, and we also, because we’re cutting things up into little pieces and then sewing it back together, we typically gravitate toward fabric that is smaller in scale. So, you know, you wouldn’t see a huge leopard print on quilting cotton because, you know, you’d get a head and then you’d get a tail and then you’d get a torso and, you know, cause you’re, you’re chopping up that leopard all very, very small. I also think, because quilting is so dominated by women, we have a lot of florals. There’s a lot of very feminine fabric, a lot of fabric actually that’s quite juvenile, that’s geared toward children, because when do women learn to sew? It’s when they’re pregnant and they’re nesting and they want to make things for their baby. Or it’s when they’re married and, you know, they’re making things for their home. So I really wanted to inject something that had a different voice into the world of quilting fabric.

And my family and I have been traveling to Key West for a few years and we just love the vibe of Key West. It’s, like, kind of gritty, because you know, we’re used to Chicago grit, but it’s tropical. It’s very laid back. But in the 60s there was this flight from New York, uh, of people moving from New York, and kind of bringing this almost higher fashion side to a very laid back, tropical world. And, and it’s very small. So it’s like this intense melting pot. And I, you know, the last couple of times I was in Key West, I kept thinking, what would Don Draper wear if he was part of that flight from New York and he came down to Key West? And I was thinking of 1960s fashion fusion with laid-back tropical motifs. I mean, it sounds kind of wild. And it was just like, I needed it to simmer in my head for a long time. And it did, before my first collection came to fruition. So I, I didn’t, I really challenged myself to not use pink, which is funny, because I love pink, but I thought “There’s enough pink. There’s, there are enough florals and there’s enough pink.” So my first collection has, has no pink. I really wanted people to quilt with it like they quilted in the past, where they would cut up clothes, and think of it almost like that. So that was Duval. And then from Duval, I also came out with a 20 collection of signature solids. So quilters also, I don’t know if garment sewers are like this, quilters can worry. And it makes so much sense, because it’s not cheap to make a quilt, okay? By the time you have purchased your fabric and your batting and even just done your quilting you have dumped so much money and time into this thing that if it doesn’t look good it is a huge disappointment, okay? So quilters really fret about if their fabric is going to look good. And so I wanted to create a capsule collection of colours where you could just not worry. And you just knew these colours were meant to go together. They all kind of have this vintage vibe. So even though there is a quote unquote “black” in the colour collection, it’s called “truffle,” it’s a vintage black. So it’s a warm black that in some lights can even look a little brown. If you put it up to a jet black, it would look brown, but on its own, it looks black. So everything has a warmness to it, which I think kind of just hearkens the tradition of quilting, but again, brings it into this more modern, bold aesthetic.

So then that brings me to Evolve. So with Evolve, I took some of the motifs of Duval and I played around with them, almost like I was using moulding clay. Like I took some of the leaves and some of the birds and I, I stretched them and I morphed them and I thought, “What can I make from this?” And it just evolved into different motifs. And that got me so excited. And I wanted it to look very springtime-y, and so I added this key lime green colour to the collection. Again, it all still pulls in with the signature solids, and then in with Duval. So the three collections work really seamlessly together. And this is kind of my dream, to create an ecosystem where quilters can live and they can live in comfort and ease and not worry that their fabrics are going to clash or look bad, or, you know, “Is this going to make a good quilt in the end?” Because it is. That’s how it was designed.

Caroline: That’s one of the things that I love about quilting and, and looking at quilting fabrics, is that you kind of take that guesswork out of mixing and matching if you’re using different fabrics from the same collection. And it’s so, it’s so great, especially as someone getting into quilting or just starting out, Being able to, kind of, look at one collection and just pull different prints and solids together and know that it’s all going to go together, because like you said, it just takes so much time to make a quilt. And this collection is so fun, Evolve, with the key lime. It’s so fun and bright and still has that kind of, like, faded, vintage-y vibe. I hope our listeners will go check it out, because it’s a great collection.

Helen: Stunning.

Suzy: Yeah. Thank you!

Caroline: Beautiful, yeah. How does it feel to make a quilt with fabric that you designed?

Suzy: Awesome. I mean, it just feels right. It’s just like, “Yes, this is the culmination of where I wanted to go.” I’ve always loved sewing with all different kinds of fabric. I mean, even that Civil War reproduction fabric. I loved it. And when I was 15, the modern fabric artists out there, you may remember Amy Butler, Kaffe Fassett, Tula Pink came on the scene and it was all floral and it was all hot colours. And you know, I was there for it, ‘cause I was 16. I was like, “Let’s do this,” you know? But since then, uh, things have evolved…like the collection. You know, my aesthetic has, has changed. It’s exciting to sew with fabric…like when I designed this fabric, because my background is so deeply into quilting, I designed the fabric I wanted to quilt with. Whereas I think a lot of fabric designers are not sewers, and so they’re designing really cool fabric without thinking about it being in a quilt or in a finished project. But that’s, when it comes to scale and colour and even just thinking about, okay, this fabric could get cut up into two inch squares. I thought about that and what it would look like when it was paired with another print in the collection. So I find it really fun to use my fabrics because I don’t think they’re matchy-matchy. I think they just, they just flow.

Helen: Oh, they sure do. And there’s even a picture of you wearing a dress made out of one of these fabrics. And I have to say, it’s stunning in a garment as well. And our listeners might not know this, but Art Gallery fabrics are actually lawn fabrics or cotton lawn. So they’re a little bit nicer to work with than some of the other quilting cottons. As far as sewing garments, you can actually do it with the Art Gallery fabrics. So that’s something that our listeners might be interested in checking out.

Suzy: I’m really glad that you brought that up, because it is a higher thread count, making it have a nicer drape. And the weft and warp thread count is different. Again, adding to the niceness of the drape if you were to just use their quilting fabric. My collection has a rayon. So both Duval and Evolve have rayons. And if you’re thinking about that Tate Romper…

Caroline: Yeah, that’s actually a, it’s a jumpsuit, right?

Suzy: Yes, it had, it was pants, but it’s so flowy. It looks like a dress. And the designer of that pattern, she just came out with, like, a hack on how to make that a dress.Bbut it’s adorable. And I mean, what’s fabulous about it is, you know, I’m so pregnant. I’m like 33 weeks pregnant. So talk to me in two months and we’ll see if the romper fits. But I kind of think it will because it’s, it’s designed to be very, very loose and flowy.

Caroline: Yeah. It’s such a cute garment. And is this with one of the rayons or is it a cotton?

Suzy: Yeah. No, that’s with the, uh, Evolve rayon. And Duval also has a rayon that’s in that dark, vintage black truffle colour.

Helen: Ooh, oh my gosh.

Caroline: Oh yeah, it’s so beautiful, the way that the fabric holds the gathers, it’s drapey, it, it looks absolutely stunning. We’ll definitely include some pictures of this make in our show notes this week. Okay, we’re gonna have to take a quick break and then we will be back.

Love to Sew is made possible by listeners like YOU! We are so grateful for the support of our amazing patrons and subscribers. If you love Love to Sew and you want to help support the pod, we have a new option for you.

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Caroline: Okay, and we’re back with Suzy Williams, aka Suzy Quilts, and we want to talk a little bit about making quilts. So can you tell us, just when you’re shopping for fabric that you haven’t designed, what do you look for?

Suzy: I have gotten to the point in my quilting career that I, this is going to maybe surprise people, where I don’t have a ton of time to actually sew. So when I actually do sew, I want to make sure I’m using really high quality fabric. I know, you know, when I was 15 and working, like, my fabric allowance was my actual allowance from my parents, you know? I would need to go to the big box hobby store and I needed to buy whatever was cheap. And I think there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. But I think if you can afford higher quality cottons, you know, I’m, I’m partial to Art Gallery Fabrics because of the higher thread count and that’s another thing that I think feels good when you’re just sewing with something. But honestly, you just gotta work with your budget. And if you don’t have a budget at all, you can cut up your clothes and make quilts, because that’s how quilts were made for hundreds of years.

Helen: It’s so true. And our listeners have a lot of scraps left over from their garment sewing and I think that’s a deep well that we can dip into as well.

Suzy: Definitely, and I know if people have the time to join a sewing group, or in my world, a quilt guild, there are so many fabrics that get swapped and thrown on a table, you know, “This is the free pile.” So that’s also a great resource.

Helen: You mentioned that for a new quilter, or for quilters in general, choosing fabrics is kind of the nerve-wracking part of the process where you really want to make sure that you’re choosing correctly so that things look good at the end. So what do you think is a common mistake, say, that newbie quilters make when they’re choosing fabrics?

Suzy: I think the easiest mistake to make is to pick all your favourites.

Helen: Dang.

Suzy: It’s kind of like, it’s kind of like if you were making a meal for someone and you brought out steak and cake and all the rich foods and you forgot to bring out a salad and maybe some bread and water for people to drink, you know? I think if you come out hard with these big splashy prints and everything is big and everything is bold, you’re going to really lose how special those prints are because they’re all going to be in competition with each other.

Helen: Oh, this is such a perfect analogy. I love it.

Caroline: It’s so true. It’s like you need those, like, almost filler complementary fabrics to really let those special ones shine, right?

Suzy: And I I even tell people, this isn’t everyone’s jam, but I, I like to just stick with the rule of thumb of 50 percent solids, 50 percent prints. And if you don’t, unless you want to go 100 percent solids. But that’s a great balance. I think unless you are very confident in your fabric picking skills, that’s a great balance.

Helen: Okay, that is great advice. Also, I think to, like, contrast because sometimes you lose design ideas if you have fabrics that don’t have enough contrast, and then you can’t see the piecing work as well. So I always like to make sure i’ve got that contrast in there.

Suzy: And you know, sometimes you want a vibe. And if you want your vibe to be very gentle and soothing and you want that low contrast, that can look awesome. But if you want the vibe to be, even just a two colour quilt where it’s bold, then like you said, the contrast is really important.

Helen: Oh, I love a two colour quilt. We can’t get into that right now.

Suzy: I know.

Caroline: We gotta stay on track.

Helen: I know, we’re gonna get lost. Okay, I would love to know, Suzy, what’s your favourite step in the whole quilt making process?

Suzy: Oh my goodness. Well, my least favourite step is cutting the fabric, but maybe that’s everybody’s least favourite step? And maybe that’s because I have some residual trauma from cutting off my finger.

Helen: Yes, that could be, that could be.

Suzy: You know what? My favourite steps are the steps where you can shut off your brain. I do love that excitement, that angst you can feel in the beginning when you’re preparing. You know, you’re figuring out the pattern and you’re figuring out the fabric. I do love that. That’s kind of like the firework show, really for me, even more so than the finished project. But the calming, like, “Sayonara family! I’m gonna go sew” – that. Like, what gets me up the stairs to actually do that is just flipping on my machine, chain piecing, doing the steps that are repetitive and calming.

Caroline: Yeah, I also love the calming aspects of sewing when you can just turn off your brain, so that makes a lot of sense. You have had such an incredible career journey as a sewist and quilter, and I wonder, what has been your proudest moment as a quilter?

Suzy: What a good question. My proudest moment as a quilter was, you know what, I didn’t know it was at the time. So, I don’t know how many of your listeners have heard of a quilt show called QuiltCon. It happens every year, unless there’s a pandemic. It’s put on by the Modern Quilt Guild and it is part quilt show and part quilt classes, part quilt vending, you know, shops. My first year going, my first year entering the show, I won an award. And because it was my first year, I thought, well, this is no big deal. Everybody must win awards, you know? And since then, I realized probably what beginner’s luck I had, but what a fool I was for thinking that. And I look back and I look at the pictures. I think it was back in 2015, maybe. And I was so young, so wrinkle free. I was so proud, but I look, I was proud then, but I look back and I think I’m even prouder. You know what I mean? For who I was, how hard I tried, how I didn’t even know where things were going to go, but things were going to keep going and, you know, getting really exciting even from there. So that was a special moment.

Helen: Oh, wow. I can only imagine. That is so, so cool. I really want to see this picture that you’re referring to. So kind of in contrast to that, was there maybe a lower point along your quilting journey and how did you get through it?

Suzy: Yeah, I’m like, where do I begin? Where should I start? So many lows.

Helen: I mean, other than the finger thing, that, that was pretty bad.

Suzy: No, that’s just a funny memory. That’s not even a low. Oh my goodness. Okay. So, you know, I was so ambitious, okay? I was ambitious before I even started quilting. I started my own freelance graphic design business after I branched off of my ad agency job and I just wanted bigger clients and I don’t know what it is in me. I’ve chilled out, okay? But I, I just always want the next thing. Maybe that’s why I can’t love the quilts I make, because I’m like, “Alright, next.” Anyway, I’m in therapy for this. Okay, so, before Suzy Quilts was what it is, like, making all these patterns, whatever. Instagram was new and I was just making quilts. Okay. I was designing quilts and I was making quilts and I was, like, crossing my fingers hoping anyone would buy these quilts, but that wasn’t really happening. So I was kind of just making these quilts as my, as my hobby. And I made some connections. What I really wanted to do was license my quilt designs to Pottery Barn, Crate and Barrel, at the time Crate and Barrel’s offshoot called the Land of Nod, which is now just Crate and Kids. But I had this idea of being a textiles designer that didn’t actually do the quilting, but did the designing. And so I had a couple cool breaks where I did some licensing with those companies. One of those companies ended up just stealing one of the designs without paying me. So that wasn’t awesome. That was another low, but not the low I’m talking about.

Okay, so Coach; designer handbags is usually what we know them for. They were going to celebrate some kind of, I don’t know, anniversary. I don’t even know which one. And they needed a quilter to make these statement quilts for their 12 flagship stores all across the world, okay, and somehow I had come onto their radar. They wanted me. I was, I had signed a contract. I was meeting with their art team. I was like shooting designs their way. I was pitching them stuff. I had been talking to, I was like, this is gonna be a huge commission, so I need help. I was talking to my sewing friends like, “Are you in it? You want to do this with me?” And then in one email, it was like a Friday afternoon, I just got an email saying, “Eh, we’ve canceled the project. We’ve moved a different direction. Have a good life.”

Helen: Oh.

Caroline: Oh.

Suzy: And I wasn’t used to that level of rejection. I wasn’t used to it. I just didn’t know it, it could be so mean. And so I remember that night I just had a glass of wine in the bathtub and I was, like, loudly moaning. You know, I was, I think I’d been married for maybe two years and some, but thankfully my husband knew the kind of person I was. So he wasn’t, like, that concerned with my loud, guttural sobbing, but it was…that one, that one stung.

Helen: Oh, yeah. I’m feeling the pain of that, just hearing the story. God.

Suzy: Yeah, so I’ve turned, actually, a couple of those designs into patterns. One of them is called Fly Away, and one of them is called Campfire, so you can look those up. And they, they’re awesome, and they would have looked great in their stores, so, their loss.

Helen: Oh my gosh. I mean, Campfire is, like, a sensation in the quilt pattern community, I feel like.

Suzy: Thank you.

Caroline: Well, good riddance. And look at you now.

Helen: Yeah, exactly. Such a strange, combo of things too, like designer handbags and quilting? I mean, it’s interesting.

Suzy: Yes. Well, they were trying to tap into this, you know, like small batch, artisanal, heritage, all the buzzwords. And they were like, “Let’s do this.” And, I don’t know, they wanted me to use their leather, and they were, they were going to incorporate the quilting motifs into next gen handbags. It was so exciting. It was like, “This is going to be awesome. And this is going to make a name for me.”

Helen: Yeah. It would have been cool.

Suzy: Yeah. My little ambitious, my little ambitious heart was like, “Let’s do it!”

Helen: Well, a good experience regardless, because like you said, experiencing that kind of rejection is probably a good building experience for you. I don’t know, trying to put a silver lining on this.

Suzy: It’s like the cheesy saying of every closed door is an open window, or I, something like that. I don’t know.

Helen: Yeah.

Suzy: I mean, I picked myself up, I dusted myself off. I kept going. I don’t know. I still think that would’ve been a really cool thing, .

Helen: Yeah, yeah, oh, so true. Well, in a similar vein, as quilters and garment sewers as well, I think we tend to be more pretty hard on ourselves a lot of the time, especially if we make mistakes or we’re not happy with our work. So I was wondering if you ever struggle with that and how you handle your inner perfectionist.

Suzy: This is such a great question, and I’m so glad I brought up therapy earlier, because this is a big one for my therapist. She, she’s, like, really talked to me about this. My dad was the principal of my school. And so I had this, I felt like everyone was watching me and teachers were kind of tiptoeing around me and I needed to be perfect. And it’s this, I never thought of myself as a perfectionist until someone was like, laughed at me when I said, “Oh, I’m not a perfectionist.” And they just laughed in my face. Like, “Are you so out of touch with yourself that you don’t think you are?” Um, so I think sometimes we don’t even see it in ourselves and it comes out in different weird ways. But with my perfectionism, this is one thing that has helped me immensely, is before I start, like, with fabric, especially, because this is, it’s kind of a newer thing for me. Before I start designing, I sit down and I say, “These are the feelings you’re gonna feel. You’re gonna feel like an imposter. You’re gonna feel like you don’t, you aren’t good at this. You’re gonna want to give up. And you’re gonna step back and you’re gonna worry that people aren’t going to like this.” Okay. So before you even start, just know that you’re going to feel this. So when you feel it, it doesn’t shock you and it doesn’t stop you in your tracks. And that has been so helpful for me.

Helen: Oh, wow. You’re blowing my mind right now. I need to try this.

Caroline: Yeah, You’re like, preemptively feeling the feelings and then it’s not a big deal.

Suzy: I’m identifying it and I’m saying, “This is the journey, this is happening. So accept it, let it, let it happen, move past it because you’re going to get through it.” And with Evolve, I wrote about this in a blog post, there were some ugly stages where it was just like, “This isn’t working. I don’t know if I can come out with another collection. Like, maybe I’m just a one and done.” You know, that’s the lie that loves to just, like, try to grow some roots, you know. But knowing preemptively that I was going to have that exact thought, it’s like, “Okay, okay, okay. You’re good.”

Helen: You’re evolving.

Caroline: That’s the theme of this episode, it sounds like.

Helen: It is so hard. I mean, just working on personal projects and sharing them online, like a lot of people like to share in the community and just that comparison trap that we can all get stuck in sometimes can be so challenging. And it’s amazing to hear someone like you, with all of your incredible designs and your amazing patterns and this fabric collection, experiencing these same feelings. So it is, it’s nice and relatable and I appreciate that. So thank you.

Suzy: Yeah, I think every work of art goes through an ugly phase. Every single one. And if you haven’t gotten to the ugly phase yet, then you need to keep working that, that piece of art. And so that really helps me when I hit the ugly phase and it’s like, okay, this is, this always happens. We’ve just got to move past it.

Caroline: Yeah, it’s like a rite of passage. And you can be like, “I’m in the ugly phase. That means that I’m on the right track.”

Suzy: Yes. And to be totally frank, not every work of art gets out of the ugly phase.

Caroline: Yeah.

Suzy: Not everything works. There are failures. There just are. I mean, I, for, let’s say I have a collection of 16 different prints, you know, I designed 24 things and 8 of them are duds. Or maybe they just aren’t ready yet. They’re for next time.

Helen: Oh, I can’t wait to see where you go next with your fabric creation journey. I’m assuming there’s more on the horizon.

Suzy: Well, the way this, I don’t, I’m, I’m an instant gratification person. So the year long waiting game of, I already submitted my next collection and it’s not coming out until 2025. I’m like, “Ughhh. Okay.”

Caroline: Yeah, that’s tough. Tough to sit on that. Oh my gosh. Well, you do so much. And we also wanted to talk a little bit about some of your other projects. You have so much helpful instructional content on your website. You have YouTube, you have Instagram. We wanna just pick your brain a little bit, and one of the things we wanted to touch on was The Cutting Table, which is something pretty unique among quilt designers. So can you explain what that is for our listeners?

Suzy: The Cutting Table has, has actually been hard to explain, which I think has been a problem. We’ve been calling it a digital mini-magazine and really what it is, it’s a subscription to a little quilting world. And as a subscriber, you get access to the entire world. So it’s like as if every month you get a little magazine, but instead of having a pile of magazines, you can log into your account and you can access tutorials, articles, quilt patterns, videos, you know, different things like that. And we expand outside of quilting. So we’ll do different things like, we really wanted it to be a place where our creative team could kind of play. That’s one of our key words, is how could we, how could we just push this a little bit and really play? So with our last issue, the theme was upcycling. And one of our creative contributors took an old pair of jeans and turned it into a fanny pack. And the jean pocket was a pocket in the fanny pack. And I just thought that was so cute because with just a few seams, a few cuts, she had a great little bag that already had a pocket. And she added, she bought a really cool strap and added the strap. And it was a quickie little project, which quilters love, you know, because they’ll labour over a quilt. But if it’s a handbag and it takes more than a day, I think that can get really frustrating. I don’t know why. So, uh, just as a subscriber, you immediately get a monthly download from our pattern shop. So, because our patterns are typically $14 to $15 and subscriptions are only $13 a month, already, like, you’re getting patterns for cheaper. And then in addition to that, you get tons of monthly content and you get a pattern, like an exclusive pattern that’s designed just for The Cutting Table that we revamp every year.

Helen: Wow, this sounds like a really big project. How has it been, working on this project and getting it out there?

Suzy: It took a year to get it up and running. It was, it was stressful because I really wanted it to live on the Suzy Quilts website. There’s a lot of different membership platforms where you go to, you know, like, I don’t know, members-r-us slash Suzy Quilts, you know? And I wanted people to be able to go to Suzy Quilts and just get all their stuff and not get confused. And they could log into their one account, they could have access to all their downloaded quilt patterns that they’ve been doing for years, and they could also get into their Cutting Table accounts and see all of the new, fresh content that we’re putting out.

So, oh, oh, and we just started a block of the month! Yeah, and that’s something that garment sewers are going to be like, “What?” But it’s, every month you get a new block design. And what’s, I was like, well, a block isn’t enough. Let’s give them a block pattern and give them a bonus tutorial. So last month, they turned it into a cool pillow. The month before that, it was a baby quilt. They’re, they’re going to get very, very fun. And then in December, the final tutorial will be a big sampler quilt. That, you know, you have all the blocks for. It’s, and, and when I design the blocks, I design them so that they all work really cohesively, because I, my hesitation, this is our first time doing a block of the month, is I just don’t like the look of a sampler quilt. I love a, like, a bold cohesive design, you know, like Campfire, how it’s that medallion, you know, or Maypole, that it looks like ribbons intersecting each other. And so I’ve always just been dragging my feet about the block of the month, even though quilters love a block of the month. So this one is very cohesive.

Helen: Oh, fun. And I think, honestly, a block of the month is such a great way for people to get introduced to quilting, because each block will have different techniques, different things you’re working with, and it’s small scale. So you’re not worrying about a huge project. You’re just focusing on a small area. And at the end, you have this really cool, almost timeline of your journey, learning all of these new skills. So it’s so fun.

Suzy: A timeline. I love that. I’m going to use that.

Helen: You go ahead. I would be honoured. Well, I admire you so much because of all of your amazing business acumen, the things you’ve accomplished over the years. Honestly, you’re a big inspiration to me and I was wondering if you had any advice for other small business owners in the home sewing space who are looking to grow their business.

Suzy: I would say two things. I would say you have to follow your excitement, because like I said earlier, if you start getting bored, why would everybody else not be getting bored too? And two, sometimes you just have to put in the work. When I was first starting out, I knew I needed to build up the search engine optimization of Suzy Quilts. I needed people to just organically find Suzy Quilts. So I just wrote blog after blog after blog, thousands of words, and I don’t, I did not enjoy writing. I’ve now kind of learned to enjoy it. But it was a lot of research writing, you know, what’s the best needle? What’s the best ruler? What’s the best all these things that quilters wanted to know? And they wanted to be able to go to one place to just know, you know, “What do I use? What fabric do I use?” And so I knew it was going to be a great resource and I wanted it to just exist. But the plodding away and getting there, it was, it was a lot of work.

And I’m not a tech person, which you two know, because it took us 30 minutes to figure out my headphone situation before recording this. And so, working with, web designers, I mean, oh my goodness. You guys know this, but the amount of back end web stuff that you have to deal with to keep, like, traffic flowing smoothly on a website. It is so much harder and more work than people realize, especially when your website gets to a certain level of visitors. It’s just bots. We’ve been having a lot of bots trying to attack us. So we’ve had to up our spamware. Well, then people couldn’t sign up for The Cutting Table because our spamware was working at overdrive. I was just like, what’s happening? Nothing’s working. I feel like with every pattern launch, our website crashes, no matter how much I prepare for it to not crash. And people think, “Oh, what a good problem.” And I…no! It’s not, actually, really horrible, is people don’t come back. They see a little broken website, then they forget about you. So it’s, you know, two steps forward, one step back.

Helen: Mmhmm. Yeah. I think, like, that is really good information to have, like, knowing that there is going to be bumps in the road, that it’s not always easy and smooth sailing, and if you’re running into issues or having trouble getting things done, accomplished, you’re not alone. Like, every business owner is experiencing that kind of thing.

Suzy: They are. And the amount of things that you could be working on could really just drive you crazy. Because as a business owner, you could always be working on something else.

Helen: Mmhmm.

Caroline: Yeah.

Suzy: And you’ve got to take time for yourself and to feed your own creativity and to be with your family and your friends. And that doesn’t make you any money.

Caroline: Speaking of creativity, I wonder if you ever feel blocked creatively and how you kind of get your sewjo flowing again when that happens?

Suzy: Well, I have a four pattern mini series called Sew Mojo because they came from a time when I was just so burned out. I was so blocked. I felt, I felt like I’d kind of hit a plateau, uh, and people who knew about me and my sales, things weren’t moving quite fast enough for me, you know, because it really is a slow process. It’s a marathon. And I just started sewing fabric together and playing and putting colours together, you know. These little, little mini quilts came out of it and they just brought me so much joy. I ended up turning them into a pattern, which, looking back, you don’t have to turn everything into a money making thing.

Helen: What?

Suzy: Yeah. I think that’s part, that’s hard for entrepreneurs because we’re always thinking, how can I turn this into money? Like, how can I turn this into my business moving forward? And I’ve, you know, after being in this for, since 2015 and even before that with my graphic design, that is the challenge. Is to just let myself have some fun.

Helen: I needed to hear that today.

Caroline: Yeah. That’s great advice.

Helen: Okay, Suzy, we do want to check in and see what’s coming up for you in 2024, obviously aside from having a baby, which is huge and should be out by the time this episode comes out. So congratulations.

Caroline: The baby will have launched by the time this episode…

Helen: Yes. So what, what are you up to in 2024? Do you have any plans you want to share with our listeners?

Suzy: Well, uh, you know, I’m trying to sprint my way to having this baby. But I just am not fast. So it’s like the, the funniest looking thing, probably, because in my head I’m like, “Sprint! Sprint! Go! Just get all the stuff done and then you can have an easy maternity leave.” But I’m actually going very slow because I’m tired and, you know, things are hard when you’re pregnant. Standing’s hard. And I don’t know, I’m hungry all the time. So I’m not probably getting done the things that I thought I could get done. And already I was going to launch four patterns this year and we already cut one. So we’re just launching three. So we launched one January, March, and then our final pattern for the year, it’s going to be a Christmas pattern or a holiday pattern, and that’s coming out, um, in the fall, in August, because quilters like to start planning for Christmas in the summertime.

Caroline: Of course.

Suzy: But you know, what I love about The Cutting Table is that it, we, we plan it, we do a big planning, you know, for the whole year. So it’s already planned out. It’ll just keep landing in people’s inboxes every month. We have so many talented, creative people writing for it. I feel like I’ll be able to step back and be a little bit in the shadows while other people get to shine a little bit more, which is a very exciting thing about being a boss, I guess, and, and hiring people who are very capable and just stepping back and knowing that you got this.

Caroline: Yeah, that’s incredible. We can’t wait to see these new patterns that you have coming out and follow along on your journey. And can you tell our listeners where they can find you online?

Suzy: Yeah, suzyquilts.com. That’s S-U-Z-Y quilts dot com. Uh, you could sign up for The Cutting Table and you can find all of the patterns there. You can find Suzy Quilts fabric in a lot of quilt shops. I guess you could just google “Suzy Quilts fabric.” It’s in retail shops. And of course, if you feel like being a part of a, you know, a really sweet and talented and helpful community, the Suzy Quilts Patterns Facebook group is actually a lovely place to be. If I’m ever kind of feeling down, I’ll just hang out there. It feels like I just kind of open a door and walk into a room and it’s like, “Ah, my people!” But it really is wonderful. And I don’t spend time on Facebook aside from just going directly to that one group. And then I’m also on Instagram, I have a TikTok, which just, I don’t know, you can ignore that. And Suzy Quilts on YouTube. We, uh, definitely on YouTube. A lot of videos there.

Helen: Yes. So much amazing beginner-friendly content and beginner-friendly patterns. So if this episode has made you want to dabble in quilting, Suzy Quilts is an excellent place to start.

Suzy: Thank you. We do have, one of our big website overhauls was organizing our blog because we have so much content. So if you just go to the blog tab, there’s a Quilting 101 tab, and then that’s even categorized into Fabric, Cutting, Binding, you know, all the different steps of making a quilt. So from each little step, you can even dive deeper and deeper. So I, I really hope that if people are interested in quilting, they, they could find answers to all their questions or maybe, maybe even questions they didn’t know they, they had, you know. I wrote a blog post on black batting and I didn’t even know that was a thing until I researched it for the post. And now I think black batting is really cool. So that’s a thing.

Helen: That is amazing. I have not heard of black batting. I’m going to go Google that right now.

Suzy: Yeah, it can really make your colours pop a lot more than white batting.

Helen: Oh, fascinating.

Caroline: Very cool.

Suzy: These are things you just learn on the internet, right?

Helen: Yeah, so true. Oh my gosh. Suzy, thank you so much for joining us today while you’re pregnant, taking some time out of your busy schedule. We really appreciate it.

Suzy: It’s my pleasure. I’m really, really flattered that you wanted me to be on your podcast. Thank you.

Helen: Oh, you’re so welcome.

Caroline: Oh, thanks so much.

Helen: Take care.

Suzy: Bye.

Helen: Bye.

Caroline: Bye. That’s it for today’s episode of Love to Sew. You can find me, Caroline, at Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns and Helen at Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co. We’re recording in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.

Helen: You can support Love to Sew and get access to bonus content by subscribing on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. You even get access to the back catalogue of bonus episodes. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew. Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or check out our podcast page on Apple Podcasts for more info.

Caroline: You can head to lovetosewpodcast.com to find our show notes. They’re filled with links and pictures from this episode. And if you’d like to get in touch with us, leave us a message at 1-844-SEW-WHAT. That’s 1-844-739-9428. Or send us an email at [email protected].

Helen: Thanks to our amazing podcast team! Lisa Ruiz is our creative assistant, Jordan Moore of The Pod Cabin is our editor. And thank you for listening. We will talk to you next week.

Caroline: Bye!

Helen: Bye bye!

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How do you connect with other sewists in today’s social media landscape? In this episode, we talk about the benefits and drawbacks of the most popular social media platforms, give some tips and tricks for making sewing content that connects with people, and answer some listener questions about sewcializing.

The transcript for this episode is on this page at the end of the show notes.

Show Notes: 

Previous Episodes Mentioned:

Resources:

Social Media Links:

Tools:

Reels:

A post shared by Helen’s Closet (@helens__closet)

A post shared by Blackbird Fabrics (@blackbirdfabrics)

A post shared by Blackbird Fabrics (@blackbirdfabrics)

Transcript: 

Helen: We are recording today on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish and Kwakwaka’wakw peoples, including Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, Musqueam, and K’ómoks first nations.

Caroline: Hello and welcome to Love to Sew! I’m Caroline, the owner of Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns.

Helen: And I’m Helen, the designer behind Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co.

Caroline: We’re two sewing buds who love to sew and it’s basically all we want to talk about.

Helen: When we talk about the sewing community, this is what we mean! We’re going to talk about the benefits and drawbacks of the most popular social media platforms, give some tips and tricks for making sewing content that connects with people, and answer some listener questions about sewcializing.

Caroline: If you love to sew, this is your show.

Caroline and Helen: How are you? How are you?

Helen: No, how are you? I’m great.

Caroline: I’m great, too.

Helen: I’m great, too.

Caroline: Wow, we’re so good at this.

Helen: You can tell we’re feeling a little giddy today. It’s the middle of Me-Made May. How can you not be excited?

Caroline: Oh my gosh, the most wonderful time of the year in the sewing community. How fitting that we’re doing an episode all about social media and sewing today.

Helen: Yes, it really did feel like the perfect time to discuss this topic. We’ve done a couple of episodes about sewcializing over the years. The first one was episode five. It’s a little out of date. And we did another one back in 2019; also a little out of date. ‘Cause things change. Things change quickly these days.

Caroline: Things change really quickly. But I am excited to take a little bit of stock today and just talk about where we’re at right now. And I think a lot of the tips that we’re going to give in today’s episode are going to work for years to come. We’re not getting granular on, like, how to use these platforms and how to edit videos and that kind of stuff. We’re more talking broad strokes sewcializing.

Helen: Yeah. So first off, how do you spell “sewcialize?”

Caroline: S-E-W…

Helen: Absolutely 100 percent correct. Go on.

Caroline: C-I-A-L-I-Z-E.

Helen: Ooh! Perfect, that’s the only way to spell it. There’s only one way and you nailed it.

Caroline: Thank you.

Helen: Well, if you’re listening to this podcast, you probably already know there’s a bustling sewing community on social media. We talk about it all the time and we both participate in it. And you can choose to participate in social media however you want. Making social media posts and maintaining an active presence is kind of its own separate hobby from sewing. And there’s no shame at all in being a lurker if you just like to go on there, take a peek at what’s going on, but not post. We do think that social media can be a lot of fun, so this episode is for people who want to be more active on social media, maybe explore a new platform, improve their reach, or simply just learn more about it and what’s going on.

Caroline: Yeah, and we’re going to focus today mainly on individual users and less on small businesses because most of our listeners are just sewists in the sewing community who want to interact with each other.

Helen: And as we mentioned, we haven’t done an episode about this since 2019 and a lot has changed since then. TikTok in particular has made huge gains in popularity and short form video in general has become more and more prominent across all social platforms.

Caroline: Yeah, love it or hate it, video is here to stay, I think. Social media is a great tool for sharing projects, connecting with other sewists, and gaining inspiration. And I think we should kick it off today just by talking about our own relationship with social media, participation in social media these days. Tell me what’s going on with you, Helen.

Helen: Well, it has certainly been an interesting ride. These last, like, eight years, I would say, to participate in social media, especially Instagram. That’s my main platform. Things are always evolving. But the one thing that has been constant for me is that I really do love sharing. I really enjoy the process of gathering, you know, whatever media I want in order to communicate the project that I made and then sharing it with the community. And that started way back in the day when I started my sewing blog. And social media is kind of a more short form version of that, although I’m still very active over on my blog. So making “content” has been a part of my daily life for quite a while now. But I really feel like in the past year I’ve, kind of, hit my stride a little bit, especially with these short form videos that are so popular now. Took me a little while to figure that one out, but I finally feel like I’m enjoying the process. I like creating the videos. I like the storytelling, the editing, sharing tutorials, sharing projects, all of it. I’m feeling much more comfortable on camera, which we’re going to talk about. And sometimes it can feel like a bit of a grind or a bit of a distraction, or, you know, sometimes I get in that comparison headspace and, and it’s not fun. But I’ve learned that, you know, that’s the point when I need to take breaks. And for the most part, it is a lot of fun to participate. And it’s just, like, managing the amount that you’re doing that.

Caroline: Yeah, for sure. I think that’s a great strategy. Like if it’s not feeling good, take a step away for a minute, you know?

Helen: Yeah, totally. And that’s really hard because it’s designed to be addictive. It truly is. And so that’s why it’s so much fun to pick up the phone and scroll. But the creating content part really is like a fun, creative process. And I wanted to also note that I, personally, think it’s important to have other places where you’re storing this information, and that’s not just for business owners. I think for personal sewers as well, you know, a journal, an album on your phone, a blog, a newsletter, somewhere where you’re kind of keeping track of your projects that isn’t social, because you don’t own that content on social media. Like, Instagram can shut down. The other day it just stopped working and we were all like, what’s happening? And that can be a little bit shocking. So just remember that it’s nice to have that content in other places too.

Caroline: Yeah. That’s a really great point.

Helen: In my personal time, I do enjoy a fun scroll through the silly and amazing reels on Instagram. I’m not a huge user in my off-time. I think that’s because I spend a lot of time on social doing work stuff. So I do have a personal Instagram for family and friends where I keep up with what the people in my life are up to and I share videos of my dog. But for the most part, I’m focused on work stuff. So I’m not a huge social media user in my off-hours. And the other thing I wanted to mention is that a year ago I started Cedar Quilt Co., my quilting pattern business, and I started a quilting-focused account for that. So starting from zero again, zero followers, zero, kind of, like, community over there. It’s been really fun. Like obviously I’ve brought over a lot of folks from Helen’s Closet to come and follow me there as well. But I’m also making a lot of new connections with the quilting community and other quilt pattern designers. And that’s been really interesting because it’s like starting over but in a new era of social media. And it’s giving me a chance to really experiment and do some fun things with that account. And I really love having separate accounts for my interests. So when I want to look at quilting stuff. I can go and scroll my quilting account. And when I want to look at my friends and family, I can go and scroll my friends and family account. So if you’re finding that it’s all getting jumbled up, maybe it is a good idea to separate.

Caroline: Yeah, I think it’s true that it is really fun to start small, I guess, or start over and be able to build a following or an audience from scratch in this sort of, like, social media world that we’re in right now. And I found that, often, those, like, accounts with less followers get so much more engagement, so it can be much more personal. So if you’re feeling, like, sad about not having enough “followers,” like, it’s okay, because probably all the people that follow you really want to follow you and are really excited to see what you’re up to. So it’s okay to not have a lot of followers.

Helen: 100%. Whether you’ve got five or you’ve got 5 million.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: Does anyone in the sewing community have 5 million? I don’t think so.

Caroline: I don’t know.

Helen: It really, it’s true that there’s people on there that are going to connect with you. And those are the people that you want to, like, be paying attention to and be fostering those engagements. So we’re going to talk about that today. But Caroline, I want to hear from you. What’s your social media journey and your current state?

Caroline: Well, I used to, like, do the social media for Blackbird back in the day, but eventually we did hire a marketing team and Now we have Celina, who takes care of all of our social media, which has been amazing. And I think since I’ve sort of, like, offloaded that, my personal participation in the sewing, kind of, space has been mostly nonexistent. I sometimes think about posting more, but obviously not enough to actually do so. I would say most of my sewcializing comes from Blackbird’s account, which I do love participating in. I love being in the content. We have a ton of fun on Instagram Reels and TikToks at Blackbird. And it’s encouraged me to not take myself too seriously, because sometimes we’re doing, like, truly ridiculous videos like dancing or lip syncing or like hopping on funny trends. And I think, at first, that was hard. And it can take some time to, like, warm up to being on camera if you’re new to that. But it does get easier and, I don’t know, I think I like the way that social media has sort of evolved in recent years, because it is, like, less polished. There’s a little bit more authenticity. I think you’re not, like, seeing that, like, perfect feed anymore. People are just posting videos that are less, like, edited and overproduced and it’s more about just, like, having fun and having a laugh. Or at least that’s how I feel about it. And that has really helped me to enjoy it more. I’m definitely a lurker in my free time. I love scrolling TikTok. I actually get a ton of joy out of it. It makes me laugh and often lifts my spirits. TikTok, for some reason, like, it doesn’t give me icky feelings. Most of the time it gives me good feelings. I’m also very attached to Instagram, because I feel like I’ve been on that platform for so long. And there are some folks that I’ve followed for, truly, what feels like forever. And I really feel like I know them. So it’s hard to step away from that sometimes, because I just want to, like, know what all my Instagram friends are up to, you know?

Helen: Yeah, I do love that parasocial relationship that can form even if you don’t ever connect face to face or maybe even talk one on one. It’s often like you’re following people and they’re following you back and you, you’re friends. It really feels real. And I think it, in many ways it is real.

Caroline: Yeah, totally. And I did take a break from social media, like, fully, a couple of years ago. Took it off my phone and all that. And that was really healthy and good for me. So I did want to kind of throw that in there. Even though we are talking all about how great sewcializing is today, if you’re feeling burnt out, try taking some time away and I think you might come back with a fresh perspective and feel excited to get into it again.

Helen: Totally.

Caroline: Okay, I think we should talk about some of the social media platforms where you will find the sewing community. So, as we mentioned, Instagram is our platform of choice for our businesses and personally. Instagram is a very visual platform. It used to be mostly photos, but now it has short form video too. And there’s been a lot of talk about Instagram prioritizing video in people’s feeds. And it’s true that videos get a lot more views. Part of that is that reels can pop up for people that don’t follow you. However, I still see and engage with a lot of photos on Instagram. So I wouldn’t worry about it too much if you’re resistant to video. Keep posting photos. That’s A-okay.

Helen: Yeah, it’s 100% okay. And I wanted to note too, that I hear people getting frustrated with the feed these days because you go on there and you’re like, “Oh, it’s my friend and their cat.” And, “Oh, it’s that person I follow who sews.” And then it’s like: random video about cooking or like, whatever it is. It just throws stuff at you that you didn’t follow or ask for. And then it doesn’t show you the accounts that you do follow and that you did ask for, and That is kind of annoying, but I did want to say there is a way to change that. You can browse only your followed accounts in chronological order, which is how Instagram used to be. All you do is just tap the Instagram icon in the top left corner of the app and then click following, and it changes the feed back to the way it was back in the olden times.

Caroline: The olden times, when I used to be able to scroll all the way to the end and it would be like, “You’re caught up!”

Helen: “You’re all caught up! You can go do something else now.”

Caroline: Boy, how that has changed.

Helen: But yeah, you can do that. And I think that’s, that’s really fun, especially if you just want to scroll through all of your sewing inspo posts and see what people have been up to. It can be really nice to weed out all that extra stuff.

Caroline: TikTok is the newest, or one of the newest, platforms on the scene, and it’s all short form video. And like Reels on Instagram, it uses an algorithm to put videos in people’s For You feeds, whether or not they follow you. Because the videos are so short and people tend to watch a bunch at once, there’s potential for a lot of views. And there is a healthy sewing community on TikTok. You’ll find all ages there, though I would say the average probably skews a little younger than Instagram, with more Gen Z makers. And again, like, a little bit less polish. I feel like there’s a lot more like slapdash DIY pattern-free sewing happening over on TikTok.

Helen: Yes, I really like that. Especially with younger folks, like, just getting into sewing and just messing around and creating really cool stuff. And I think that we’re going to see more and more people using TikTok and more and more people of different ages. So don’t be intimidated. Don’t just assume that it’s not for you because of your age. I’ve definitely, myself, felt that way. But then once I started using the app, I was like, “Oh, it’s just like Instagram.” I don’t know. It’s not that different.

Caroline: Yeah, for sure. And I will also add: there are photos on TikTok now. Like, you can post an album where you can scroll through photos. But I would say, like, primarily it is video and I kind of love that.

Helen: Of course, there is still Facebook, and my understanding is that groups are the best way to interact with the sewing community on Facebook. That’s because most people tend to follow pages of businesses or influencers versus kind of mutually following other individual sewists. Facebook groups, on the other hand, those are a great place to ask questions, see sewists’ makes, show off your own. If you hit it off with someone from the group, you can always friend request them too, or start, like, a private chat. And there’s a few really active sewing groups on Facebook that we wanted to call out: Curvy Sewing Collective, All About Sewing, and My Hobby is Quilting. But there are thousands of groups, including local groups and groups with special interests like vintage sewing or paper piecing or bra making. So really, whatever you’re into, you can definitely find a group for that.

Caroline: Yeah, for sure. And you always want to look at the group’s description and rules before you request to join. That can help you figure out whether the group’s vibe fits what you want. For example, some groups don’t allow posts about items that are for sale. Other groups are for specific groups of people, like plus size sewists. And you want to try to follow the rules and have fun, of course. Posts from your groups will pop up in your main feed, or you can go to the group’s page and scroll the feed there. Obviously, Helen and I are not really in Facebook groups, so if you have any little tips for sewcializing on Facebook, send them our way.

Helen: One tip that came to mind, just generally on social media, and I think we mentioned this in both of our sewcializing episodes, is: don’t give unsolicited advice.

Caroline: Oh, yeah.

Helen: If you’re seeing someone’s make and they’re displaying it and they’re showing it off and you notice, you know, a drag line here or a wonky hem there, you don’t need to say anything about that. You just let it be. You say, “Wow, looks great on you.” Unless someone’s asking for, “Oh, the hem turned out a little wonky. What did I do wrong?” There’s really no need to jump in with that kind of advice, because it’s a lot of times, these are spaces where people are just wanting to show off what they did and wanting some positive reinforcement.

Caroline: Mmhmm. I love that you fit that one in there, Helen, because it’s, that advice rings true even eight years after our first sewcializing episode.

Helen: Totally.

Caroline: YouTube has so much great sewing content. It’s not quite as interactive as the other platforms we’ve talked about. There’s something a bit uneven-feeling about responding to a long video with a comment. However, there are some amazing channels like Sew Sew Live that have live sewing sessions where you can type in comments and questions in real time. And also, if you’re interested in making your own YouTube channel, it can feel more interactive in a way. You can participate in video trends and even collab with other sewing creators. I’ve personally been getting a little bit more into YouTube, because we are gonna have a YouTube channel for Blackbird and BF Patterns and start making more videos. And I’ve been filming some videos for that and I’ve been having a lot of fun. It’s kind of fun to get into something new that I haven’t really tried before and I don’t know. There’s like a whole, a whole lot going on on sewing YouTube these days.

Helen: I love sewing YouTube. I don’t necessarily, like, watch a lot of channels on the regular. But if I need a visual on how to do something, you better believe YouTube’s where I’m going. And I’m always so grateful to all the people that have put in the effort and time to make all of those tutorial videos, sewalongs, like, people are making sewalongs for our patterns and posting them up there. That is so lovely and so helpful and amazing.So I really appreciate sewing youtubers and the effort they put in.

Caroline: Yeah, totally.

Helen: There are, of course, more text-based social media platforms like X, which is formerly Twitter, BlueSky, there’s Instagram Threads. These text-based communities don’t have super active sewing components, necessarily. But if you’re trying to change that, or if you have some advice for sewists on these platforms, we’d love to know about it. Please write to us. I think because it’s a visual hobby, it kind of makes sense that it’s not thriving on these text-based platforms.

Caroline: So true. Pinterest will definitely get an honourable mention today because it is a great place to find and collect sewing inspo, tutorials, and more. It’s not very interactive though, so we’re not going to be covering it a ton in this episode. It, again, feels a little bit one-sided. There’s not a lot of, like, “sewcializing” happening on Pinterest, but I still think it’s a great tool.

Helen: Yes, I love going on there when I’m planning a new make and I can make a little board and think about the colours and the proportions. So handy. Pattern Review has popular discussion forums that are split up into categories. It can take a bit of time to navigate as opposed to social media sites that have a feed. But it can be nice if you’re looking to talk about a specific topic or if you need an answer to a very specific question. Everything under the sun has been discussed over on Pattern Review, so you’re bound to find a really good thread that you can dig through and find the information you need.

Caroline: Mmhmm. And the sewing and quilting subreddits are active and friendly. The nice thing about Reddit is you can see posts from the subreddits you follow in your main feed. And Reddit is a great place to ask and answer questions, see others’ work, and show off your own. I’ve actually been pretty into reddit lately because I’m on the Reddit, like, Puppy 101 subreddit. And I’ve really enjoyed it. I think it’s, like, kind of a different vibe. People are really helpful and encouraging. And I just like, I don’t know, there’s something about Google lately that’s been a little bit less reliable. And I find myself turning to Reddit for answers a lot of the time. It just feels more, like, organic, you know?

Helen: Google’s like asking the Internet index, but Reddit’s like asking your friend, you know.

Caroline: Yeah, totally.

Helen: Give me the direct advice.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: There are some communities online that come with pattern subscriptions, like the discussion boards on Seamwork, Closet Core Crew, and Cashmerette Club. We don’t have experience using these, but my guess is that it would be a lot like Pattern Review, but with a smaller number of people. So there’s forums and ways to interact and share your makes. And I think having a small private space can be a little bit easier sometimes. It’s a little less overwhelming.

Caroline: Mmhmm. And listener Camilla recommended Virtual Sewing Room, which is a social zoom call for sewists. The organizer, Jenny, says, “Set up in your sewing space wherever it may be and join the zoom call. Sew, quilt, knit, crochet, iron or unpick a project whilst chatting or listening in to sewing chatter.” Each session lasts for two hours and there are several available every month in 2024, so we’ll have a link in our show notes. This sounds so cool.

Helen: It’s so cool. We should go to a virtual sewing room, Caroline.

Caroline: I know, when I read this I was like, I kind of want to join. I don’t know. I feel like it’d be really fun.

Helen: Little fly on the wall.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: Would you join with your real name or would you come up with an alias?

Caroline: I was just gonna say, like, maybe I’ll come up with a clever alias. Oh my gosh.

Helen: “ILoveBlackbirdFabrics.” Listener @ovo.cosido recommended the Sew Club Sewciety on Discord. It’s organized by @genuinelyempatterns. Discords are kind of like private message boards, and this one sounds like a lot of fun.

Caroline: Yes, it does. So, while it might be technically possible to be active on every social media site, it’s probably not going to be that much fun. If you can choose one or two of your favourites, you’re going to have an easier time creating content and getting to know the other people on it. If you don’t know what your favourite platform is yet, try out a few. They all have different vibes and different styles of content. And don’t worry too much about missing out on what’s going on on the other apps. The idea is to find your community and put down some roots. Seamwork has an article called “How to Connect with People in the Sewing Community” that has some really great advice. They say the pillars of community building are listening, appreciation, and sharing. So here’s how that would look on social media.

Helen: The listen pillar means spending some time reading, watching, or listening to what others are posting. The appreciation pillar means if you like what you see, you can press like, you can react, comment, or share. Such a huge boost when you do this. I know it never gets old for me to see a nice comment or a question that starts a conversation or see that a bunch of people have shared a tutorial that I made, knowing that they’re probably sending it to their friends and being like, “Wow, did you know this?” That makes me so happy. And lastly, sharing, and that can mean making your own content, answering someone’s question, or participating in, like, a fun social media trend. I really like this way of thinking about social media. You can participate in these three pillars as much or as little as you want to. You can be one pillar kind of person, a three pillar kind of person. It’s all good.

Caroline: Yeah, it is. So would your two platforms be Instagram and TikTok, Helen?

Helen: Yes, I think so. We’re currently not sharing, like, a ton of TikTok-specific content. We’re mostly sharing the same content on Instagram and TikTok, which I think is generally not recommended from a business perspective. The apps want original content. But I do really enjoy the short form video. Like, when I want to have a little social media break, and I don’t mean taking a break from, I mean like diving into social media to have a little brain break and just watch the world flow by, I love scrolling through Reels and scrolling through TikTok. Like, short form video, it’s so much fun. Like you said, Caroline, it really lifts my spirits. There’s so many people doing amazing comedy, sharing really relevant and useful information about current events. or, you know, ways that we can be better human beings and treat each other with kindness and respect. I love that people are, like, putting themselves out there, being goofy, being political, like all that stuff. It’s just so fun to see it all mixed together. And it just feels like this grab bag of awesomeness in the world, you know?

Caroline: Absolutely. I feel exactly the same way. And I think there are a lot of folks that are sharing similar content on TikTok and Instagram. So I wouldn’t be too, like, sheepish about it. I feel like it’s, like, very, very common. And totally okay if that’s all you can handle, right? Like, you don’t have to be creating original content for every platform. I still feel like the sewing community on Instagram is probably the most active. So if you’re wondering, like, “What’s one place that I could be?” Instagram might be that place.

Helen: Yeah. I would agree with that. Unless you’re, like, really into your Facebook groups and you’ve built an amazing community over there. That’s so awesome. I think that can be so valuable. And then I spend a lot of time on Pinterest, ‘cause I like looking at pretty things.

Caroline: Yeah, we can’t pick just one or two. It’s too hard.

Helen: And like, there’s this garment sewing Instagram community, and then there’s the quilting Instagram community, and, like, they blend now and then, but they’re also separate spaces. So that’s been, like, so interesting to dabble in and get to know this other sewing world of the internet that I have previously not participated in.

Caroline: Oh my gosh. Yeah. Like, do you follow any knitting people on Instagram or TikTok?

Helen: I definitely follow a few, but I’ve fallen off the knitting train, I think, since quilting came into my life. I can only have so many fiber art hobbies. So I haven’t knitted in a little while, but that is also a huge online community. And Ravelry, of course, is amazing. I mean, what we wouldn’t give to have a sewing Ravelry. We’ve said it before, but maybe one day, fingers crossed.

Caroline: It truly is like any kind of, like, hobby or like sub-hobby that you are interested in probably has its own little community online, or I would venture to say definitely has its own little community online. And that’s one of the great things about social media, is that you can find your people and really connect. Whereas back in the day when we didn’t have social media, we were kind of, like, stuck with whoever was in our immediate vicinity, you know, and not so much open to, like, the worldwide community.

Helen: It’s true. It opens a lot, a lot of doors. Okay, we have so many more sewcializing tips and tricks for y’all, but we’re going to take a quick break and we’ll be right back.

Caroline: Love to Sew is made possible by listeners like YOU! We are so grateful for the support of our amazing patrons and subscribers. If you love Love to Sew and you want to help support the pod, we have a new option for you.

Helen: You can now become a paid subscriber on Apple Podcasts! Subscribers get access to our monthly bonus episodes. It’s so convenient; if you already use Apple Podcasts, the episodes are right there in your feed!

Caroline: So, what are the bonus episodes? Well, we do a chatty catch-up on what’s been happening in our lives, share about the realities of running a small business, discuss new indie pattern releases, and talk about what we’re sewing right now! Many of our subscribers say these fun bonus episodes are their favourite, and if you subscribe, you get access to the full back catalogue. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew! We also do a mini-episode that deep dives into a specific topic. We get to discuss so many fun sewing techniques and answer specific subscriber questions about sewing!

Helen: And we are still on Patreon! If you subscribe over there you can get access to the bonus episodes, behind-the-scenes photos, and a special 15% off discount code at our superfan patron tier. That discount applies at Helen’s Closet, Cedar Quilt Co., Blackbird Fabrics, and BF patterns. If you shop with us regularly, it basically pays for itself!

Caroline: If you’d like to try out Patreon or Apple podcast subscriptions and check out our bonus content, you can sign up for a free 7-day trial. And, of course, you can help support the show by listening, just like you are right now. You can also leave a review! Reviews really help our show to get discovered by new listeners. We know that financial support isn’t always possible and we want you to know that we love you for listening!

Helen: Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or visit our show’s page in the apple podcast app to become a paid subscriber. Thank you to all of our listeners, patrons and subscribers – you’re the best!

And we’re back! Okay, let’s get into some advice about using social media. First thing is to create a bio that represents you. If you see someone’s content and you get intrigued to go to their account, I usually go to their page and I’ll look at their profile pic, their bio. So it really helps if your profile pic is a close-up of your face. As an icon, they’re super small. So it’s kind of hard to tell what’s going on. If it’s, like, a full-body photo, when it’s, like, a picture of Winnie-the-Pooh or something, it kind of disconnects me from the person. It’s always really nice to see a face or maybe a logo if it’s a business. But otherwise, yeah, it can be hard to tell who you’re interacting with.

Caroline: Yeah, it’s so true. And for the bio, here’s an idea of what to include. So you want to have your first name or handle or alias and your pronouns. This helps people who want to talk to you. It’s that basic info you find out when you introduce yourself.

Helen: And you can include other basic info too, like what you might find out about someone if you had a short conversation with them. So what do you do for work? Do you have kids or pets or partner? What are your main hobbies? Of course you can leave out whatever you don’t want to share with a large number of people, but sharing a little bit can make people feel like they’re getting to know you and give you an idea of what they might expect to find.

Caroline: And you can also straight-up tell people what to expect to find on your account. So for example,”I post my sewing projects and pictures of my cats.” Or, “Expect to see a lot of memes in stories and a lot of quilts on the grid.”

Helen: Yeah, setting those expectations can be really valuable. You can pin your best posts. So, most social media platforms have this as an option. Pick a few of your posts that you’d like to be known by or some recent stuff that you want someone new to your profile to see and you can pin that to the top so that when they go to your profile they’re seeing those things immediately.

Caroline: Mmhmm. Or if you have like a viral video that has like multiple parts, pinning that at the top is a really nice thing to do for people who are just discovering you, because they probably want to see, like, that whole, sort of, story if they go to your profile. The whole idea is to make it easy for someone new to get an overview of what you’re about, the same way they might if they were chatting with you for the first time.

Helen: So, it does take some experimentation and time to find your voice and figure out how you want to show up on social media. Think about the kind of content that you like to consume. Like, do you love it when people are being funny and chatty in stories? Or do you live for those beautiful, well lit, flat lay photos of finished makes? I mean, do you like seeing projects go from a pile of fabric to a finished dress in one TikTok video? It will be a lot easier to think of ideas for your own content if you enjoy watching or reading that kind of thing. So that can really help to guide you and your vision for what you want to share.

Caroline: Helen, I really love watching the Get Ready With Me videos, like the Storytime ones, where someone’s, like, doing their makeup while they’re telling you a really juicy story, but I feel like I couldn’t do it myself.

Helen: I can barely apply makeup. Period.

Caroline: I know, like my makeup would look so goofy if I had to also talk to a camera.

Helen: Okay, but this could be like a TikTok goal, Caroline, because this is the kind of thing that’s like, hilarious! Like, do a get ready video with me where you just like, mess it up completely. Like, it look so bad.

Caroline: Yes! Yes, I do love the ones where like, you know, there’s like a little, I don’t know, like text overlay that’s like,”I didn’t realize that I had this like crumb on my face for the whole video. Like, you’re welcome.”

Helen: Oh yeah, I’ve been there.

Caroline: Truly though, try things out. There’s no need for it to be perfect. Just like sewing, learning how to take nice pictures, write an engaging caption, or cut together a video is a learning process. You’re gonna make mistakes, and you’re gonna be way better at it after a few months of practice than you are at the beginning. But that’s kind of the beauty about learning anything new.

Helen: It’s true. And, of course, on social media, everything moves so quickly. That content that you created a few months ago that maybe wasn’t the way you wanted it to be. It’s gone. It’s, like, truly, like, so far in the back catalogue, it doesn’t matter. You’re going to just keep evolving and keep making new and exciting stuff. But of course, sharing is very vulnerable and it takes time to get comfortable in front of the camera. So try to look at yourself through the eyes of someone who loves you. Sometimes when we look at ourselves, we can only see a certain part or certain things that we don’t like, but I can guarantee you that the vast majority of people are not looking at you that way. They’re not looking at you and thinking, “Oh, they’re old,” or, “Oh, their skin is weird,” or, “Oh, their hair is, needs to be recoloured,” or whatever it is that you’re seeing. People are not seeing that. They’re thinking, “Wow, what a beautiful smile. Wow. This person made their clothes. That’s incredible. Oh my gosh. The lighting in this picture is amazing. Their dog is so cute.” They’re thinking positive things for the most part. I honestly, really, truly believe that. So try to get out of your head and avoid looking at yourself with that critical eye. And before you start filming, think of a friend you love to hang out with to get yourself in the right head space. Imagine that they’re there with you. Hey, I’ll be the little ghost friend hanging out in your camera, because truly I want to see your content and I think you’re great.

Caroline: Mmhmm. Yeah, think of me and Helen just on the other side watching and cheering you on.

Helen: I love that. Picture us just being like, “Yes! Show us the good stuff.”

Caroline: Yeah! You can also consider focusing on a niche within the sewing world. Not that all your content has to be about that, but it might be a good way to meet like-minded sewists. So here are some examples of niches. You can do vintage sewing, zero waste, thrifting and upcycling, costuming, tips and tutorials, and of course, quilting.

Helen: Quilting! Okay. We have some tips for photography also, because of course you’re going to be needing to photograph your me-mades. Natural light is the most important tool you have. So experiment with taking photos at different times of day to see when the natural light is best around your place. Or go outside. The goal is to have the subject of the photo really nicely illuminated without any harsh shadows. And I honestly can’t stress enough: it makes all the difference to have nice lighting. So when Sam and I find a location that we like for photos, we spend like two to five minutes just like going around in a circle and taking photos from different angles and then looking at them on the phone and being like, “Oh, this angle is really nice.” And it’s not always the angle that you expect. Like sometimes standing in front of the light works. Sometimes it looks amazing when you’re more silhouetted with the light behind you. Truly depends on so many factors. So it’s really fun to just take that moment to experiment and find the right angle.

Caroline: Yeah, and I do love…some folks that I follow kind of have a spot where they always take their photos. So if you can find a spot where the photos or videos often look good, like, reuse that. And you can always add a different little backdrop, maybe drape a piece of fabric in the background. Or if it’s outside, it’s always fun for your followers to see, like, the changing weather. It’s a whole vibe that totally works. So don’t worry too much about always, like, reinventing the spot that you’re taking photos. I think you can just stick to what works if you find something that really works for you.

Helen: Yeah, and if you want to, you can remove anything distracting from the background of your photos. Makes it easier to focus on you. But the truth is, the whole room can be a total mess and people are still going to be looking at you because you’re the focus of the picture. You’re sharing your makes. So I wouldn’t worry too much about cleaning up behind you. But if you want, you can clear your area and then take your pictures. Or I like to just use portrait mode on my phone so the background kind of blurs out and then all the focus, like, literal focus, is on me. That works really well, I find. Another thing I wanted to mention about lighting specifically is that a lot of people assume the best time to take photos is on a sunny day, which is just simply not the case. Full sun is really hard to take pictures in. Your skin gets reflective. There’s so many shadows on your face. Wrinkles are really pronounced on the clothing. It can be so hard to take a picture in full sunlight. So when it’s sunny out and you want to take pictures, seek out some bright shade that has, like, a nice even tone. Overcast days offer the best light because it’s just, like, super even and there’s no shadows. And then morning or sunset light are the most stunning when you’re outside. Of course, if you can pull that off, that’s the time to do it.

Caroline: Oh my gosh, it’s so true. And when you don’t have the sun, like, shining in your eyes, it’s much easier to look into the camera and not be, like, squinty. I definitely have squinty problems. I’m always squinting at the camera. so not having that sunshine is always helpful.

Helen: It’s so true.

Caroline: Taking photos with the camera at eye height can actually make your body look a little distorted, like your head is big and your feet are tiny. So if you drop the camera to waist height, your proportions will look truer to life. And this is so true. I mean, unless you are going for that sort of, like, distorted look, which is definitely, it works for some people and I think it can be a vibe. But if you’re looking for that more true-to-life kind of proportion, I think, just drop that camera a little bit.

Helen: Yeah. Experiment with dropping it all the way to the ground too. That can be a really fun look, that, like, upshot. I mean, obviously not, like,, up the skirt, but like, you know, that upwards angle can make you look so, like, fashion model. Like it really, really has, has a vibe. You don’t have to wear your me-mades in your photos. I mean, hanging them on a hanger or doing a flat lay can be really nice. Some folks are just not comfortable being in photos, don’t want to put their photo on social media, on the internet, and that’s 100% okay. Totally fine.

Caroline: Yeah. Posing can be tricky, but anyone can do it. So it helps to move around instead of sticking to one pose for a long time. And if you’re feeling tense, stretch or wiggle it out, maybe do some jumping jacks, dance around, imagine a friend cheering you on. Or you can actually get a friend or partner to take pictures of you and cheer you on. And it can also help to look through Instagram or Pinterest and save pictures with poses you like, and then you can scroll through them when you’re ready to shoot your new me-made. I know at Blackbird, when we do photo shoots with people, we’ll often actually, like, print out sheets with examples of poses. ‘Cause when you’re in the moment and getting photos taken of yourself, it’s really easy to, like, default back to your hand on the hip or legs crossed, or like a little head cocked to the side. And having something to refer to, to sort of, like, jog your memory and remember those poses that you think look cool on other people is, like, a really great tool.

Helen: Yeah, totally. And it can force you to experiment a little bit, especially if you literally just don’t know what to do with your hands.

Caroline: Yeah. And sometimes it doesn’t work, right? But that’s okay.

Helen: I have, like, many go-to poses, most of which involve me putting my hands over my head, which is kind of weird, but I love it. Strike a pose. But we do like a 360, so I’ll take, like, several from the front and then a little, like turn a little bit. Several more. Turn to the side, several more. Turn to the back, several more. So we make sure that we get everything. And that can really help to loosen me up to, just knowing, okay, we’re doing the 360. I’m going to go around in a circle and I’m just going to like, try to hit all my best America’s Next Top Model poses.

Caroline: And the, like, micro-movements, I know you’re going to talk about taking a lot of photos in a sec, but if you’re able to take a ton of photos and just do little tiny movements for every photo and little tiny expression changes, I think will give you a lot more to choose from when you’re, kind of, culling through your photos.

Helen: Totally, yeah. I know from a lot of experience taking photos over the years to take way more than you think you’re going to need. When Sam and I do a photo shoot, even if it’s just for a blog post or an Instagram album, we take like 50 to 100 photos and I choose, you know, 5 to 10. So it’s so nice to have that variety. And like you said, Caroline, those micro movements are so valuable, because you take a ton of pictures and then you look at one and you’re like, “Oh, this is so cute, but I wish my smile was a little bigger.” Next one, it’s bigger, right? Like, ‘cause you didn’t move that much. So you actually have all of those options available to you. So that can be really valuable. And another thing I wanted to say is, of course, like nobody wants to be a bother when they’re getting help taking photos, like it can feel really awkward to ask someone to take your photo to interrupt whatever it is that you’re doing. If you’re on a hike or something, or you’re out on a walk, or you’re with friends, to be like, “Oh, could you just take my picture for a second?” And you want it to be over with super quickly. You don’t want to bother anybody, but the people helping you take the photo, they’re usually actually kind of excited and they want to help you. They genuinely want to do a good job taking the photo, make sure that you get the photo that you wanted. So give them some instruction. I mean, ask for those full body shots and then ask for a couple of closeups and work with them to find the best light. And it can be actually really fun and a fun, like, bonding experience to take pictures with somebody. So just, like, have your moment, you know, stand in that moment, getting your picture taken, get the photos you want. It really just takes like 10 minutes.

Caroline: Yeah, And just tell them to take a gazillion photos.

Helen: Yeah, take lots. Take lots.

Caroline: Just take lots. But if you don’t want someone else to photograph you, or maybe you don’t have someone that’s available to do that, a tripod is a great tool to have. You can get phone tripods with a Bluetooth remote so you can take the photos yourself, or you can set a timer on your phone.

Helen: Yeah, I totally use my tripod quite often as well, especially when I’m filming video, which is our next topic of discussion. Video content is so much fun and making short form videos on TikTok or Instagram or even YouTube Shorts is a great way to reach beyond your current followers, find new people to connect with. It can feel a little complicated sometimes when you’re getting into video; there’s a lot of things to think about. But video can also be super simple. You can upload a video of you just talking to the camera, no editing. Those can be really nice. Or you can get into editing and make cool transitions, mini movies, tell a whole story of your make. Really, it runs the gamut from simple to complex and you can dabble wherever you feel is good.

Caroline: Yeah, and if you’re feeling overwhelmed by the amount of editing tricks that are available, but you want to learn, you can make a goal to try one new tool or technique once a week. You can also follow people who the literal whole, like, social media thing is giving people tips and tricks on how to edit videos or how to get your videos seen. So that can be an inspiring way to sort of, like, learn some new things while you’re also scrolling.

Helen: But we do have some short form video ideas for y’all. So first, to introduce yourself, show some of your best me-mades, maybe say what you love about sewing, add a little clip of your pet being cute. We love to see those behind-the-scenes moments.

Caroline: Yeah, you can film your favourite sewing tip. I love this kind of content. The amount of sewing knowledge online is something I would have killed for as a teen, when I was just tracing out things with my scissors. Literally just laying a tee shirt on the ground and having at it. I don’t know.

Helen: I mean, that kind of content would kill on TikTok.

Caroline: True, true. Yeah.

Helen: I think tutorials are exactly what Instagram, at least, is looking for. ‘Cause every time I do a little tutorial or show a tool or show how to do a technique, those videos always perform really well. So that’s a great one. And you don’t have to put your face in it. It can just be your hands. You can film your process for a whole garment. Listener Lucie said, “I make five second videos for all the steps when sewing and then it’s easy to make short TikTok videos from it!” Simple and effective.

Caroline: If you make a garment for a particular event, film yourself wearing it there. This would be maybe hard to do if you’re really busy or if you don’t have someone with you, but I think it’s so fun to see people kind of wearing their final garment at the actual thing that they made it for.

Helen: You know what I really love? And it’s kind of the opposite of this, because it’s not an event, but I really enjoy bathroom mirror selfies at work.

Caroline: Yes.

Helen: Or elevator selfies, you’re like, in the elevator and there’s a mirrored wall and you’re like, “Here’s my outfit today. I’m at work.”

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: Keep doing that, people. I love it. I live for it.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: Film close-ups of the details of a garment that you’ve carefully finished. Set it to some beautiful, like, soft piano music. I mean, gorge.

Caroline: You can make a quick montage of your inspo pictures and then show the final garment you made. This is always really fun to see.

Helen: I like that. You can ask an interesting question and invite people to respond to it with their answer. You might get a lot of comments and engagement doing that.

Caroline: You can find a song that matches the vibe of your new garment, put it on, and film yourself dancing to it.

Helen: Ooh! I like that idea. You can make a montage of your projects over time to show your sewing journey and how much your skills have improved. That one sounds fun.

Caroline: Remember, if you’re not interested in making videos or it just seems like too much work to do, you don’t have to. It’s totally okay. And it doesn’t mean you can’t participate in the sewing community. I feel like the sewing community still loves pictures, so it is A-okay.

Helen: Absolutely. I think both can often be nice if you have a video on your grid of your make and then you also have an album. So if people want to see more of that particular make, they can scroll through photos. And they’re not moving, so they can get, like, a clearer picture of all those details that you put in.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: So speaking of participation, there’s some built-in ways to participate in the sewing community. So let’s talk about some of those.

Caroline: Sewing challenges are so fun. It’s the closest I’m ever going to get to being on Project Runway. Sometimes it takes a challenge to wake up your creativity. The challenge rules give you something to work with, which can be easier than working with a blank page.

Helen: Challenges also foster community engagement. There’s usually a deadline, which means people tend to post more, and that can be really motivating. Plus, you can follow the hashtag to see and comment on what others are doing, and you can make friends that way. Sometimes the hosting account or blog will share other people’s posts, so it’s a really great way to find other sewists and for them to find you.

Caroline: Mmhmm. And trends in the sewing community or trends on your social media platform can be super fun to hop on. It’s kind of like a mini-challenge to participate. And they don’t have to dictate what projects you make. Following a trend can mean following a video format or a sound, which is pretty common on TikTok.

Helen: Yeah, on the Helen’s Closet account, we did the “I’m a sewist, so of course, I…” kind of format and we asked our followers to comment with what they would include in that video. And it was so awesome to see all of the funny comments. Caroline, you guys did that one too, right?

Caroline: Yes, that was such a fun trend. I love hopping on trends, like when something’s popular, like a movie or maybe a new Taylor Swift album, there are often lots of trends that go along with it. I know back in the fall we had so much fun with Barbie movie-themed videos when that movie came out. So yeah, definitely don’t be afraid to hop on a trend when you see it because it can be a great way for people to discover you and it’s also just tons of fun.

Helen: Yeah, one way you can keep track of those is to just save them so you put them in your saved folders on Instagram or TikTok and then you’ll be able to go backthere and find that audio clip that you wanted to use or remind yourself of that sewing trend you wanted to try this week.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: All right, to wrap things up here, we have some listener questions about sewcializing. Lindsey wrote, “I wonder how to keep up with content posting, especially in the era of short form content, while trying to remain mindful and sustainable with my sewing practice.”

Caroline: Ooh, I think a lot of us feel a little underskilled on social media now because we’re posting in the same place as, like, influencers who are making content professionally. And I think it’s really important not to compare yourself to people who are literally doing this as their job. They obviously have a lot more time and resources to put into it. I don’t think it’s bad to follow influencers. I like looking at their content. That’s the part of Instagram that reminds me of flipping through magazines when I was a teenager. But I also like to follow people in the sewing community who aren’t doing things that are pleasing to the algorithm. And I think if a bunch of people do that and like and comment on each other’s stuff, it makes social media less intimidating and more about seeing what’s going on in the sewing community. So don’t stress too much about, like, a posting schedule. Instead, just focus on showing up for others the way that you’d like for them to show up for you.

Helen: Yeah, and in terms of mindfulness and sustainability, you don’t always have to be making new things all the time to make fun content. In fact, you can post in-progress stuff. That’s where you could share, “Here’s a little tip for sewing darts, because today I’m sewing darts” or “Here’s this collar that I just finished. Doesn’t it look amazing?” It doesn’t always have to be this, like, final reveal where you’re showing off a finished garment. That in-between stuff actually tends to do even better on social media. So experiment with that a little bit. And this leads us into our next question. @whatsgigimakin asked, “How to incorporate more content not associated with completing sewing projects because…the way I haven’t been sewing…”

Caroline: Yeah, I definitely go through times like this. And we already listed some ideas in this episode But we have a few more, because you don’t always have to be sharing a finished make or even a process of making something. You can give a me-made wardrobe tour. I actually love these, like people are like, “Here’s everything I made in the last year” or “Here are my five favourite sewing projects of all time” and they have a little rack and they’re going through them. Or something that’s a little bit more like snappy and quick where it’s not even necessarily, like, you modeling it. You could be flat lay. There’s so many options there.

Helen: Totally. You could show your favourite sewing gadget and ask people to share theirs.

Caroline: You can list your tried-and-true patterns and show pictures of what you’ve made from them.

Helen: Show off your favourite fabrics from your stash or highlight one really beautiful fabric. Maybe ask your followers what would they make with it.

Caroline: Ooh, you can do a fabric unboxing, too. I love those.

Helen: You would. “My Blackbird Fabrics order is here! I can’t wait to open it!”

Caroline: It’s so fun.

Helen: It’s so fun. I do love it.

Caroline: You can demonstrate your favourite hand sewing stitch. That’s a good one.

Helen: There’s so many things. Brainstorming is a really great way to come up with ideas. The concept is that you spend a short amount of time writing down everything that comes to mind without judging it as a good idea or a bad idea. It can also help to release all the restrictions of time and money and put your big ideas down there. And then the editing and judgment can come later. Brainstorming time is for unleashed creativity.

Caroline: I love brainstorming for content. It’s really fun when you can do it with other people too, in like a business setting. But even on your own, like, you know, use Pinterest or your saved posts to get you started and then just let your creativity guide you.

Helen: Mmhmm. Eowyn wrote, “I want to know what kind of tools people use to film from above for filming tutorials or to film their hands while they’re at the sewing machine. Do you have to build special overhead structures? I fear that the angle is not wide enough with the kind of little tripod that they sell online.”

Caroline: And then Esther replied, “There are tripods that film 90 degree angles. I use a phone arm that can be attached to a table. It’s cheaper than a 90 degree tripod.”

Helen: Those are great tools. I also use a phone arm. It kind of looks like one of those old-school lamps with the kink in it. So you can kind of move it around. And then I zoom out on my phone to like 0.5 zoom. So it, like, it’s more of a bit of a fisheye situation, but it gives you, like, a lot of visible area. And I find it works pretty well for most things.

Helen: I don’t have a lot of fancy stuff. I really struggle to film at my sewing machine. That’s one thing I would love to get better at. Like, how do you get the angle at the actual foot of the sewing machine where your fingers aren’t in the way and it’s in focus and it looks good and the lighting is nice? Like, that is the holy grail for me and I have not figured it out.

Caroline: And often when you’re filming, you can’t actually see the screen of your camera. So it’s only after the fact that you’re like, “Wait, my hair was in the way” or something, you know? Yeah. It can be frustrating.

Helen: So many awkward moments with, like, a tripod between my legs and I’m like trying to sew something like three feet in front of me. The lengths I go through.

Caroline: Helen, our listener Roni had a related tip that might help you. They said, “My camera is sometimes in my bra for sewing shots up close. Many times I use a mug. I’ve had a tripod with me, but it’s not always the best way to get in there. Anything that can hold the phone relatively steady works great.”

Helen: Oh my gosh, I have seen people crochet or sew or knit little like neck bands that kind of hang down in front of your chest and then you can balance your phone in them or you can just stick it in like, you know the neck band of your of your shirt or your bra. I love that idea. And then you can get that, like, right-in-front-of-you angle. Sometimes it can be a little unsteady, is the thing. Like, my sewing table is bouncy. It’s so bouncy. So if I put my camera on it, it’s a disaster.

Caroline: I was gonna say, I’ve also seen folks do, like, POV filming, where they, it literally seems like they have, like, a GoPro strapped to their head, and so the camera moves along with them, which I will say can be, like, a little bit dizzying. Like, when I’m watching it, it takes a little bit of getting used to. But that is an option, and I don’t know, I’m just imagining, like, strapping a phone to my forehead or something and just like, don’t move too much.

Helen: I love this idea of GoPro sewing. Maybe I need to work that into my, my process. Collette wrote, “I’d like to know how people add subtitles and closed captions to their videos.” Well, there’s a tool in the editor on both TikTok and Reels that you can use to add and edit subtitles for your videos. So we’ll link a tutorial for each of those in our show notes for you. As a user of those platforms, you can also turn on captions so they’ll show up for all videos. They’re not always edited, so sometimes they’re incorrect, but they do their best and they have gotten a lot better.

Caroline: Yeah, I was gonna say, it’s really nice that a lot of these tools are built into the platforms now, whereas a couple years ago you had to use a separate app to get your captions and then import it; and then there was, like, a watermark…

Helen: I remember that.

Caroline: Oh gosh, we’ve come a long way. And on a related note, Jess wrote, “It’s important to make your content accessible. Otherwise, you’re limiting the pool of people who can sewcialize with you.” @anti.ableist.makers.society has good info about this, and we’ll link that up in the show notes. But yeah, thank you so much for that, Jess. It looks like this account has a series called Inclusive Instagram Tips for Makers, which could be very helpful.

Helen: Totally. Yeah, I really love watching silent Instagram with just captions on. Like, I don’t always want the, the noise, you know? So it can be really handy for everybody. Esther wrote, “I’d like to know how to find people on Instagram who have a similar style. Since the recent hashtag browsing was removed a while ago, it’s become impossible as hashtags are just the same people over and over again. Maybe there’s a way to find them through a method outside the app.”

Caroline: Oh gosh, this change on Instagram was super frustrating. I hope they change it back eventually. It’s so much harder to browse hashtags now. And sometimes there’s just things that you don’t see. So, if you follow a hashtag you’re gonna see posts from it that pop up in your feed. So that’s one way to find people from hashtags. So instead of just like clicking the hashtag and browsing it and then leaving, you can actually follow that hashtag. Another thing that helps is, if you follow a few people who have similar style, check if the people they follow are viewable and check some of them out. Or pay attention to what people share to stories. You can often find other great people to follow that way. There are also sometimes write-ups on websites and blogs recommending Instagram accounts to follow. So Googling can be helpful. There’s even sometimes when you follow someone or go to their profile, you can click, like, “Suggestions from Instagram” and Instagram will suggest similar accounts to follow. And I’m sure they use some kind of, like, a formula for that. Like people who follow this person also follow this person. So that can be a good way to find new people to follow that are sort of in your wheelhouse.

Helen: Yeah. Sometimes that algorithm can help you out. I hate this hashtag change so much. I can’t wait for them to change it back, but I feel like I don’t want to be that person that’s like, “They changed it and I hate it!”

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: But I truly, like, miss it so much because one of my favourite things to do used to be just like going and browsing our garment pattern hashtags and it was so nice because it was in chronological order and now it’s just like, the top posts show up at the top. And those are beautiful and nice but I want to see everyone’s makes and I want to see, like, the most recent versions of things. And you can’t do that anymore and it’s very frustrating.

Caroline: I know. I know. I feel you.

Helen: Rant over. Another listener wrote in to say, “Some people are open to new DMs and some folks hate it. How do you sewcialize responsibly?”

Caroline: Okay, I think it’s always okay to shoot a DM to someone as long as their DMs are open, because you can turn them off. And you can also set an autoresponder. Have you ever seen this? Where you send a message and then you get a response that’s like, kind of a, clearly like a pre-filled thing that’s like, “We only check DMs at this time,” or whatever. But anyways, if you DM someone, like, who has more of like a personal account, if they don’t respond or if they respond negatively, don’t take it personally. Some people just don’t have the time to write to someone new and others need to close their DMs If they don’t want to get messages. If someone doesn’t respond, I would say don’t message them again, but there’s always the chance that they will respond. And there’s lots of people out there that are just like you: interested in finding a new sewing bud. So I think it’s worth taking the chance on sending a message. I also think sometimes messages just get buried, like if an account has a lot of followers or a video goes viral or a story and gets a ton of replies and stuff can just get lost. So truly don’t take it personally if your message doesn’t get responded to.

Helen: Yeah, the inbox can be like a messy place with all the different folders. And if you’ve never sent them a message before, it might go into their message requests folder, which they might not even know exists. So if you don’t get a reply back, yeah, totally don’t try and take it personally. And if you’re trying to get in touch with someone like me, for my business and patterns, email is so much easier and so much better. And I know it’s not as quick, but you’re guaranteed to get a reply, versus Instagram where, yeah, things get lost and it’s really hard to stay on top of it all.

Caroline: Listener Maura wanted to know about “the line between trying to build sewing community and parasocialism as a non-influencer.”

Helen: I think “parasocial” is said in a negative way a lot, but there’s a lot that is positive about it. For example, one of our favourite podcasts, Caroline, is Too Scary, Didn’t Watch. Absolutely love that podcast. They recap horror movies. There’s three hosts and they just have this delightful friendship and it’s so much fun to listen to. I get a lot out of it. I have fun and I feel like I’m in on the conversation and on the storytelling. And I don’t think that the hosts are actually my friends. That’s something different. But I do feel a, like, pretty strong connection with them. I know a lot that’s going on in their lives. I feel like I know them. If I ever met them in person, I feel like we would get along. And so you can kind of have those deeper connections with followers, people that you follow. And I think that’s okay. I think it can be kind of fun. I know we probably have listeners out there right now who are thinking about, that’s how they feel about us, Caroline. And I absolutely love that. I think that’s so cool that we have these, like, built-in friendships all over the world that we might not necessarily be aware of, but it’s like, it’s like a presence I can feel in my life, you know?

Caroline: Yeah, totally. And those deep connections can definitely happen, but it’s usually when you start interacting outside of social media. Like you and I, you DM’d me and now we’re here almost 10 years later. So it definitely can happen. And that kind of brings us back to like, it never hurts to send a DM. You never know what’s going to happen.

Helen: Yeah, totally. And it is a weird space these days with, there’s so much influencing content. There’s a lot of businesses carving out space in the sewing community and the social media space. So it can be hard to find your place in that. So I can definitely relate to that more trying to balance, where do I fit into this big puzzle?

Caroline: Mareike asked, “How can I make good pictures of my new makes when it’s dark outside?”

Helen: Oh, this is tough. Unless you have a studio light and reflector kind of set up, it’s going to be hard to get those really nice pics without the natural light. But I will say that the better the phone, the better the pictures it will take in dim light. So try taking photos in different spots to find the best ones. I don’t have a lot of natural light in my studio space, so I make up for it by having very bright light fixtures. I have two 24-bulb light fixtures in my studio. So 48 light bulbs. And that brightens it up a lot. And then I slap a bright filter on there and it does a lot of the heavy lifting.

Caroline: Those are great tips.

Helen: Yeah. 48 light bulbs and a filter. Erin asks, “How do you get the best flat lay photos?” So, you can set yourself up in front of a natural light source, use pieces of white foam core to gently reflect the light as needed, or to put underneath your makes if you need a nice white background.

Caroline: You might also want to look for extras that will complement the subject of your shot, like knick knacks, scarves, pieces of fabric, or sewing tools. Get creative. You can add pops of colour with your extras or keep it tonal.

Helen: Look through the camera at the composition, moving things around until they look pleasing to you. It can help to use some flatter pieces around the edges to frame things. You can group things together in clusters or lay them out evenly for an orderly look. And the way you organize things can draw your eye in different ways. So experiment and see how different compositions make you feel. It’s like you’re making a work of art.

Caroline: And taller items tend to cast shadows, so consider placing them at the edge so that the shadow falls outside of the frame.

Helen: Hold your camera as steady as you can. Use a tripod or maybe brace the arm that’s holding your phone against your body. That makes a big difference. And we’ll link up a blog post from Sew DIY, because they have a great post about this. So that will be in the show notes.

Caroline: Okay, so we’ve been super positive in this episode overall, I would say. And to be honest, I do feel positive about social media most of the time, but of course, we all know that social media isn’t all nice.

Helen: Yeah, those comparison feelings, the imposter syndrome, affect a lot of us. Past guest Suzy Quilts had a good strategy that I’m going to try. She wrote, “Next time you see something that’s really amazing, maybe it’s something that you do yourself and that this person is doing it really, really well, tell yourself this: There’s enough room for them. There’s enough room for me. Their awesomeness does not equal my lack of awesomeness.” I really like this. I feel like it helps to think about how many people I know in real life who have my skills. It’s actually pretty rare, but when you’re in these, like, dedicated online spaces, it can feel like, well, everybody knows how to make jeans. And I made a pair that’s not as nice as that person’s pair, but like, you made jeans! That’s wild!

Caroline: Yeah, it’s incredible. And also having room to grow is a good thing. If I completely 100% mastered sewing, I don’t know what I would do with my life.

Helen: Another thing that helps the social media space to be a happy place is to be genuine online. It makes everything feel friendlier. Share both the successes and the failures; that can really foster connection and build trust. Following others who are showing more than just the highlight reel can lower the pressure on your own content.

Caroline: Setting boundaries can help you have a better experience on social media. Take a bit of time to think about what aspects of your sewing practice and personal life you feel comfortable sharing online. You don’t owe your followers any certain thing and you get to decide what your content is like.

Helen: To go back to Suzy Quilts, who does have a great article about using social media as a quilter, she said to think of Instagram like a party. So think about how big you want your party to be. At a small party with only your nearest and dearest, you can get as intimate as you like. And at a big party with a lot of people you might not know, you might want to keep it a bit more surface level. And if the party stops being fun, you leave or stop by at a different party, meaning try a different platform or sewcialize with some other people. Really, you are in charge here.

Caroline: I love this way of looking at things. Thank you, Suzy. Okay, we’re gonna end with some wise words from former guest Sewrena. “Make what you love, not what you think people will love.” Perfect advice.

Helen: Perfect advice. That’s it for today’s episode of Love to Sew. You can find me, Helen, at Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co. and Caroline at Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns. We’re recording in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.

Caroline: You can support Love to Sew and get access to bonus content by subscribing on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. You even get access to the back catalogue of bonus episodes. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew. Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or check out our podcast page on Apple Podcasts for more info.

Helen: Head to lovetosewpodcast.com to find our show notes. They’re filled with links and pictures from this episode. And if you’d like to get in touch with us, you can leave us a message at 1-844-SEW-WHAT. That’s 1-844-739-9428. Or send us an email at [email protected].

Caroline: Thanks to our amazing podcast team. Lisa Ruiz is our creative assistant and Jordan Moore of The Pod Cabin is our editor. And thank you for listening. We’ll talk to you next week.

If you love to sewcialize, this is your show.

Helen: This is your show-sha-lize!

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We interview Sandeep Sandhu, the owner of the amazing fabric store Sister Mintaka! She tells us how she chooses her beautiful fabrics, what advice she would give to small business owners in the sewing space, and all about her personal sewing. She’s not only a fabric mogul, she’s a style icon!

The transcript for this episode is on this page at the end of the show notes.

Show Notes: 

Find Sandeep Online:

Some of Sandeep’s Makes:

A post shared by Sister Mintaka (@sistermintaka)

A post shared by Sister Mintaka (@sistermintaka)

Fabrics:

Sewing Patterns:

Notions/Tools: 

Other Mentions:

A post shared by Sister Mintaka (@sistermintaka)

Transcript:

Caroline: We are recording today on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish and Kwakwaka’wakw peoples, including Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, Musqueam, and K’ómoks first nations.

Hello and welcome to Love to Sew. I’m Caroline, the owner of Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns.

Helen: And I’m Helen, the designer behind Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co.

Caroline: We’re two sewing buds who love to sew and it’s literally all we want to talk about.

Helen: In this episode, we’re interviewing Sandeep Sandhu, the owner of the amazing fabric store Sister Mintaka. She tells us how she chooses her beautiful fabrics, what advice she would give to small business owners in the sewing space, and all about her personal sewing. She’s not only a fabric mogul, she is a style icon!

Caroline: If you love to sew, this is your show.

Helen: Hello Sandeep. Thank you so much for coming on the show today.

Sandeep: Hi, thank you for having me.

Helen: can you please start us off by introducing yourself to our listeners?

Sandeep: I’m Sandeep and I’m the person behind Sister Mintaka, which is a fabric shop based in the UK.

Helen: Fantastic. And whereabouts in the UK are you located?

Sandeep: In the Midlands, in a city called Coventry, which you probably haven’t heard of.

Helen: No, but it sounds idyllic.

Sandeep: Yeah, it’s not really somewhere to write about, unfortunately.

Caroline: Oh my gosh, I haven’t heard of it, but it does, Helen’s right, it does sound idyllic. I think all UK city names sound idyllic to me though, being from Canada. Okay, we want to ask you about your sewing journey. Can you tell us a little bit about how and when you learned to sew?

Sandeep: Yeah, so I started sewing in the summer of 2017. Before that, I would procrastinate a lot at work. And I would browse WordPress blogs of sewists from, like, around the world. And I just loved everything they were doing and making, and it really inspired me to look for sewing lessons locally. And so, yeah, I signed up to a class and it just took off from there. I just enjoyed it so much. It just escalated very quickly.

Helen: Yeah, no kidding. That’s really not very long ago when you think about it, and you have this amazing fabric store now, and you’re such a member of this online sewing community, and it’s amazing to see your growth. Do you remember what your first project was that you did in that class?

Sandeep: Yeah, we made a tote bag which I still use, so I must have done a good job of it.

Caroline: That’s a classic first sewing project, a tote bag, I feel like. Okay, we want to get right into talking about your amazing fabric shop, Sister Mintaka. If any of our listeners have not heard about it, can you just introduce your shop to our listeners? Tell them a little bit about what it is, what you sell. Give us the lowdown.

Sandeep: So Sister Mintaka is a very small online fabric store. I sell fabrics, haberdashery, and sewing patterns, and I choose everything based on, like my personal style, so there’s often a bit of colour, some abstract fun shapes, and, yeah, lots of natural fibers, just things that bring me joy. So that’s kind of what I, I focus on.

Caroline: Amazing. And you’ve been open for almost six years. Is that correct?

Sandeep: Yeah, that’s right. Time’s flown by. I can’t believe it’s six years.

Caroline: I know! I was telling Helen before we got on here, it feels like you’ve been a mainstay in the sewing community for a long time. So six years is, is an amazing accomplishment, but it does feel like you’ve just been around. And we’ve loved following along on your journey. I wonder if you can give us a little bit of an overview of your fabric shop’s journey from the early days until now.

Sandeep: Okay, so when I first started Sister Mintaka, it wasn’t intentional. I’d never planned to open a fabric shop. I had no business plan. I had genuinely no intention of doing this. I bought some fabric off Rifle Paper Co. and it arrived here really early, before any fabric shop had received it in the UK. I’d been sewing for about six months at this point and my stash was already getting a bit out of control. So I decided to put these fabrics on Etsy, and if they sold, that would be great. If not, that would be also great, because then I get to keep them and use them. The fabrics actually sold, which was amazing and completely unexpected. But it just kind of gave me this idea of, perhaps I could do something with this. So I started to kind of put that idea in my head and I decided, well, why don’t I just give this a try? So I did. I invested about 3000 pounds into the business. Bought some fabric for wholesale, which, looking back at it now, the prices weren’t exactly wholesale, so I probably didn’t make any money. But again, the fabric sold, and it just kind of grew from that. Everything just happened really organically. And I’m just so lucky considering that I’ve never had a business plan or anything like that. It’s just, it’s just happened.

Helen: That is so awesome. I love hearing that you were just accidentally thrust into this role as a fabric store owner. It really cracks me up. Were you doing this out of your apartment? Like, what was the situation like in the beginning?

Sandeep: So in my previous career, me and my dad had a lettings agency, and we had two office spaces. It was, like, the main office and then, like, a meeting room. So I spoke to my landlord and I said, like, “Can I use that meeting room to put some fabrics in there?” And they were like, “Yeah, sure. Whatever.” Probably thought I was the most strangest person for wanting to do that. ‘Cause the building that I’m in is traditionally, like, very much, you know, lots of professionals. I think we were, like, the first estate agents to be in our building. Everyone else is, like, solicitors or accountants. They’re, like, very professional jobs. And so then there’s this strange girl who’s asking to put fabrics in one of the rooms. It was just quite a fun conversation to have. But since then, I’ve taken over, like, three rooms in this building, which is amazing. And the estate agency is now gone.

Helen: Oh my gosh. So you’re still in the same building then, with all of those other professionals and still rocking the fabrics and wearing all the fun prints to work.

Sandeep: Yeah, for sure. It’s great. I absolutely love it. Like, you walk out and everyone’s all suited and booted and looking all fancy. And then there’s me, who’s, like, this colourful rainbow, just walking around. And yeah, I love it.

Caroline: I love this. I feel like we should do a whole episode where people write in their, like, reactions of people when they tell them, like, what they do or that they sew for themselves. Because, like. we could probably write a whole book on the different reactions.

Helen: Oh, so true.

Caroline: I could just imagine all those business people wondering what you’re doing with all your fabrics. But that is awesome. We wanted to ask you about the story behind the name Sister Mintaka. Can you tell us a bit about that?

Sandeep: Yeah! So when I was 14 or thereabouts, a teenager of some sort, I would walk home from school in the winter, or I’d be walking home from my grandma’s house, and it would be so dark. And it used to get me down. And I just, I’d feel sad because I’d been stuck indoors at school all day, so I’d miss the sunshine. And yeah, it just, it made me feel really, really sad. And then one evening, I was walking home and I saw these three stars in the sky and they were all, like, lined up in a line. And I thought, “Wow, that’s really cool.” And the next evening I saw them again. And then the next day I saw them again and it just blew my mind. Like, I’d never paid attention to the stars in that way. And it just, suddenly, those three stars became something to look forward to in the darkness. And so when I was walking home, I could just know that even though it’s dark outside, I’ve still got a piece of joy to look forward to. And so those three stars have always kind of meant a lot to me. And even now when it’s winter and, or like, there’s a clear sky at night, I will pause and I will just look for them. And they just give me, like, a nice, grounded, warm feeling and they just bring me joy. So when I was opening my fabric shop, I was thinking of names, and the names were really bad. Some of them, one of the options was like, Sewing Supplier, which is great for SEO, but it’s just so dull. So then I looked at those three stars to see what they’re called according to Wikipedia. I can’t verify this. It’s just Wikipedia. The three of them are known as either, like. the Three Kings or the Three Sisters. And then the very top one is called Mintaka, so I thought, Sister Mintaka. And yeah, that’s where the name comes from.

Helen: Oh, I love it. It is so creative and fun and memorable. It rolls off the tongue and I love that it isn’t necessarily that SEO-friendly or sewing-themed name that we see so much in our community, which are really fun, but it’s very unique and I just think it suits you and I love hearing the backstory.

Sandeep: Ah, thank you!

Caroline: Yeah, so heartwarming. So, selfishly, I want you to take us behind the scenes a little bit, because I love hearing about other fabric shop owners. And I’d love to just know what a workday in the life looks like for you these days.

Sandeep: I’m gonna do this in the most honest way possible, and it’s probably terrible to confess, but my first part of the day I waste my time. I literally just spend ages on my phone, scrolling away and procrastinating. I don’t know if anyone else does that or dares to confess it. But yeah, that’s genuinely what I will do until I’ve had enough and I’m like, “Right, I need to do some work now.” And then it depends on the weather, really. If the weather’s great, I’ll take some photos of fabrics and things or, like, film some content. And then if the weather’s not so great, I might just list some products. It varies all the time. I could be sourcing, I could be accounting. Just because this business is only me, I have to do everything at some point. So it’s just whatever I kind of fancy doing on the day, really.

Caroline: Sounds really varied and dynamic. And I also was wondering if you’re also doing, like, all of the cutting and shipping, and I know you just said you’re a one woman show. Is that for all aspects of the business?

Sandeep: Yeah, so I have to do completely everything. I had hoped to hire at one point but that fell through. But that turned out to be a blessing in disguise, If I’m honest, just because the economy in Britain has been so up and down, there’s been times in the business where it’s, like, grown and then times where it’s got really quiet. So the time when I was looking to hire, it was really busy. And then as soon as that fell through, the business went really quiet. So it genuinely was like a, a real blessing in disguise, because if I had hired this person, I wouldn’t have really been able to afford them and I wouldn’t have had enough work for them either. So yeah, I mean, maybe one day there’ll be more people, but I just have to kind of see how this business grows and just take it slowly one step at a time.

Helen: Everybody needs to go order something from you right now!

Sandeep: Oh, thanks.

Caroline: No, but it’s, I think it’s commendable to kind of go with what is right for you and what’s right for your business. And I think it’s easy to look at other businesses and say, you know, like, “Oh, I need to hire, I need to grow, I need to build this into something, you know, really big.” But really, like, if you’re happy being the one person show that you are, then that’s amazing. And that, that should be enough, you know, it is enough. Cause you’re still doing amazing things with your business. So okay, we also sometimes get letters from listeners who would like to start a small business in the sewing world. I wonder if you have any advice that you would share with them.

Sandeep: Yeah, there’s two parts to this question. And I’ll start with the boring part first, which is: find yourself a good accountant, someone who knows everything that you need to do in terms of taxes and stuff, because it is a minefield. And then, yeah, the basics of, like, getting like your website domain and, like, your socials and make sure you’ve got all that kind of stuff. But then when you’re actually deciding to go into business, again, you’ve got to think about, are you looking for investors or whether you’re going to self fund it. And then if you are going for investors, you’ll need a business plan. There’s lots of, like, dull stuff, but that’s, like, quite important. But the fun stuff is the good stuff. You want to make sure it’s something you’re really passionate about and something you’re willing to take a risk on. For me, personally, when I decided to invest in my business and put down that initial bit of money, I asked myself, “What’s the amount that I’m willing to lose?” ‘Cause it’s not necessarily guaranteed that it will work. And I mean, still today, like, I don’t know if this business is going to make me a lot of money one day, or if it’s just going to keep me by, or one day if I have to close, so there’s still that risk that I could lose money from it. So you have to see what you’re comfortable with taking that risk. But once you’ve kind of made those serious decisions, then just go for it and really enjoy it and make sure you’re focusing on joy and what makes you happy. I think that’s the most important thing in life, in whatever you do. Happiness should be your biggest goal. Like, for me, being rich is not really what I kind of focus on or anything like that. That’s not a goal in life for me. Being happy is my biggest thing. And this job does that. It really does. And I’m so lucky to be a part of this community and doing this job. So if sewing makes you happy and it makes your heart race and just fills you with joy and you can make that, and you’re happy to, like, put all your kind of focus and everything you want to do into a business, just give it a go. Find your space within this community, find your voice, and share your passion. Don’t try and be like anyone else. Just be you, because that’s what people want. People want to see your perspective and your style and your taste, and they want to hear your choices and opinions. And when your passion radiates, that’s what people care about. So just find what’s important to you and give it a go.

Helen: Yeah, I think that’s such amazing advice, because often when people are thinking about starting a new business, one of the big questions is, “How will I stand out from the crowd? How will I make myself different from everything else that’s available out there?” And you, and your perspective, as you said, is really that, like, secret ingredient. That’s the thing that’s going to set you apart. And that’s the, like, special uniqueness that you can bring to the table. So focusing on that and then combining that with chasing the happiness factor and what you actually want to do and what you’re passionate about is just the recipe for success, I think.

Sandeep: Yeah, for sure.

Helen: Well, I think that your joy and happiness and passion comes across in particular with the fabrics that you stock, because you have so many amazing prints and bold colours and fun designs that are really playful. What do you look for when you are stocking fabric?

Sandeep: I guess, initially, like, the first criteria is, like, the quality of the fabric and the composition. So I gravitate towards natural fibers. And I mean, occasionally. there’ll be some synthetic stuff, but it’s mainly just for occasion wear that you’re not going to wash regularly. So you’re not, kind of, shedding loads of microfibers and stuff and, and whatever, microplastics. So natural fibers is one. And then how a fabric feels and how it sews as well is really important. I want it to be soft. I want it to be silky. And I really want it to be not too challenging to sew. I don’t want sewing to feel like a frustrating experience. So I kind of try and find a balance between those three things. But then in terms of colour and design, I like to go for bold, vibrant colours. And abstract shapes and just really fun prints. Generally things that just bring me joy. They’re kind of a little bit modern, a little bit quirky. Something that just sparks a little bit of joy is, is always great.

Caroline: Do you have a personal favourite, like, woven fabric or favourite knit fabric at the moment?

Sandeep: Yes, I do. There’s this really amazing fabric that I found at the start of this year. It’s called Paradise Jacquard and it’s made in France. So this is my woven choice. And it’s so beautiful. There’s, like, birds, mountains, trees, and stars and moons and sunshine, like, there’s literally all of the most beautiful things from planet earth on this fabric and it’s just amazing. I love it so much. And then in terms of knits, there’s a really beautifully soft Tencel Modal Rib Knit, which, I will confess, I’m a little bit too scared to sew, because I’m not very confident with knit fabrics. But that’s one I really want to sew up soon because it just feels so soft and it’s really lightweight and it’s going to feel amazing when you’re wearing it, especially in the summer because it’s just, like, the right weight for it.

Caroline: It sounds soft and luscious. I love a Tencel modal blend. It sounds amazing. Is that Paradise Jacquard that you mentioned, is that the fabric that you used to make a jacket or a coat?

Sandeep: I’ve draped it in a video on a reel but my, yeah, my plan is to make it into a jacket. I was debating between the Daughter Judy Thompson Coat and the Puff and Pencil Luna Vest with Kite Sleeves, and I think I’m gonna go for the second option. So yeah, by the time this episode comes out, hopefully that jacket will exist and I’ll be wearing it all the time.

Caroline: Ooh, awesome.

Helen: I’m looking at this fabric now and I’m gonna buy it after we finish talking. I love it. It is so…

Caroline: Sold.

Helen: I’m so sold. I love black and white too. Like, I’m obsessed. Okay. We wanted to hear a little bit about your personal fabric stash, because of course, as a fabric store owner, you obviously get to see all the beautiful things. So are you able to resist bringing a little bit of each of them home with you, or is your personal stash overflowing?

Sandeep: So, my personal stash is out of control. It’s so bad. I have a IKEA wardrobe, just literally full of fabric. And then there are boxes full of fabric and more boxes. And there are cupboards full of, like, it’s just literally out of control. So it’s fair to say I have a bit of a, I have a bit of a, yeah, a passion for fabric. But thankfully, I’ve kind of like, given myself this rule where I have to buy fabrics from my own fabric shop. So it allows me to, kind of, take my purchasing a bit slower. If everything was free, I mean, half of the shop would be at home. But yeah, it means that, unfortunately, I have missed out on, like, some fabrics because I also used to have this rule that if a fabric hadn’t sold out in 24 hours, then I could, would be allowed to buy it. And like, in earlier years, things would go, like, quite quickly. So I would miss out on a lot of stuff. Which is also quite a good thing. Because yeah, otherwise I’d have way too much and I couldn’t possibly sew everything that I’ve got, but it doesn’t stop me getting some bits here and there.

Helen: That’s very admirable restraint that you actually purchase from your own shop. Caroline, how do you feel about that?

Caroline: I wish I could say the same for myself, honestly. It would probably help me to bring home less fabrics, although I’ve gotten better in recent years, because my stash is also out of control, or it was. Oh my gosh, that’s, those are great strategies, though. I commend you.

[Helen: Do you have a good method for keeping your huge stash organized at home?

Sandeep: Slightly. I, like, I try to separate things based on, like, their composition. So I’ve got all my silks together and all, like, the viscose. But then like categories like cotton, like. I have so many cotton fabrics, so they get split down into weight. And then also my cotton lawns are now in, like, colour order, because there’s so many of them as well. So yeah, it depends on just how intense a category is before it gets kind of split down further and further. Yeah, there’s just stuff everywhere.

Helen: I can relate.

Caroline: Yeah, and we love following along on your personal Instagram as well, and we do want to talk about your personal sewing in a little bit, but I was wondering, like, from the perspective of a fabric business owner, do you think owning a fabric store has increased your personal sewing output or possibly decreased it?

Sandeep: It’s really varied depending on, like, how busy I am. In terms of, like, my sewing journey, because I started sewing in 2017, and then six months later, I had a fabric shop. Having a fabric shop is kind of all I’ve ever known. So for me, just my productivity levels really depend on how quiet the business is. If the business is quiet, I can sew more. But if it’s busy, then I just get a bit less time. So there’s pros and cons to both things really. But yeah, it’s, it’s nice. ‘Cause then at least I have the excuse to say like, “Oh, I’m just creating content or increasing my wardrobe, coincidentally.”

Helen: Content. You can always have that as an excuse. I love it. We wanted to mention too that you have some absolutely gorgeous items in the haberdashery section of your shop. You’ve got such fun notions over there. Can you name a few of your favourite notions for our listeners?

Sandeep: So I’m going to give you, like, my top few. but I think everybody needs to get themselves a hot hemmer, because that’s something I cannot live without. It’s such a handy tool and it just helps you to, kind of, measure your hems and, like, points where you’re going to press, and I mean, I’m not describing this very well, but basically it’s a little kind of swatch of, not quite fabric, but it has markings on there in, like, half a centimeter, centimeter, you get it in imperial and metric, but it allows you to press your hem and measure the, like, allowance at the same time without burning your fingers. So it’s really handy, ‘cause I’m quite clumsy. So anything that kind of helps me not burn myself is great.

Which leads me nicely onto a loop pressing bar, which sounds really strange, but basically it’s this long rectangle. It comes in several different widths. And if you’re making, like, straps or ties for a garment, you would sew your strap, and then while the strap is still inside out, you would insert the most appropriate width loop pressing bar, and then you can press your seam allowance open. And it helps you to kind of do that without, again, putting your fingers really close to the fabric and burning your fingers. You would then turn your ties or straps the right way out and then reinsert the loop pressing bar. And it just allows you to kind of set that seam, that stitch line, in, like, the correct position and press it. So you get really beautiful crisp edges. And I cannot, like, recreate that without using that tool. Like, whenever I try and turn a strap without having used that tool, they just don’t come out so nice. So yeah, it’s just a really brilliant, odd tool that you just wouldn’t think exists, but it’s great.

Oh gosh, there’s so many. Like, I really love the Prym loop turners, which are essentially, like, a straw and like a rod and they help you turn your straps and ties as well. I think anything that, kind of, can make your sewing experience a little bit easier, I’m like, there for.

Helen: Well, our listeners will have to go to your shop to look at all of these things. And of course, we’ll link them all up in the show notes. But I’m very intrigued by this pressing bar that you’re talking about, because it is so challenging to get those little straps nicely pressed without that seam all wobbling all over the place.

Caroline: Yeah, and I absolutely burn my fingers constantly when I’m trying to do stuff like that. So the idea of protecting my little fingies is very appealing to me. Sandeep, can you tell us a little bit about, like, what has surprised you the most about owning a fabric shop over the years?

Sandeep: Oh gosh, what surprised me most is the ability to meet so many people. I have struggled a lot with loneliness over the years. And just having a fabric shop and being a part of this community, I kind of push myself to go on courses, go to events and just meet people. And having that kind of hobby and that talking point that’s already existing, you know, is there between, like, you and someone else, it allows you to form friendships really easily. And I’ve made the best friends ever since having this shop. And that’s, I think, the most thing that, like, the thing I’m most grateful for is, that sense of loneliness is, is disappearing because I’ve just met so many people that are just really incredible and have changed my life. Sorry. I’m getting emotional, which I didn’t expect to. But yeah, I think that’s the most luckiest thing about being a part of this world, is just the people in it.

Caroline: Yeah, the sewing community is so incredibly supportive and rich and wonderful and owning a business can be isolating. It can feel lonely. And it’s so nice to have a community that you can fall back on and interact with that is so wonderful and, and supportive. So, we know you have a lot of fans out there. We know there’s a lot of our listeners that are probably big fans of your shop. So yeah, keep doing what you’re doing.

Sandeep: Thank you, Oh gosh, I’ve actually got tears in my eyes.

Helen: It truly is the most surprising thing!

Caroline: Yeah. Well, in a, in a similar vein, and I don’t want to make you more emotional, but I wonder if you could share some highlights with us from owning a fabric shop.

Sandeep: I mean, this has to be, like, on the list for sure. Just talking to you two. Because I listen to you, like, every week that there’s an episode out, and I’m very honoured to be here. So thank you for having me. Having a pattern named after me, that was like, mind-blowing. My business has been featured in books as well, which, yeah, again, blows my mind, and it’s just stuff you couldn’t ever really dream of. It just goes back to the people, really. Yeah, meeting so many people and, yeah, being a part of this community is, is the most important thing to me in the whole world. Gosh, I feel like a politician who’s trying to sell fabric, but this, so, yeah, it’s just that everyone here in this community, including you two, you just, you’ve made such a big difference in everyone’s lives, and being a part of that is, I’m so grateful for it. It’s honestly the best thing that could happen to me. It’s brought me so much joy in life. And gosh, I’m about to cry again!

Helen: You’re gonna make me cry.

Sandeep: Oh dear. Um, Yeah, I’m just, I’m very grateful.

Helen: Oh, that’s so sweet.

Caroline: That’s so kind of you. Yeah, I just want to say, like, you, you bring so much joy to our lives and to the sewing community, because the way that you share your sewing journey and your business, and it’s just infectious. We just enjoy following along so much. And we’re so happy that you’re a part of the community. So the love is mutual.

Sandeep: Thank you.

Helen: Yeah. And you mentioned the pattern that is named after you. And that, of course, is the Sandeep Dress by By Hand London. If anyone wants to go check it out, it’s absolutely gorgeous. And you look so stunning in the photos. That must’ve been so much fun.

Sandeep: It was, it was just, yeah, amazing. But, a confession, I actually haven’t made that pattern yet.

Helen: Oh no, don’t say that. No, I’m just kidding.

Sandeep: I know.

Caroline: Did you get to keep any of the samples from the photo shoot? Like, do you own one?

Sandeep: Yeah. I have the cream dress, which, I guess, is why I haven’t made it, because, like, I already own the perfect version of it. So I don’t feel like I need to make another one. But I probably should one day.

Helen: You’ll get to it. You’ll get to it. Well, in a similar kind of vein, or maybe in contrast to, what has been, maybe, the biggest challenge that you’ve faced while running this fabric store?

Sandeep: I think it’s being human and having to rely on my body to function at all times in order to, like, run the business. So during the last like six years, I’ve had to take time out for shoulder surgery. And I was like, the business was just, like, doing nothing for three months because I was recovering from major surgery. And then similarly, last September I went to the gym and I broke my collarbone. So again, I had to take time out of work, and that’s the biggest challenge for me because, being the only person in this business, I’m reliant on being, like, strong, fit and healthy. And if I’m not able to do those things, then it kind of puts everything on hold. And yeah, it becomes a challenge, because if you can’t run your business, you can’t have any income and all that sort of stuff. So yeah. The hardest part is literally just being human and getting injured sometimes.

Helen: Yeah, that’s so fair. I’m so sorry you had to go through both of those experiences. I imagine the second time around, breaking your collarbone, that must have been absolutely devastating, having already gone through a round of surgery. I’m very sorry to hear that.

Sandeep: Thank you. Yeah, it was a nightmare.

Helen: And we noticed that your dad took over your Instagram for a little while, I think it was last autumn. Was that related to you having to take some time off?

Sandeep: That’s right. Yeah. So as soon as I had my fall, I was like, my dad just kind of took the reins and just started packing orders for me. And then I was like, “Can we just maybe produce a bit of content while you’re here?” And yeah, and he just did such a great job of it. He’s like a full-on celebrity now. It’s great.

Helen: Honestly, he was such a joy to watch. He is, first of all, adorable. Just, like, he looked so cute and like, he was nailing it, packing the orders and cutting the fabric and showing off all of the things that you have for sale. And it was so fun to see. So kudos to your dad. Do you think he’ll ever return for an encore?

Sandeep: Yes, we had this conversation, and he just loves it because he got so much encouragement and support from the community. And like, every time there was, like, a like or a comment or the views just went up, he was just like, “Oh my God, like, this is amazing.” So having that support behind him, it just, it gave him so much confidence. So yeah, I think he’ll be back.

Caroline: We’re gonna take a quick break and we’ll be back in a minute to chat more with Sandeep.

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Caroline: And we’re back! Let’s change directions a bit and talk more about your personal sewing. We always love seeing you pop up on our Instagram feed and you have amazing style. So could you describe your personal style, maybe using a short phrase, for our listeners?

Sandeep: Yeah. It took me a while to figure out this short phrase, but I think I’ve, I can summarize it. I’m gonna describe it as: Fourth-in-Line Quirky Princess. And by that I mean, to explain that a little bit, imagine like, you’re a royal but you’re so far down the list that you’ll never be queen, so it doesn’t really matter. You’re allowed to be a little bit odd, bold, fabulous, and just do what you want and don’t really care about, like, what’s fashionable or what’s stylish. Yeah, you just do as you please.

Helen: This is so perfect, especially, like, I love the touches of whimsy that we see in a lot of your makes. I know you love a dress, you love a little gathered moment, a puffy sleeve, that kind of stuff. So it has that princessy element to it. So I really love this description.

Sandeep: Thank you.

Helen: So what’s on your sewing table right now?

Sandeep: This is actually a little bit of a different direction for me. I’m going for the Saturday Skirt Set top with the Chalk and Notch Evelyn skirt. And I’ve never really, like, bared my, like, waist. So I don’t know how comfortable or confident I’ll be wearing it, but I thought I’d give it a go. Yeah, I just, I love the way it looks on so many people. So I’m really intrigued. It could be like, the dream outfit, or it could just be something that I pass on to my sisters. So yeah, we’ll see how it goes.

Caroline: I love the Saturday Skirt Set pattern combo, especially the top, and the Evelyn pattern is so cute. It has like some, kind of, buttons down the side, similar sort of midi length, right? It’s very, very cute. What fabric are you using for it?

Sandeep: Um, I’m using my Tropical Nights Viscose. It’s quite like a, it’s got, like, a grid sort of style with a black background, and then, like, palm trees and tropical plants. Yeah, hopefully it will look quite cute. It might be like a bit of a an evening wear, like, out to dinner sort of vibe. So that’s, yeah, one of the things I’m making. I’m making something else as well. A tulle dress which, yeah, is a challenge. It’s making me pull my hair out ever so slightly, but yeah, it’s currently sitting in the naughty corner at the moment.

Helen: We did want to ask you about this tulle dress because it is, I mean, I’m sorry to hear it’s in the naughty corner, because it is absolutely stunning. You’ve done this amazing layering of the fabric to create some patterns with tucks across the bodice and it’s more or less opaque in different areas. So can you tell us a bit about how you decided to make this? Are you draping it? What kind of tulle is that? Give us the details.

Sandeep: So it’s a, like a mint deadstock tulle. It’s quite, like, soft, but it’s not too drapey. So it does have a little bit of, like, structure and it’s not too tricky to sew. The idea of the bodice came really easy to me. I could just see, like, the shape of the bodice is like a panel across, like, the bust line. And I was just playing around with some pleating ideas and settled on an idea for just, like, very regular pleats. And then the skirt part is where I’ve just kind of gone a bit, I mean, I don’t know. I’ve tried a few ideas. So initially it was like, let’s do a gathered skirt and then maybe let’s add some, like, pleats in there to kind of mirror the thing that’s happening on the bodice. The problem is, I’m draping all these ideas, but I don’t know actually how to, to stitch them or create them in a way that looks good. Like, I’m just really struggling. And then I have so many ideas and they’re all competing with each other and I’m just getting so lost in what to do. So actually, maybe I need your help, Helen. How do you manage, like, all these ideas when you’re creating a pattern or designing? Because my head is just, like, so overwhelmed.

Helen: That’s very fair. I think, like, for me, I have to remember not to get so focused on one particular garment and just give myself permission to explore ideas. And maybe it doesn’t work out. And like you said, maybe you give it away to a family member or you’re just making trial versions out of some scrap fabric that you have on hand so that the stakes are really low, you know. Like maybe your investment in this dress is, like, too strong and you need to like step back and try out some of these ideas in a different fabric or just let this be a practice run. You know what I mean?

Sandeep: Yeah, that, that’s a good idea. Maybe I can just be like, “Let’s just try a few ideas out, sew it up and then once it’s done, it’s done.” And then I either love it or I donate it.

Helen: Exactly. You can always make another one. No one’s stopping you.

Sandeep: That’s true.

Caroline: Were you making this for any particular occasion or event? Or is it just everyday tulle opulence?

Sandeep: I’m just a very impulsive sewist. So I think I’m just a very impulsive person. So yeah, just the idea came to me and I was like, right, forget everything else. I’m just gonna go for it.

Caroline: I also understand this isn’t your first tulle dress. Do you have any tips for working with tulle for our listeners?

Sandeep: Yeah, just to add to that, my other tulle dress is also in the naughty corner for different reasons. Yeah, that other dress, I made the Daria Rose Cafe Bustier Dress and I put in a cheap zip. And that was my biggest mistake, because the zip broke. And then I had to unpick myself out of that dress, which was a nightmare. So I damaged, like, some of the fabric, ‘cause I’d used silk and tulle and, like, unpicking that while it’s on your body and you’re in an awkward position, just trying to escape. I wasn’t very careless. I was just like, just get me out of it. So that needs a bit of a repair job or something. But yeah, no, tulle is actually like, it’s really easy to sew. It’s just a fine fabric. You’re just going to take your time with it. I’m lucky I’ve got a machine with a built-in walking foot, so maybe that’s what makes it so easy for me. I would just say, just practice on loads of scraps and see what kind of settings work best for you on your machine. But generally it doesn’t really need any kind of special treatment. Like when you’re pressing it, just make sure you’re using, like, low temperatures, ‘cause it might melt. Use pressing cloths. I mean, some might not even be able to handle heat, and that’s okay, too. But I would say, always just try out different seam finishes and see what you like.

The mint dress that I’m working on has different seam finishes in different areas. So on my shoulders, I’ve just pressed the seams open, but on the bodice where there’s, like, a feature panel, I French seamed that, just because it adds a little bit more opacity and it just adds a bit more depth and design detail. So you can choose how you’re wanting to highlight different areas and, and kind of, sew with that in mind. The only actual tip that I have with sheer fabrics and tulle is that if you’re sewing a dart or a box pleat or any sort of thing like that and you don’t want to do a backstitch on the fabric, what you can do is, you would sew your dart, knot the end. And then with your thread tails, you weave that in and out of your stitch line. So you kind of take each thread at a time and just go back and forth through like a little S shape back through the seam line and, and then it kind of just tucks everything away. And you would weave it for about two centimeters or so, and then just trim off the end so that way you don’t have to deal with, like, the dangling thread or like a big knot on the end of your dart where you’ve gone and done a backstitch.

Helen: Oh, that’s a really, really great tip. Much appreciated. And I don’t want to put any pressure on you, but we are recording this a bit early, so perhaps by the time this episode comes out, we’ll get to see this dress. I don’t know. Maybe.

Sandeep: Yeah, Maybe.

Helen: Maybe.

Caroline: We’ll see if it makes it out of the naughty corner.

Helen: Well, I mean, one of the things that we love about you and your sewing is that you always seem very keen to learn new things and explore new techniques and new styles. What motivates you to push yourself in this way, like, getting out of your comfort zone?

Sandeep: I would say a lot of it depends on, like, where I am in life, and what I’m doing, and like, my confidence levels. If I’m falling in love, you’ll probably know about it because of the way my garments look; they might be a little bit sexier. I just, I really think it just depends on where I am and who I’m feeling at that time. I kind of just see where my, like, heart falls and lands and just, I let myself just try things out because what’s the worst that can happen? You’ll end up with a garment that is beautiful. You’ve learned something, but if you don’t wear it, it’s okay. It’s not going to go in the bin. It can go to the charity shop or you can pass it on to people you know. It’s just, give it a try. I just don’t feel the fear of not wearing something. I just think, just try it out and see how you feel.

Helen: Yeah, no, it’s this age-old wisdom of just go for it, right?

Sandeep: Yeah.

Helen: Just dive in. And you did mention earlier your sisters and giving them, potentially, this project that you’re working on, and do they often benefit from your sewing? Do they have a lot of your makes?

Sandeep: One of my sisters does, because she’s closest to me in size. So she gets, like, most of my clothes, which is great, because then my mum can’t complain that I have too many clothes, which she often does. Yeah, so it’s nice, and it’s really great to see the clothes being worn and enjoyed again. But then occasionally I’ll be like, “That Myosotis Dress, do you reckon I could have that back?”

Caroline: Take it back. I love that. I do wonder, because you, you’re talking about being sort of fearless and, and just going for it. And you’ve been sewing for over six years now. It sounds like, do you have kind of, like, a Holy Grail project or a dream project that you would like to make someday that you’ve sort of been ruminating on, maybe?

Sandeep: Something that I’d really like to try, that I’m not quite brave enough, is, like, a bias-cut dress. Because my biggest fear is hemming it. I genuinely don’t understand how people can get a level hem. Because it’s like, if you, if it’s a bias-cut, like, slip dress or something, you have no reference points to, like, measure from, so how are people working that out? Like it just blows my mind and I just don’t understand it. But people seem to do it. So yeah, maybe once I kind of figure that out. Or I should just do it. Do it and try it and see what happens. But yeah.

Helen: I think you can achieve this goal. There’s so many great bias-cut dresses out there and patterns out there in the sewing community now. So I do think you should just give it a go. It’s probably going to be easier than you expected. And the other thing is just that, no one’s looking that closely at the hem. Like, it’s okay if it’s wonky. Don’t worry about it.

Sandeep: That’s true.

Helen: Yeah.

Caroline: It’s so true. And it’s, like, the last step, too. So just get to that point and then you’ll figure out the hem. You will.

Sandeep: Or it will just stay in the naughty corner for, like, a century.

Caroline: Or yeah, it’ll stay.

Helen: How many things are in this naughty corner? Is there any room over there?

Caroline: We need evidence of this naughty corner.

Sandeep: There’s a few garments, but we won’t talk about them.

Caroline: Oh yeah, okay. We won’t mention them. We did also want to touch on your bra-making a little bit, because you’ve made some beautiful bras and it seems like you really work on getting a great fit on your bras. So we were wondering if you have any top things that you’ve learned about bra fitting from these projects.

Sandeep: So I’m gonna take a moment here to plug @whatbellamade. And she is the best bra fitting person on this entire planet. I hope I’ve got her Instagram handle correct. But yes, Bella is just the world’s best, biggest genius. She taught me how to fit my bra and she spent so long at Bra Camp helping me achieve a really good fit. So if you ever get the opportunity to work with her, please do, because she has so much knowledge about it. So I did a bra fitting class with her and we started by going through her library of underwires to see which one fit my breast shape. And mine was a really unusual shape. Rather than, like, a traditional curve, mine has, like, a slightly flat bottom to it. Yeah, which is, like, something I never expected, but it was just mind-blowing. And then we like worked on fitting the part that goes around your rib cage. And then we worked out which kind of cup size fits. And I ended up with, like, a really unusual and unexpected combination of sizes. So I used, like, a much larger band around my rib cage, but I kind of ended up shortening it and, like, making it smaller, but then my cups were quite big as well. I don’t know. I think you just have to be able to mix and match sizes and not be so scared of, kind of, combining bits.

I don’t think that’s a brilliant answer because I think Bella would give you so much great advice, but I mean, she taught us how to move straps in, and there’s just, it’s, so many small little tweaks can make such a big difference. Bra-making is such a brilliant experience, but just having someone that has that extra bit of knowledge on how to fit them, it, it really helps.

This is a sort of project where, like, a toile makes a really big difference. And a tip that I think I’ve picked up from your podcast at some point in history was: wash-away thread. It’s really great stuff. You can literally, like, sew your bra using all the components and then, like, you can take it apart by literally washing away the thread. So you would use it as a top thread and you would use a regular bobbin. In bra-making, it’s almost impossible to unpick your seams, because you’re sewing zigzags or you’re sewing into channeling, which is, like, really thick and fluffy. So being able to take your components apart with literally just a bit of water, it saves so much time and effort and money because buying all these like materials, it can be quite expensive. And if you’re making small adjustments, just being able to kind of go back to the starting point a bit easier, it’s just so much more helpful. So yeah, so thank you for that tip at some point.

Helen: Oh, I mean, thank you for bringing it up again. That’s really brilliant when you’re in those beginning stages of just learning how to sew a bra and how to put it together. You want to take a trial run at it and then do a final version once you’ve worked out some of the kinks. And I just noticed too, on the What Bella Made website, that they offer some online bra fitting consultations. So if you’re a bra maker, that could be a really great resource if you want to get some fitting advice from her.

Sandeep: Yeah, I highly recommend doing that.

Caroline: Sandeep, it was such a pleasure talking with you today. Thank you so much for coming on the show. Can you tell our listeners where they can find you online?

Sandeep: Yeah, so you can find me on Instagram and TikTok: @sistermintaka. And if you want to find my personal one, it’s @sandeepbeep. That one is a mix of, like, sewing, life, dating, all that sort of drama. But yeah, the fabric shop is Sister Mintaka.

Caroline: I do love following along on your dating adventures as well, just an aside.

Sandeep: Yeah, I mean, I could have my own Netflix show.

Helen: Oh my gosh. I would watch that.

Caroline: It is incredible, yes. Oh, well, thank you so much. And of course we’ll link all of that up in the show notes. And there’ll be tons of pictures on Instagram and stuff this week. It’s been such a pleasure getting to know you more. And you are such an inspiration. Thank you so much, again, for coming on.

Sandeep: Thank you for having me.

Helen: We’ll talk to you soon. Bye-bye.

Sandeep: Bye.

Caroline: That’s it for today’s episode of Love to Sew. You can find me, Caroline, at Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns and Helen at Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co. We’re recording in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.

Helen: You can support Love to Sew and get access to bonus content by subscribing on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. You even get access to the back catalogue of bonus episodes, and that’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew. Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or check out our podcast page on Apple Podcasts for more info.

Caroline: You can head to lovetosewpodcast.com to find our show notes. They’re filled with links and pictures from this episode. And if you’d like to get in touch with us, leave us a message at 1-844-SEW-WHAT. That’s 1-844-739-9428. or send us an email at [email protected].

Helen: Thanks to our amazing podcast team. Lisa Ruiz is our creative assistant, Jordan Moore of The Pod Cabin is our editor. And thank you for listening. We will talk to you next week.

Caroline: Buh-bye!

Helen: Bye!

Sandeep: So I’m Sandeep and I’m a sewist. Which makes sense because…oh, let’s start that again.

Helen, Caroline, and Sandeep: [laughter]

Sandeep: Of course I’m a sewist. I’m on Love to Sew.

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This episode is about one of our very favourite fabrics – Indian block prints! We explore the rich history of these textiles, the process of making them, and where to buy them. We also share a bunch of pattern ideas and sewing tips so you can incorporate these dreamy, light, beautiful fabrics into your wardrobe! Plus, we answer a listener question about sewing rulers.

The transcript for this episode is on this page at the end of the show notes.

Show Notes:

Share your block print makes with us on Instagram by tagging us (@lovetosew.podcast) and using the hashtag #LoveToSewBlockPrints!

From the Listener Questions Section:

Resources:

Helen and Caroline’s Block Print Makes:

Christine Haynes’s Block Print Makes:

A post shared by Christine Haynes (@christinehaynes)

A post shared by Christine Haynes (@christinehaynes)

A post shared by Christine Haynes (@christinehaynes)

A post shared by Christine Haynes (@christinehaynes)

Sewing Patterns:

Where to Buy Block Prints:

DIY Block Printing Resources:

Helen: We are recording today on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish and Kwakwaka’wakw peoples, including Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, Musqueam, and K’ómoks first nations.

Hello and welcome to Love to Sew. I’m Helen, the designer behind Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co.

Caroline: And I’m Caroline, the owner of Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns.

Helen: We’re two sewing buds who love to sew and it’s the only thing worth talking about.

Caroline: Today’s episode is about one of our very favourite fabrics, Indian block prints. We’re going to talk about the rich history of these textiles, the process of making them, and where to buy them. We’ll also share a bunch of pattern ideas and sewing tips so that you can incorporate these dreamy, light, beautiful fabrics into your wardrobe.

Helen: If you love to sew, this is your show.

Caroline: Hello, Helen.

Helen: Hi Caroline!

Caroline: You’re looking good in your block print dress over there.

Helen: I had to, you know? It was the right outfit for the day.

Caroline: I love it. It’s the perfect view.

Helen: Thank you. Yeah, I am obsessed with block prints, as I know you are too, and all of the birdies over at Blackbird Fabrics. Y’all have the best block prints.

Caroline: Oh my gosh. Yes. I cannot wait to talk about block prints today. They truly are my favourite, I think. My favourite, I’ll call it. They’re my favourite fabrics. They’re my favourite.

Helen: Wow.

Caroline: Yeah. Favourite all-time. But I think we need to get to a question before we get into the episode.

Helen: Yes, we have a great question to start with today, from Brianna. “As a relatively new sewist with my first ever dedicated sewing space, can you help me understand all the different specialty rulers, especially the French curve ruler? How do I use it? Which part of the curve do I use when? And would someone use all the fancy rulers and their sizes for sewing and quilting? Are there good crossover measuring tools for both?”

Caroline: Ooh, hi Brianna. This is a great question. Let’s go over some of the main rulers and what they’re for. We have lots of info for you today. So, a clear straight ruler with a grid is pretty common in quilting, but not so much in garment sewing. I think that should change, though. It’s so useful. I use mine all the time for garment sewing. One of the best things about it is that you can combine it with a rotary cutter set up to quickly cut straight lines. We actually use these at Blackbird too when we’re cutting fabric. But for quilting, it’s great for cutting out precise geometric pieces. And for garments, it’s helpful for cutting out bias binding or rectangular pieces like belts. It’s also great for making adjustments to your pattern or drafting your own patterns. It’s great for measuring the grain line to selvedge edge. And being able to see through it and having the grid of measurements is super helpful. A 6” by 24” size is a really good one to have on hand. You can use it for a lot of different applications, both in quilting and garment making. And if you’re a quilter, you can collect different sizes of rulers, plus shapes like hexagons or specific sizes of squares that you use a lot. Helen, I feel like you have potentially amassed a collection of clear grid rulers, am I right?

Helen: Oh, yes. I particularly love the CreativeGrids rulers. Not sponsored, just happen to think they’re awesome. They have kind of a, like, little rough sticky patch on the back so they don’t slide around as much. They come in so many different shapes and they’re, like, clear, I guess, white. Well, clear. They’re clear with black lines, which, I really like that look. Yeah, I have a ton. I have lots of different sizes, but the 6” by 24” size is the one I use the most when I’m garment sewing, by far. So if you’re a garment sewer, I think that’s really the only one you need to get started. And then you’ll probably pick up a few along the way for specialty things as needed.

Caroline: Yeah, in garment sewing I find anything less than 24”…like, I wish it were longer, because if you’re drawing a fold line or a grain line on something that you’re tracing, or anything really, 24” I would say is, like, the perfect size to have.

Helen: Mm hmm. Yeah, and then you can just have a regular old craft ruler around for measuring darts and things like that if you want. I also wanted to mention that I have one of those cool handles for my big ruler. It’s, like, got suction cups on it and so you can just grab it and move it around really quickly and easily. Total game-changer. Definitely would recommend investing in that thing. I think mine is a Dritz brand one.

Caroline: If you aren’t ready to invest in a clear grid ruler, you can do a lot with a regular ruler or yardstick. Home Depot has yardsticks for super cheap. These are good for making adjustments or other drafting steps. I wouldn’t recommend using them as a straight edge for a rotary cutter, though, because there isn’t enough room for you to hold down that ruler without risking cutting your fingers.

Helen: Great point. Brianna also mentioned the French curve, and a French curve isn’t really a ruler in the traditional sense. It’s used for drawing smooth curves, which is hard to draw freehand, so the French curve really helps you with that. When you’re drafting a pattern or making adjustments to an existing one, you often have to redraw curves according to the points that you plot out. You hold the French curve up to those points and you kind of turn it and rotate it until the curve is hitting all the points correctly, and then you use it to draw your curve.

Caroline: Yes, and a hip curve works the same way. It’s just a shallower curve. Usually you would use the French curve for tighter curves like necklines, armscyes, and crotch curves, and the hip curve for, well, the curve of the hip.

Helen: Yes, it’s very specific, but necessary. There’s also something called a design ruler, which combines a bunch of those rulers. It has a straight edge ruler on one side, has a hip curve on the other, and then it has a tighter curve that works like a French curve at the top. This is a cool all-in-one for sewists, if you’re just getting into drafting, or you just want to have something around for those moments when you need to draw a curve.

Caroline: Ooh, and a flexi-curve is a flexible ruler that can replace a French curve and hip curve. If you’ve never seen these, they’re really cool. You can bend them into whatever curve you need. And it’s also handy for figuring out how long a curve is like when you need to make binding for a neck opening.

Helen: Yeah, I love my flexi-curve. I use it, actually, quite a lot, and I think it was fairly inexpensive, so that’s a good one to get a hold of. There’s lots of variations on these rulers. There’s lots of price points on these rulers, but I think we’ve covered the main types. If you’re just getting started, you don’t need anything too fancy. We’ll link a couple articles about using curved rulers to help you visualize the different ways you can use them and decide if it’s something you want to add to your arsenal.

Caroline: Okay, now I think it’s time to get into block prints.

Helen: Yay!

Caroline: I’m so excited about this. Okay, I feel like we should kick it off just defining what is a block print.

Helen: Block printing is a method of printing fabric using carved blocks and dyes or inks. In the home sewing world, most block prints you will encounter are on a lightweight cotton-based fabric.

Caroline: And today we’re going to specifically be talking about Indian block prints, which are the only block prints that I’ve seen available to buy by the yard. There’s a long tradition of talented Indian artists making stunning block prints. We’re going to talk about that today.

Helen: Yes, as we mentioned, block prints are one of our favourite fabrics, and there’s lots of reasons to love them. First of all, the prints are beautiful and unique. I especially love the ones that are inspired by nature. There’s lots of flowers and botanicals.

Caroline: And you can see the hand of the maker in the print. These fabrics are literally printed by hand with wood blocks, so they have tiny variations and imperfections and they are chock full of character.

Helen: The lightweight cotton fabric that they’re often printed on is soft and breathable. Many of the fabrics are opaque enough to wear without a lining too. It is the perfect fabric for warm weather, although to be honest, it makes a gorgeous quilted jacket as well. And if you make something like a top, it’s definitely wearable all year round.

Caroline: And these fabrics are also easy to work with. They don’t shift around, they press beautifully, and they have a soft drape while also being able to hold volume. And block prints come in so many gorgeous colours and colour combinations. They’re so beautiful. There’s just so many possibilities with them.

Helen: Yes, truly one of my favourite things about them is how easy they are to sew. They are a dream to sew and press, like, oh! They hold a press so, so well and it just makes everything about the sewing process feel super dreamy.

Caroline: Yeah. And even though they are really lightweight and breathable and kind of airy, they’re also pretty durable. Like, my block print garments have lasted me years, and I know you recently said the same thing to me. So I love to hear it. I love that they are not only beautiful, but also long lasting.

Helen: Yeah, they feel like they might wear out over time because they are so lightweight, but I can definitely attest to their strength because I wear my March Dress constantly. Sam has a button up Cameron; he wears it all the time and it has like really held up. Like, the colours are really true, the strength is there, they’re not really wearing out, like, all the seams have held. I mean, it’s just great.

Caroline: Yeah, I should also mention, there’s definitely a variety of weights out there with block prints. Like, the one that we carry at Blackbird is pretty consistent. We’ve chosen our base. It’s a cotton batiste. We love it. That’s the one that we use. But our supplier sent us, like, a whole booklet of different options. There were some lighter weight cottons, some that were a little bit heavier. So if you’re buying from a new place that you’ve never purchased from before, maybe check the weight of the fabric online, compare it to some fabrics that you have, make sure it’ll be something that you like, and maybe just try one out and see if you like the weight of it. Because they’re not all going to be exactly the same. But generally speaking, I would say they’re pretty lightweight and airy and durable.

Helen: Yeah, and they’re usually cotton which makes them nice to press and nice to sew with.

Caroline: Totally. And if you’re not familiar with this fabric, please go Google it ASAP. We know you’re gonna love it. And if you already love it, maybe we’ll have some new info and inspiration for you in this episode.

Helen: Yeah, so let’s start with a short history of block printing, a bit of overview of where it came from. We found a couple of really interesting articles all about this, including one from the New York Times that has a bunch of links to workshops where you can learn from block printers in India. Truly, dream trip. The articles we referenced while making this episode will be linked in the show notes. So make sure to check them out for some more information. And also, important to note, we are not historians, just two sewing buds doing our best to gather all this info for you. I mean, really three sewing buds, because Lisa was gathering all this info for us today. So thank you, Lisa. And yeah, we’ll link up all these references in the show notes.

Caroline: Okay. So the recorded history of block printing goes back thousands of years to the Indus Valley Civilization. Indians had deep knowledge of plant dyes, mordants, and resist printing, which meant that they were able to create the most visually striking and detailed prints. And block printing really flourished during the Mughal empire from the 16th to 18th centuries.

Helen: The state of Rajasthan was historically the block printing center. Over time, the tradition spread to different states, which each developed their own visual style. For example, and we’re quoting from a Vogue India article by Shweta Gandhi here, “Rajasthan is known for its colourful prints of gods, goddesses, humans, animals, and birds. Ajrakh prints originate in the Dhamadka village in Gujarat, and feature geometric motifs made using natural colors. Punjab’s Chhimba community, which is a group of textile workers, use a print with floral and geometrical motifs in light pastel hues.”

Caroline: Block printing is traditionally a family occupation. Even today, the families who block print have an ancestral tradition going back at least 300 years. Block carvers are usually fathers and sons and other family members do the printing.

Helen: There have been a lot of threats to traditional block printing over hundreds of years: punishing imperial policies, corruption, new technology which imitates the look of block printing but without the handwork, and opportunities for more income for workers who move to larger cities.

Caroline: And today, the hub for block printing is Sanganer, a suburb of Jaipur, and in recent years, companies like Anokhi, a design firm which is based in Jaipur, and Block Shop, which is based in LA, have commissioned block print artisans to create incredible traditional and modern fabrics. Together, they’re keeping this amazing art alive.

Helen: I love that. Caroline, where do your block prints come from at Blackbird?

Caroline: Our block print supplier is based in Sanganer.

Helen: Awesome. And you guys did a really cool, like, video with them, right? Or was that for hand weaving?

Caroline: No, we have both actually, but yes, for the block prints we have a video. I’ll link it up in the show notes. It’s on our YouTube channel and I believe on our website, as well. We have a really direct connection with the supplier, which is so wonderful. We feel like we can work with them really closely and we’re supporting family owned businesses. And it’s just a really great kind of relationship that we’ve developed over the years.

Helen: Ooh, that’s so cool. And I love seeing how the fabrics get made. It’s absolutely amazing.

Caroline: Yeah, they really are true artists. It’s incredible.

Helen: Yeah, so let’s talk a little bit about that process. How does one make a block print fabric?

Caroline: Okay, so believe it or not, carving a block takes 7 to 15 days, and blocks are carved from teak, sycamore, or pear wood. After they’re carved, they’re soaked in oil for anywhere from 3 to 15 days to soften them. There’s one block made for each colour of the design, so if the print has 5 colours, it’s going to have 5 different blocks.

Helen: Whoa, and all those blocks have to be, like, the same, or they could contain, I guess, different motifs because then they get layered when they’re stamped, right?

Caroline: Yeah, exactly. And not every new fabric needs a new set of blocks. A lot of these artisans will have a whole library, like a design library of blocks that they pull from. And you might notice at Blackbird, we repeat a lot of designs in different colourways. So it’s not like they’re carving a new block every time they’re producing a new fabric. But sometimes they will do custom carving based on, like, a brief or something.

Helen: Ooh, very cool. The fabric base itself is prepared by washing, scouring, and bleaching. This removes the starch and other finishes that can change how the dye reacts when it’s applied to the fabric. And it also makes the surface of the fabric smooth and even in colour.

Caroline: And in order to match the dye to the colour that it’s been designed for, the dyers will mix, test, and remix dyes until they’re the perfect shade. It takes a lot of time since some dyes take a whole day to reach their final colour.

Helen: Ooh, that’s cool. Once a block is done, the fabric is ready and the final dyes are mixed so the printers can start printing. The fabric is pinned onto a covered table so that it’s nice and taut, like a drum, and the blocks are dipped into a pad of dye and pressed onto the fabric. It’s a very precise process. A lot of designs are continuous, so the direction and distance between the prints really matters. For a design with more than one colour, the first colour must dry completely before the second colour is applied. It always amazes me when I watch videos of people doing this process. Yes, it’s a very precise process, and they need to be, like, really particular about where they’re placing it, but they’re so fast. Like, how do they do it so quickly? It’s just, like, muscle memory, like, boom, boom, boom, boom. It’s amazing.

Caroline: It’s so cool to watch. I really encourage you guys to go and check out a video. They, like, place the block down and then give it a good solid whack and then they, like, move it over and it’s just, like, continuous go-go-go and they can print quite a bit of fabric in a short amount of time because they’re so skilled and experienced with that process.

Helen: Yeah, and sometimes there may end up with, like, a tiny little overlap, but that just adds, again, to that handmade quality of the fabric when it’s finished. So it doesn’t even matter.

Caroline: A hundred percent. It’s that maker’s mark that I think makes these fabrics so special.

Helen: Yeah, I do love the spanking of the block.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: Really satisfying.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: Okay, once all of the ink has been applied using the blocks, then the final step to prepare it is to wash and iron the fabric.

Caroline: And this process can vary based on what kind of block printing is done. There are three types of block printing done in India: direct printing, resist printing, and discharge printing. What we just described was direct printing. And in resist printing, one of the steps is to apply clay or resin to parts of the fabric so that it can resist the dye, and then when the resist is removed, more prints may be added on top with blocks. Discharge printing is where chemicals remove dye from parts of the fabric, which are later filled in with a different colour. Most of the block prints we carry, and I would venture to say, most of the block prints that you can find online and home sewing, are direct printed, but a handful of the ones that we carry at Blackbird are discharge printed. And this is something that we kind of changed over the years because, we’ll talk about this later, but some block print fabrics have a smell to them and it’s due to dye pigment. So darker block print fabrics tend to smell a little bit more and certain dyes just have more of an odour to them. And we realized that if we do discharge printing, and this is through, like, talking to our supplier and kind of working through, discharge printing will, just because of the amount of dye that’s used, it just won’t smell as much. So we switched over to discharge printing for some of our fabrics, and they look really similar. It just tends to have a little bit more of a uniform look, especially in the background, so you don’t get as much of that, like, sort of overlapping block, almost like the colour gets a little bit darker in the overlap and stuff because the background colour is printed in a more uniform way.

Helen: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And then resist printing sounds kind of similar to the process of making, like, a wax print or a batik, right?

Caroline: Yeah, exactly.

Helen: Very cool. Well, as you can tell from this overview, this whole thing is a process that demands a lot of artistry, skill, and handwork. It involves a ton of talented artisans and the results are truly stunning. So, well worth the investment for these fabrics.

Caroline: Okay, I think it’s time to take a little break and we’ll be right back.

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Caroline: We are back with more about block print fabrics. So there are thousands of different block print designs out there. Some are such a local tradition that they are only worn by the people of a certain region. Those that are available for sewists to buy can come in both traditional and modern designs. On the more traditional side, there are lots of beautiful florals. They come in different scales, from small scattered blossoms and blooms to big bold flowers with tangled vines. There are also traditional geometric or abstract designs. Some are directional, meaning they have a right side up, but others are not. And there are also modern designs like stripes and ginghams. At Blackbird, we designed our own collection of wavy ginghams and checkerboard patterns a while back, and this is still one of my favourite things we’ve ever done.

Helen: Yeah, I loved those fabrics. It was so fun. And it must’ve been so neat to go through that design process with your supplier.

Caroline: Yeah, it was incredible and we were so proud of those designs. I mean, they were obviously really simple. We weren’t going to try to emulate the incredibly intricate detailed designs that are traditional to block prints, but we put our spin on it and obviously those kinds of prints were pretty trendy. So we were really excited to be able to do it. And I still have a bag that I made out of the checkerboard that I love so much.

Helen: Do you guys think you’ll ever do that again? Do a custom block?

Caroline: I would love to. We’ll see.

Helen: I would love to see it. Okay, the other thing you want to consider is the quality of the block print that you’re purchasing. So here’s how to spot good quality block printed cotton. The fabric should be smooth, not rough. It should be made of cotton or linen. If it’s on polyester, it’s definitely not hand printed. Good quality block prints will have a nice drape to them. That’s because they’re lightweight and tightly woven. They’re not as drapey as rayon, say, but they should drape more than, like, quilting cotton would.

Caroline: There are tiny imperfections and variations on all block prints that are made by hand, but too many irregularities in the print might indicate a lower quality fabric.

Helen: Yeah, and of course, buying from a trusted source is always a good idea because they will vet the fabric and make sure that it’s up to their standard. There are a few things you might want to consider if you’re thinking about buying block print fabric. Some block prints have that petrol-y kind of smell to them that Caroline was talking about earlier. This is totally normal, but it can be a deterrent if you are very sensitive to smells. Darker prints can be smellier due to the high pigment of the dye, but the smell does get better with washing and you can add vinegar to the rinse cycle if you want the smell to go away faster. I know the smell that we’re speaking of and, uh, I like it. I also like the smell of gas stations though, so.

Caroline: It doesn’t bother me at all, and I’m not very sensitive to smell. We definitely had a lot of really funny discussions in the office where some of our team members were extremely sensitive to the smell and really didn’t like it, and then there were some people that were like, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Helen: Yeah.

Caroline: “This doesn’t smell at all.” So it’s just a testament to, like, different folks having different, sort of, smell sensitivities, and I think it will register with some people as a bad smell and other people as a smell that’s neutral, or even, like you, a smell that they like.

Helen: Yeah, I think I just like the fabric so much that I just like everything about it, you know? Even the smell.

Caroline: You’ve been conditioned to love the smell, because you love the fabric.

Helen: Yeah.

Caroline: That’s great. The colour is slowly going to fade with washing for some of these prints. For me, that’s part of the charm. I love them in both their super bright and more faded forms. And I will say, I don’t think they all fade. I mean, maybe like a little bit, but I think some of them hold their pigment pretty well.

Helen: Yeah, like I said, the March Dress that I’m wearing right now, I don’t really think it’s faded at all. And I’ve, I wash it, like, at least once a week, so…yeah, for a couple of years now. So I think it’s doing really well considering, and, you know, all fabrics kind of fade. So, I think it fades a normal amount, I would say.

Helen: Some colours of dye can bleed, so we do recommend washing them by themselves first, or at least with like colours, maybe throw a colour catcher into your washing machine or dye catcher. Just in case, you know, don’t throw it in there to wash with your white linen on the first go around.

Caroline: Yeah, definitely not. Darker colours are more likely to be opaque in a single layer of fabric, so if you’re working with a white or a lighter colour, you might want to consider a lining or maybe just wearing a slip or some kind of shell underneath that will help to make that fabric more opaque if you want it to be,

Helen: And the last thing to think about is that the width of these fabrics is typically narrower than many apparel fabrics. So the ones that Blackbird stocks are 43 inches wide; that’s closer to the width of a quilting cotton, typically. So you do have to go by the narrower cutting requirements when you’re looking at your pattern.

Caroline: Yeah. Let’s take a break from all this information and get into inspiration. We’ve both made many garments from block print fabrics, so I feel like we should talk about them. Helen, can you share your favourite block print makes with me?

Helen: Yes. Okay. Well, the March Dress we’ve already mentioned, I’m wearing it right now. It is so comfortable. I added an extra gathered tier to the bottom and it’s just, like, the most breathable, easy-to-wear, want-to-throw-it-on-every-day, perfect dress. Great as a house dress. Great as a summer dress. Very, like, farmer’s market vibes.

Caroline: Mmhmm.

Helen: I made Sam a Cameron Button Up for some of the weddings that we attended this past summer and it looked so good under his suit, that little, like, pop of colour and print, but it’s like fairly subtle because I chose one of the prints that was, like, a smaller scale. So it really worked in that formal setting. Also, just texturally, it has that matte texture versus the suit, which had a little bit more of a sheen to it. It was giving. And he wore some suspenders. We’ll have to put some pictures up on Instagram this week because yeah, it was hot.

Caroline: Yeah, you really nailed it with the scale that you chose. I remember seeing a picture that you shared of Sam and at first I didn’t clock it as a block print. I was like, “Oh, that’s a cool print.” And then when I looked closer, I was like, “Ooh, that’s a block print!” And it looked so good. It paired really well. He has, like, leather suspenders, right?

Helen: Yeah, like brown leather suspenders. So cute. So cute.

Caroline: Mmhmm.

Helen: And the other thing about it that really worked well is that he runs so hot. And so wearing a suit for him is like, just a recipe for disaster. Like, knowing that he’s going to be, like, overheated the whole time. So block prints, like we said, they’re so light and airy. It’s one of the, like, thinnest fabrics, the one that you guys carry at Blackbird. The batiste is just super thin and breathable. So it was really perfect for him, but it’s also a nice tight weave. So it doesn’t have that problem where sometimes, if fabrics are really thin, they feel kind of flimsy. Or, like, you know, he has chest hair–like, is that going to poke through the weave? No, it doesn’t. Right. It’s, like, really nice and tight and light. And he was very comfortable.

Caroline: Ooh, I’m so glad to hear it.

Helen: Yeah! I also made a block print Cassidy Wrap Top that I really love in the sweet pink and blue colour. And then finally, one of our Lawrence Dress samples is one of my absolute favourite dresses in a green block print with yellow sunflowers, and that’s another one that gets worn every week, just like my March Dress. It’s just like, I’m out of the shower, throw on the Lawrence Dress, throw on the March Dress, like, easy breezy, just perfect house dress.

Caroline: Yeah. I think block prints lend themselves really well to that sort of dramatic, long, gathered tiers, volume, like, just head to toe cover yourself in block print. It will not overwhelm you. It just shines in that application. And I know some of my favourite makes out of block prints are also that similar style. I have a March Dress, very similar to the one that you’re wearing right now, in a green block print where I added a gathered tier. And that is definitely my most-worn block print make in the summertime. I, like you, will put it on whenever possible, definitely all weekend. Like it’s so perfect with a little straw hat and some Birkenstocks and you’re, like, good to go. I also made, this past summer, a dark blue, it’s the Pattern Fantastique Vali Dress, which is kind of similar. It has, like, puffy sleeves and a little yoke in the front, gathered tiers, very long. Actually, it might not have gathered tiers. I probably added that. I think I added that.

Helen: You love a gathered tier.

Caroline: I love a gathered tier.

Helen: Well, and block prints gather so well, like in some, you know, sometimes you gather certain fabrics and, and the seam ends up looking a bit puffy, but the block prints just, like, sit perfectly in a gather.

Caroline: Yeah. And I actually wore that one for my engagement shoot with Shea last summer. So I have some gorgeous pictures of this dress and I still love it and I still wear it a lot. So it’s great. It’s casual. It can go a little fancy too. I would say that’s one of my favourites. And I mean, I have so many block print makes. I have some tops. I’ve got, like, that crimson red block print that has been so popular. We’ve restocked it many, many times. I have that one in like a ruffly sort of shift top. I have a Papercut Patterns Array Top in a lavender block print. I also made a Victory Patterns Sofia Dress, which has all of that shirring around the bodice and some puffy little sleeves and it’s long and, shocker, I also added a gathered tier to that dress.

Helen: I love it.

Caroline: Which I don’t wear as often, but I do love it a lot. And then, of course, what I mentioned before, that checkerboard canvas Bestie Bag with the tie strap is one of my favourite bags and I’ll pull it out whenever I can. It doesn’t go with everything, ‘cause it’s a checkerboard and it’s brown and pink, but whenever it matches my outfit, I will pull it out cause I love it so much.

Helen: Yeah. Ooh. Okay, I have a curveball question for you. What’s your dream block print make? Do you have one in mind that you’ve been wanting to do?

Caroline: Ooh. My dream block print make is a quilted jacket. I’ve seen some incredible quilted vests and jackets out of block print. I have a couple in my stash that I have earmarked for a jacket, where I’m going to do, like, a block print on one side and then a different block print on the inside and make it reversible. So I think block prints look incredible quilted and I have not tried that yet. I also have so many block print scraps, and I just think they’re perfect for home decor. So I’d love to do, like, a quilted, maybe pillow cover for my living room out of block prints.

Helen: Yeah, great idea.

Caroline: I don’t know. The possibilities are endless.

Caroline: Napkins would be amazing. Or like, the Playful Placemats. What about you? Tell me, tell me what your dream is.

Helen: Well, I also have a bunch of leftovers from all of my block printed projects that I’ve been collecting. So I’m very excited to do a quilt project with them eventually. I’m not quite sure which one, but I feel like I’ll know it when I know it, you know, and when I have enough leftovers to do it. I am with you on the quilted jacket. I love the idea of the reversible quilted jacket, or if you want something that’s a little more neutral on the outside, just putting the block print on the inside for that pop of fun colour. And after seeing Sam in that Cameron Button Up, I want to make him, like, four more because he looks so cute in a floral, and it’s definitely on my list to basically reproduce that shirt like four times over.

Caroline: Ooh! Oh my gosh. That sounds amazing. I would love to make Shea a block print shirt. I think it would look really handsome on him, too.

Helen: Yeah, it totally would. Oh, I thought of something else. I definitely had plans, when we released our Arbutus Robe, to make a block printed version for summer, like for the warm summer months. And also for wearing to the beach would be really nice, like a nice cover up to protect you from the sun in a block print.

Caroline: Yes, a block print robe is gorgeous. I’ve seen a few versions. It’s per, it’s the perfect fabric for, like, a summery throw-on robe. So I’m with you on that one.

Helen: Oh, okay, great. I gotta get on it. Well, one person that really pops to mind, when you think of block prints, for me at least, is Christine Haynes. She has so many amazing block printed makes in her collection, it’s hard to even choose which ones to talk about. I mean, she has an Avenir Jumpsuit in this, like, soft blue small-scale floral with a little hint of yellow. She’s made the Lahja Robe, which is from a larger-scale pink floral on a green background. Again, the perfect warm-weather robe. Definitely my inspiration.

Caroline: Yeah, and it looks like she made a set of Friday Sport Shorts from the scraps, and the binding is made of pink block print, which I feel like is the best scrap busting project ever. It’s so cute.

Helen: It’s so cute. Mixing block prints. I mean, again, the March pattern is great for that because you can do, like, the center panel different from the bias ties and then sleeves different and mix them all together. So cute. She also has a bunch of button-ups in smaller scale florals. I mean, it’s amazing. We’ll do a little roundup on Instagram this week.

Caroline: Mmhmm. Okay, hear me out. Orchard Dress, lengthened, with a patchwork block print fabric. Like, if I patchworked all of my block print scraps and then cut out an orchard dress, I feel like that patchwork look, I’ve seen a lot of it on Pinterest, it looks so cool in, like, a really simple tank dress. I don’t know. And then I could use even block print for the binding.

Helen: Yeah, contrast for the binding. That would be so, so cute. I love that idea. Also like, our Lawrence Dress would be good for that too, because it already has gathered tiers that you could, like, easily patchwork those rectangles, and then the bodice could be all one fabric if you wanted. And then you have, like, patchwork on each of the tiers.

Helen: Ooh, ooh, I’m inspired.

Caroline: Truly, you can never have too much block print. Like, if I could have a whole wardrobe of block print, I would.

Helen: You don’t require any neutrals.

Caroline: No, just block print on block print on block print.

Helen: Just block print.

Caroline: Also, okay, every time I wear a block print make, I get compliments on it. Like people always ask me, “Where did you get that? Oh, is that block printed fabric?” People recognize it. People love it. It’s like, it just, like, adds this, like, a little sum’n-sum’n, you know, to an outfit.

Helen: Yeah. I think it is also very representative of makers. Like, a lot of people who are into fiber arts and into sewing and knitting and making of any kind really appreciate this textile because of all the artistry that goes into it. And it’s recognizable. And when you see it, you’re almost like, it’s a cue to be like, well, that person really appreciates fabric and textiles. You can tell.

Caroline: It’s like, wear a block print to the farmer’s market and all of the sewists will find you.

Helen: Yeah. Oh, whenever I wear this March Dress to the farmer’s market, I get compliments. From like, every vendor is like, “Oh, your dress!”

Caroline: Me too!

Helen: Oh my gosh. Yeah. It is literally the perfect farmer’s market dress. Okay, let’s move on and talk about some sewing tips and actually working with this block print fabric. Officially, the care instructions are to hand wash cold, do not bleach, hang to dry, but you can probably get away with machine washing them on a cold delicate cycle. It’s important to pre wash and dry the fabric the same way you’re going to care for the finished garment. So if you plan to use the machine later on, you can use that at the beginning too, for your first wash. Truthfully, mine just goes in with all the other things and comes out the dryer just fine.

Caroline: I’m not gonna lie, same. And I’ve never had a single issue, so if you want to be brave and just wash your block prints with everything else once you’ve pre-washed them, I think you’ll be fine.

Helen: Agreed.

Caroline: Speaking of pre-washing, if you’re pre-washing a long piece of fabric in the machine, which you probably will be because it’s narrow, so you’ll need more than you think, you can safety pin the corners together so that it doesn’t twist up. Or you can sew the cut ends together so that it makes the yardage into, like, a long loop and that will help too. This is a great tip regardless of whether it’s block print or not.

Helen: Yeah, it often comes out of the washer and dryer all kind of bunched and twisted up, so it is a good thing to do. Also, when I’m drying long swaths of thin fabric like this, I’ll usually check the dryer halfway, untwist it, put it back in so that, yeah, fluff it up so it doesn’t, like, come out in that tight little ball. If I remember to do that, anyways.

Caroline: Yeah. Same. And you can always, like, do that after the cycle’s finished and, like, throw it back in for a few minutes if you forget.

Helen: Yeah. Totally. After you pre-wash, you can hang it to dry if you want. Fold it once or twice over if you need to. The nice thing about it being so lightweight is that it does dry pretty quickly. And if it’s taking a long time to dry you can flip it over so the wetter part is more exposed to the air. But again, I mean, Caroline and I, with the Blackbird Fabrics block prints, we’re just washing them and drying them like normal.

Caroline: Mmhmm. Yeah, you gotta make it work for your life, you know?

Helen: Yeah.

Caroline: French seams are really nice on block prints They complement the delicate and lightweight nature of the fabric. And I also love that they strengthen the seams while also making the garment look really beautiful on the inside. And you really don’t have to worry about bulk with block prints. The seams will still be really nice and light.

Helen: You might have to alter the seam allowance of your pattern if you’re planning to do French seams, so double check the pattern and see what the seam allowance is and then redraw it if you need to. Usually people like to do a ½” seam allowance for French seams so they can sew ¼” inch away from the edge, trim it, press it the other way around, and sew another ¼”. I often just go with the ⅝” and I do a ¼” seam and then a ⅜” of an inch seam so I don’t have to do any trimming, but it does result in a slightly wider seam allowance on the inside than maybe is preferable for some people.

Caroline: Yeah, so true. You also want to be paying attention to the direction of your fabric. If it is a one way print, meaning that it has a right way up, you will want to lay the pattern pieces out all in the same direction, and this usually means buying more fabric. Also, you might want to consider whether you want to pattern match. This could mean buying more as well. One thing that I like to do, especially with something like a March Dress, is almost like alternate the direction of the block print to add a little bit of interest. My favourite block print design is, what we call at Blackbird, the Bloom block print. So it’s just like a really simple kind of flower that’s all in the same direction, sort of lined up in rows. And I think it just looks really nice when you sort of alternate the direction to add a little bit of interest to the garment. And I think I did that on my March Dress with the yokes and the tiers and the sleeves. So that’s a good way to kind of get a little bit more out of your fabric and not worry so much about having to cut everything in the same direction.

Helen: Yeah, like, even though the flowers are upside down, it doesn’t matter because they’re still gorgeous and they don’t look weird. It’s just a personal preference.

Caroline: Yeah. And if you make those choices intentionally, then I think it looks good. Like if you’re like, “Okay, I want my yoke to be all going in this direction and my sleeve to all be going in this direction,” and maybe don’t just go totally random with it. Or do. Whatever you want.

Helen: Or do. It’s small enough scale that it’s not really going to be noticeable. And don’t feel the need to point it out to every person you talk to. I did this on purpose. This upside-down flower. That was a design decision. Well, we mentioned this already, but pressing on lightweight cotton is great. You can use a hot steamy iron. It holds the press so well. Sewing it’s amazing too. It’s just, like, beginning to end, a very dreamy experience. Great for beginners.

Caroline: If you need to make a lining or a slip, you want to choose a smooth fabric like rayon bemberg, silk habotai, or maybe like a silky polyester. Using another cotton for the lining can cause bunching. Although I think sometimes it would work, like, for a gathered skirt, for example, where there’s a lot of volume, I think lining with a cotton would be fine.

Helen: Yeah, you could even do a gathered cotton petti-skirt underneath to give it volume. Or if you’re underlining like a bodice, a fitted bodice, for example, definitely a cotton would work well there. Save your scraps. As we mentioned, even small pieces can become really cool accessories, home decor, gifts. Imagine getting, like, a block print oven mitt or a scrunchie or a little bag as a present. You can incorporate them into other garments to make details like pocket bags, bias binding. Those, like, hidden neck bindings and armscye bindings are really nice in a block print. ‘Cause on the inside you get that beautiful pop of floral.

Caroline: Yes, I love a block print pocket bag. Okay, we have some pattern ideas for block print fabrics. These, as we’ve already mentioned, are a great match for gathers. There are no problems with bulky seams and the fabric holds a soft volume. The Harmonic Set by Pattern Fantastique will look amazing made in a block print for the main sections and maybe a coordinating solid cotton for the colour blocked section. The top has giant gathered sleeves and a circular keyhole over the chest, and the area around the neck is colour blocked, kind of like a bib style, and the sleeves and skirt have a wavy colour block detail that is so cool and unique. And this pattern goes to a 55 ½” chest and a 48” waist. I know you really like this pattern, hey, Helen?

Helen: Oh, I do. And it’s in part because I’m a sucker for, like, a strong contrast black and white or black and cream, and the sample they made is just that. And of course, these squiggly lines around the sleeve and the skirt. It’s just so cool. It’s so freaking cool and I would love to make this one day. I love it.

Caroline: Mmhmm.

Helen: The Juliette dress by Silversaga has a gathered scoop neck, voluminous full length sleeves, and pleats at the waist. It has buttons down the front and an integrated sash that ties at the front waist. This would be such a statement in a beautiful block print. There’s a lot of patterns, actually, from this company that I think would make fantastic block print outfits. And that one goes to a 46 ½” bust.

Caroline: We both have Helen’s Closet March Dresses in block prints and we both absolutely love them. Mine feels so comfortable to wear. It’s loose and light and breathable, but I also feel really stylish and put together in it. It’s one of the few dresses that I own that I feel like I can wear on the couch and I can wear to an event and still feel, like, amazing, you know?

Helen: I love that. I feel the same way. It’s like pajamas that you wear outside.

Caroline: Yeah. And with that extra tier at the hem, which I highly recommend, I feel pretty covered up as well, which is nice for those days when I don’t feel like showing my whole body to the world. And the March goes to a 56” bust.

Helen: Yeah, I’ve seen a lot of people make this pattern also as more of a modest fashion garment, and it works really well for that, with the longer sleeve, the tie that can tie up at the neck and make it, like, quite cinched up at the top as well. Casual button-ups are another great choice for block prints. Something about it feels so unexpected and cool. The Cornell Shirt by Elbe Textiles for block prints would be great because it has a relaxed fit and a band collar which would go really well with the softness of the fabric. And that one goes up to a 48” chest.

Caroline: And like we already mentioned, the Cameron Button Up is a perfect match for block prints If you’re looking for something with a collar.

Helen: Yeah, and good for, like, your first shirt-making adventure, because it is easy to sew.

Caroline: Block prints make amazing pajamas. That is my definition of luxury. A classic set like the Closet Core Fran Pajamas would be so nice. Or you could make just a basic pair of PJ pants and wear them with, like, a soft t-shirt. The pattern doesn’t have to be complicated because the fabric is such a star.

Helen: It would be really nice to have that lightweight block printed robe in the summer. The Whitlow Robe by In the Folds would be a good choice. It could double as a swim coverup if you want to wear it open at the beach. Or a light layer–if you want to wear it over, like, a t-shirt and jeans, it’s just like, a fun layering jacket. I love that idea.

Caroline: Yeah. Okay. So now that you’re all inspired, let’s talk about where you can buy these beautiful fabrics. We stock a bunch of block prints at Blackbird. We absolutely love carrying them. They’re super popular with our customers. We usually choose florals in vibrant colours. Sometimes we do a little bit more of a muted earthy fall collection. I am super proud to have these in my store. I love them so much. I don’t know. I’ve been gushing for the whole episode, but I just, I love our block prints.

Helen: Tell us how you really feel! No, they are fantastic and I have like eight of them in my fabric stash as well. It’s like, every time you drop a new collection. I’m like, “Oh, look at that!” Yeah. Totally addicted. Another Canadian company that I have bought block prints from is Maiwa, which is based in Vancouver. They sell in-person and online. They’re known for, like, their dyeing selection. If you’re into fabric dyeing, they have a ton of resources and materials for that. They also do carry fabric yardage and their selection has a bit more of a natural, muted tone colours, abstract prints, like, bold polka dots and things like that. Really cool. Um, definitely check them out.

Caroline: In the UK, Merchant and Mills has block prints in neutrals and indigos. They also have some really cool quilted block print fabrics that would make great blankets or jackets.

Helen: In Australia, Woven Stories has a huge selection of block prints with lots of colours and styles to choose from.

Caroline: And in the USA, Gilded Threads has a great selection of block prints, lots of beautiful, light, bright colours.

Helen: Etsy is another great place to look. There are even Etsy shops that specialize in block prints. So you can really get a wide selection over there.

Caroline: And if you’re feeling inspired to try your own version of block printing, you have some options. We did an episode with the artist and sewist Jen Hewett back in 2018 that you might be interested in. It’s episode 59.

Helen: Yeah, and I actually made an Ashton Top out of fabric that I block printed myself, and I wrote a post about the process on the Helen’s Closet blog, so we’ll link that up. I did that little workshop at Blackbird Fabrics, actually, back when y’all had workshops, and it was so much fun. We carved our blocks out of, I can’t remember the name of the material, but just that, like, soft material that you can…

Caroline: Like rubber…

Helen: Yeah, like rubbery material you can carve really easily. So we could do it quickly. And then we mounted them to wood blocks. And then you roll the dye on and you print the fabric, and then you can sew it up into something. And that whole process was so creatively invigorating, like, I would highly recommend trying it out if you’ve been interested. It was not hard to do. You just need the right materials, and you’re really good to go. So It was really fun and I enjoy that Ashton Top a lot. It’s one of my proudest makes.

Caroline: I love that top. As we mentioned before, there are several workshops available where you can learn directly from Indian block print artisans. They’re linked in the New York Times article that we talked about, and that’s going to be in our show notes. Also, Maiwa here in Vancouver is a great place to get supplies, if you’re local. I think they have an online store as well. They have a bunch, including pre-carved wooden blocks.

Helen: Ooh, very cool. Well, I hope that you liked learning about one of our favourite fabrics of all time. It’s really just the tip of the iceberg. The history and the tradition is so rich, still living and changing. Block prints forever!

Caroline: Block prints forever!

Helen: Ooh, Caroline, can we have a hashtag for this episode? I want to see everyone’s block prints.

Caroline: Oh my goodness. Yes, absolutely.

Helen: Okay. Please share this week or whenever you’re listening, #LoveToSewBlockPrints and tag us, @lovetosew.podcast, so we can see your makes. And we’ll reshare anything that comes in and, yeah, we can’t wait to see what you’ve made.

Caroline: There has never been a truer statement. I love to sew block prints! That’s it for today’s episode of Love to Sew. You can find me, Caroline, at Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns and Helen at Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co. And we’re recording in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.

Helen: You can support Love to Sew and get access to bonus content by subscribing on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. You even get access to the back catalogue of bonus episodes. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew. Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or check out our podcast page on Apple Podcasts for more info.

Caroline: You can head to lovetosewpodcast.com to find our show notes. They’re filled with links and pictures from this episode. And if you’d like to get in touch with us and tell us how much you love block prints, leave us a message at 1-844-SEW-WHAT. That’s 1-844-739-9428. Or you can send us an email at [email protected].

Helen: Thanks to our amazing podcast team! Lisa Ruiz is our creative assistant, Jordan Moore of The Pod Cabin is our editor. And thank you for listening. We’ll talk to you next week.

Caroline: Bye bye.

Helen: Buh-buh-block prints!

Caroline: Buh-buh-buh-block prints!

Helen: Buh-buh-block print!

Caroline: Oh my gosh, we’re obsessed.

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In this episode we’re interviewing Daisy Braid, also known as DIY Daisy! We chat with her about her book, Sew it Yourself, which is filled with pattern-free, wearable projects. She also tells us about her personal style evolution, how to find the good stuff when you’re shopping secondhand, and her year of DIY!

The transcript for this episode is on this page at the end of the show notes.

Show Notes: 

Find Daisy Online:

Daisy’s Book, Sew It Yourself: 20 Pattern-Free Projects (and Infinite Variations) to Make Your Dream Wardrobe

Some of Daisy’s Projects:

A post shared by Daisy Braid (@_diydaisy)

A post shared by Daisy Braid (@_diydaisy)

A post shared by Daisy Braid (@_diydaisy)

Some of Daisy’s Pattern-Free Designs:

Other Mentions:

Transcript:

Caroline: We are recording today on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish and Kwakwaka’wakw peoples, including Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, Musqueam, and K’ómoks first nations.

Helen: Hello and welcome to Love to Sew. I’m Helen, the designer behind Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co.

Caroline: And I’m Caroline, the owner of Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns.

Helen: We’re two sewing buds who love to sew and it’s basically all we want to talk about.

Caroline: Today we’re interviewing Daisy Braid, aka DIY Daisy. We chat with her about her book, Sew It Yourself, and her personal style evolution. We also cover how to find the good stuff when you’re secondhand shopping and her year of DIY.

Helen: If you love to sew, this is your show.

Helen: Hello, Daisy. Thank you so much for coming on the show today.

Daisy: Thanks for having me.

Helen: We’re so excited to chat with you. Can you please introduce yourself to our listeners?

Daisy: Of course. So my name is Daisy Braid and I live on the Gold Coast, which is Yugambeh country in Australia. I’m 30 years old. I’m a twin. I’m also a gemini. And I’m also a big sister. So I have another little brother and a little sister as well. And, of course, I like sewing.

Helen: Of course.

Caroline: Yes, you are DIY Daisy, after all.

Daisy: Yep.

Caroline: Okay, let’s start off with hearing a little bit about your sewing journey. Can you tell us how and when you learned to sew?

Daisy: Well, I guess a sewing machine just sort of appeared, or existed in my house. And so I always, kind of, saw it and was like, “Oh, I guess that’s something I could just figure out how to do.” And, when I was younger, I was always really inspired by my auntie, who was a plus size designer in Aotearoa, New Zealand. And she’s been doing that for 30 years. So when I was a kid, she was probably halfway through doing that, I guess, or 10 years into doing that. And I always saw her doing that and I thought, “Wow, that’s really cool that she has this passion and this thing that she’s interested in. I want to be like that too.” And also my grandmother, who was my mum’s mum and my auntie’s mum, she was a sewist and a quilter. And she always sewed her own outfits. And my grandpa always told me stories about how every weekend she would sew a different outfit to wear. And I just wanted to be like that. I thought, “Oh, that’s such a cool way to have your own clothes in your own style.”

So when I was younger, I wanted to have my own clothes in my own style. So. I would go to the op shop and find pieces of clothing to upcycle or to change the hem or make into another kind of top and it sort of started from there. Very DIY approach, just figuring out how the sewing machine worked. I absolutely ruined that machine when I was a teenager, but I learned a lot about how the machine works and how clothing goes together. And so that was sort of like my origin story as a sewist. But then, in high school, I continued a little bit more, not doing home ec, I didn’t do home ec, but I would bring my sewing into the art room and I would, like, apply that to my projects and what I was doing in art.

And then I guess I forgot about sewing for a few years, you know, that time in your life where you’re like, “I’m at uni, I can go to the club, I can drink now. So I’m going to go out.” And I was travelling a bit more. So I sort of left that to the side, but I would still make my costumes for a dress-up party. And then a couple of years later, I moved to New Zealand, and I guess the slow fashion or the the local fashion community is really strong there and I was kind of immersed in that. I started working for this designer who was, they’re called Twenty-Seven Names, and they’re a New Zealand made designer, like, label, and they would make all of their clothes in the country and they would really get their community involved with it. And they made beautiful clothing. And then I got a job.

Helen: How did you end up getting this job working with this designer? Was it because you had sewing skills or did you know them previously? Like, how did that happen?

Daisy: So basically I moved to New Zealand because I’d been with this guy and he cheated on me. My parents hate me telling that story, but I think it’s part of why I moved. I was feeling really lost and my mum sort of said like, “I don’t know who you are anymore. You’re not you anymore. So I think you should go and live in New Zealand. You should go spend some time with your auntie.” And my auntie is always someone that I’ve really admired because of the way that she is, like, so persistent in, “This is what I’m doing. This is my job. This is my career. I’m a fashion designer. And I’m going to keep creating clothing for women’s bodies.” And I’ve always just been like, “Oh, just so amazing.” So I thought, okay, I’ll go and work with her. And I kind of was her intern for maybe six months. And I lived with her for free, which was perfect because the job with her obviously wasn’t paid. And, but then after that six months, she was like, “Okay, Daisy, if you’re going to stay around a bit longer, you’re going to have to start paying rent. So you’re going to need to get a job.” I was like, “No problem.” So I started looking for jobs, and when you live in New Zealand, I guess, and you’re interested in fashion, you learn about the local designers. And one of them that I became aware of was Twenty-Seven Names. And I thought that their clothing was beautiful. And the stories, of the way that they told the story of each collection was so thoughtful. And I also liked the idea of this slow fashion. I was starting to discover slow fashion and more thoughtfully-made fashion.

So I applied and I got a job in their retail store, just selling the clothes, like, on the weekend and a couple of days a week. And then while I was working there. I was still helping my auntie a little bit, but that was where I sort of started to make friends in New Zealand. So I felt like, okay, I’m going to have a paid job from now on working with my auntie, I need something more. I lived with my auntie, I worked at Twenty-Seven Names. And then one day I saw a job for The Fabric Store and it was in their head office and it felt like a job that would align with what I studied at uni. So I applied and I got that job. And the only reason I got that, or one of the reasons I think I got that job, was because they asked me, “Who are some of the local designers that you like?” And I said, “Well, of course I love Twenty-Seven Names. And I like The Carpenter’s Daughter, which is my auntie’s brand. And then I said a couple of other local designers, and I think they were like, “Okay, she, she’s interested in local fashion. She’s not talking about fast fashion. She gets what, what our mission is and our values.” And I also said, “I know how to sew,” even though I hadn’t sewn for years at that point. And I think that’s how I got the job there.

Helen: Amazing. Well, it’s like riding a bike. You’re like, yeah, it’ll come back to me.

Daisy: Exactly, exactly. But I was, boy, was I wrong! Like, when I first got there and I was like, “All right, I’m going to go start learning how to sew again.” I was completely out of my depth because everybody that I worked with had studied fashion at uni. So I was like, “Oh, I’m, I’m just a DIY girl with all of these really talented seamstresses and makers.” Every single person that I worked with wore me-made every day. It was really inspiring. And that’s, and so as soon as I got there, I was like, that’s it. I’m buying a sewing machine.

Caroline: Okay. So you were in New Zealand working at The Fabric Store, but when I started following you, you were living in Japan. So can you tell us what you were doing there? How did you end up there?

Daisy: Yeah. So I was always interested in Japan and Japanese culture, and I’d studied Japanese language all throughout my schooling. And I did a year or so at university while I was also studying business. So when I was learning Japanese at uni, I heard about this thing called the JET program, which is kind of organized through your country’s government, I guess, and they have it in, like, lots of different countries where English is a first language. So that was a way for you to go and work in Japan. They pick your placement as well and they put you in a school and then you will be an assistant language teacher and you will go and assist Japanese teachers of English with teaching English so that they have a native speaker in the classroom.

And I had already used my working holiday visa in Japan because I had done some snow seasons in Hokkaido. And I thought, well, this is another way for me to go and experience Japanese culture, but in a different way, because when you do a snow season, you’re surrounded by foreigners. And yes, there are obviously Japanese people around you, but you definitely don’t experience life in Japan in the same way, because it’s a party culture and it’s a snow town. So if you’ve ever been or done a season, you would understand. It’s like, you’re partying in the nights and on the weekend, you’re skiing in the day, maybe you’d go to the onsen once or twice a week.

But I thought If I taught English in Japan, I would be able to experience life all year round instead of just in winter and maybe get to expand my circle, I guess, of my understanding of Japanese. And meet new Japanese people. So I got placed in Tokyo, and like I said, they choose where they put you. So you just apply, you give them all this information and then they pick where you go based on, I don’t even know, they don’t really tell you the criteria. And so I was placed in a school in Tokyo and five days a week I would teach English.

Helen: Cool. Oh my gosh. It sounds like a dream to be placed in Tokyo. Were you so excited when you got that placement?

Daisy: I was, because everyone had said, there’s actually a very big community of assistant language teachers online. So there’s, like, Reddit groups and there’s YouTubers that are all within that community. So you can learn about doing the JET program or learn about being an ALT which is an assistant language teacher. And everyone had always said getting Tokyo is the hardest placement. No one knew how you would get Tokyo. And so there were even people in my group that were pretty grumpy at me for getting that. And I said, like, I didn’t even have it on my list of my top three placements that I would, would like to get. So I was very excited. But one of the downsides of living in Tokyo on the JET program is that your accommodation is not subsidized and you have to find it yourself. So if you get placed anywhere but Tokyo, usually the local board of education or your school will have a house for you, a full house, not an apartment, and it might already have appliances, whereas in Tokyo you have to go through the whole rental process and put down key money. And basically that’s the only way I thought I could live in Tokyo, because that’s what everybody said. But then I later learned that there are share houses and you don’t have to put down all this big deposit at the start. And it’s also a really great way to meet other people. So I ended up living in my own apartment for the first six months. And then I went and moved into a share house. And I lived in share houses for the rest of my time in Japan.

Caroline: Oh, nice. And did you sew while you were in Japan?

Daisy: Yeah. So one of the first things I bought when I moved in, I bought, like, paid for my apartment, put the deposit down, and then I went onto Amazon and I bought a sewing machine. And then I had some fabric coming from The Fabric Store. I knew it was on its way. So I thought, “I’d better get a sewing machine so I can sew it up and keep sharing my sewing journey, but just from a different perspective of being in a different country and maybe having different influences,” which I definitely had because your style changes based on where you live, because of the fashion or what’s trending, but also what’s appropriate. So because I was teaching English in a school with high school students, I had to dress a little bit modestly. So I would wear a lot of longer skirts and t-shirts or shirts that had full coverage on the neckline and things like that. Just because that was appropriate. I was pretty lucky that I didn’t have to wear a suit every day. I know that some schools had much more formal work attire requirements. But I was really lucky that I was able to still express my personal style, but it just had to be a little bit more modest.

Caroline: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I remember when I was following you back then, my memory of your style was like, a lot of Liberty, a lot of gathers and sort of, like, volume. And I imagine your students all thought you were really cool.

Daisy: Well, I hoped that they thought I was cool. Yeah, I hope, I hope they did. I definitely had some students that, I, I’ve had some students that I’ve spoken to, like, years later. One of them ended up living on the Gold Coast and was looking for a place to live and sent me a message and said, “Hey, did you work at this school?” And I said, “Yeah, why, how did you know that?” And he said, “I’m living on the Gold Coast now. I saw your listing for your, for the rental.” And I was like, “What the heck? That’s crazy.”

Helen: Wow. Small world. Really.

Daisy: It was very small-world situation.

Helen: So tell us a little bit about how you got into sharing content online. When did you start, like, participating in the online sewing community?

Daisy: Well, when I started working at The Fabric Store, one of my responsibilities was to manage the brand ambassador program, which was basically like influencer marketing, but back in 2016, before it was really a big thing. And that was the first time I discovered that you could make money from sharing content, or you could get free stuff from sharing content as a blogger or a fashion blogger online. I sort of knew that fashion bloggers existed, but I didn’t know that brands were, I don’t know why that didn’t really click to me, but I guess because I was on the other side of it, I realized, “Oh, that’s how these people are able to get all of this stuff. It’s because brands are sending it to them sometimes.” And so one day I joked to my coworker, wouldn’t it be funny if I became a sewing blogger called DIY Daisy? I guess I’d been thinking about it a little bit, but I never took it seriously. It was always a bit of a joke, but I thought, “If I want to really understand the sewing community, I need to engage in it. I need to get involved.”

So I was writing blog posts for work. So I understood, these are the kinds of blogs people want. They want pattern reviews, they want tutorials, they want free resources. So I thought, okay, I’ll start making my own clothes and documenting them. I guess I’ve always had a DIY brain. And so I thought, “I can figure out how to make a tutorial.” So I made one and I shared it. And then people in other countries made it too. And I thought, “Wow, okay, this is really rewarding. This is really fun and a cool way to connect with other people that are interested in my hobby, which is sewing.” So I decided that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to start sharing tutorials. I’m going to start sharing resources. And at first it was really just a real passion project. It was just something I would do on the side. And when I was in Japan, I continued to do that and shared the Maya Ruffle Dress. And then shared one or two tutorials every now and then, and other people in the sewing community made them.

So I thought, “Oh, this is really fun. Maybe I’ll just continue doing this.” And then I was offered some fabric in exchange for tagging and posting from a company. And I thought, all right, this is really cool. I’m going to keep doing this, because if I keep sharing, people will keep engaging and maybe brands will reach out to me and give me opportunities or more material so I can keep it up. And that’s sort of what sparked it and then continued motivating me to do it. I guess when I saw other people find joy out of making what I have shared or being inspired by something that I’ve created, then I just wanted to keep going.

Helen: I love that you came to it quite organically, that it was like a joke between you and your coworker. Like, “Wouldn’t it be funny if…” And I think you hit the nail on the head with what people are looking for as far as like looking at projects and they want tutorials and they want free resources and your stuff is so accessible because you are teaching people how to make a garment without them having to purchase a pattern, which is so neat. And we’re going to pivot and talk about your book in a little bit here. But before we do that, we want to hear about your personal style. Because your style is so eye-catching, so recognizable. Like I would know you on the street, if I saw you, in a heartbeat. So can you please describe your personal aesthetic for our listeners?

Daisy: Sure. I think my style has really changed since I started and that is because it’s an evolution. So my style has always been evolving, but I think now what I wear and the things that I make are so uniquely or authentically me and I’ve never created things that I want to wear more. I would say that I’ve always wanted to look like a cartoon. So you know how every day a cartoon wears kind of the same thing? I want to be like that, as in, I kind of have, like, a uniform style. So, cartoon. Colour block, of course. I stopped wearing prints and patterns and I just love being able to play with colour and colour blocking without putting prints and patterns in there. Not that I don’t love them. So I would say, cartoon, colour block, always comfy, and maybe easy as well. Where I live in Australia, it’s really laid back and I don’t have anywhere fancy to go. So maybe every now and then I’ll have somewhere fancy to go. So a lot, like, I always have an elastic waistband. Things are a little bit slouchy and comfy and yeah, so: comfy colour block cartoon cute! I don’t know.

Helen: Yeah, all c words! I love it.

Caroline: So cute. Yeah.

Caroline: Lots of linen, too. I feel like you work with a lot of linen.

Daisy: I love linen and I think when all of the fabric in my wardrobe is the same there’s, it just gives me the ability to have this, kind of, everything feels cohesive. Everything feels like it’s from the same collection of clothes. And that’s what I want because I want it to feel like it all matches and makes sense. So linen is my number one favourite fabric to sew with, but then I do also love a crispy kind of cotton lawn, poplin kind of fabric.

Caroline: Mmhmm.

Daisy: But I definitely don’t have as much of that. I have maybe one or two pieces made out of that fabric, but I have some in my stash that I need to make.

Caroline: Cool. I can’t wait to see it. Yeah, it’s interesting that you talked about your style kind of evolving. Because I’ve definitely noticed that over the years and it’s been really fun to watch. But one of the constants that I’ve also noticed is that you are continuously sharing this tutorial content that you were talking about, sharing your love of crafting. It’s really infectious and I think that a lot of people come to you for inspiration, both style-wise and sewing and crafting. So it makes a lot of sense that you ended up writing a book that was also very inspiring. It’s called Sew It Yourself, and it came out back in 2022. It’s so great. I got my hands on a copy because we provided some of the fabric for the book at Blackbird. And I know it is a coveted book around the office. Everyone is always asking, “Can I borrow it? Can I take it home?” It’s just so, so great. So can you tell us a little bit about how that came to be?

Daisy: Oh, thanks for saying that. It actually makes me so happy to hear that it’s coveted in the Blackbird HQ, because when I reached out to you to ask for some fabric, or ask for some help, that was really scary to do. But I was so grateful that, at how generous you were to share fabric from Blackbird because I was already, like, buying fabric from Blackbird, but just being able to include that in the book and say. like, this is where I get my fabric from as well, it really just added to the fun of all of the garments in the book, especially with those ginghams. And I’m so glad they’re back.

Caroline: Yes.

Helen: Yes, love a gingham.

Daisy: They were so fun. And so all of the pieces, I’ll come back to it, but all the pieces in the book that I made, I gifted out to either the models, my editor, or my close friends. And so every time I see one of those pieces being worn, I just have this lovely feeling of warmth in my heart. So it’s really special. But basically, yeah. So after I moved home from Japan, it was COVID time March 2020. And then for the next nine months, I just shared as much content as possible, because I thought, “I’ve got no job. There’s no jobs happening. And I guess I just have to hang out at home.” And then January 2021, I got an email from Emily, who was my editor. And she said, “Hey Daisy, have you ever considered writing a book?” And I said, “Not really, but I would,” because I looked up Hardie Grant, which is the publisher, and I saw heaps of my favourite creatives in Australia had written books with this publisher. And I thought, if I’m going to write a book, it’s going to be with them. So I said, yes, let’s do it. And Emily was amazing. Basically, she really understood my style. And every time I’ve seen her and met her in real life, I just look at her and go, you get me. She’s always got a bit of gingham on, she’s got colourful style, she has cool earrings, so I just knew straight away that she understood me, she understood my style and what I wanted to say, and it was the perfect match, I think.

So we wrote this book together; she edited all the words and motivated and pushed me along. And so for the first four or five months of 2021, I was a hermit, at home, in my pajamas, writing these tutorials, that, some of them were taken from my blog, so, tutorials I had already shared, and then some of them were totally brand new that I had to develop and figure out how the formula worked. And I wrote it all into this giant document on Google Docs, and then I submitted it off to be edited. And then it went through Emily. It went through a woman called Eugenie, who was like, I feel like she was one of those math wizards or something, she was reading through these formulas as if she was making them and going, “Daisy, you haven’t put, said that right sides are touching there. Are you sure that’s right?” So obviously she was a maker as well. She understood what I was saying and she was able to edit and make sure everything made sense. So that was sort of the process that went: me and Emily worked together, I wrote the manuscript, submitted it, then it went through Emily, Eugenie, and then in that time that it was getting its final edits, it went off to the designer who created all the art, sort of the cover artwork, and put all the pieces together on the pages, and I provided the illustrations that she turned into the illustrations in the book.

And then I had to sew all the garments that went inside that we photographed. So I worked, probably two months of sewing, just sitting in my studio surrounded by piles of fabric and just racks of clothes and half-finished garments. And in that time, it was still COVID lockdown kind of time. So I was planning this photoshoot and I had to get models, and I wanted to make sure that I had lots of different sizes and different body shapes. And then they closed the borders. So two of the models that I was going to work with, one of them was my friend’s sister, and then another one was my art teacher. They both lived in New South Wales, which is on the other side of the border. So they were out. I wasn’t able to work with them to be models in the book, so I had to find two more really last-minute, and make sure that the garments fit them. And I managed to find Maddie, who is a family friend that I didn’t even, I can’t believe I didn’t even think of her. So Maddie is the beautiful girl with freckles and red curly hair in the book, and she is a mathematician, but she’s also a sewist. So, it was really, it felt really natural for her to be in the book and she just brought heaps of energy. And then when we got to the photo shoot my sister and Elle, who was also one of the models in the book, helped me prepare everything. And we drove up to Brisbane, and for two days we shot all the photos and it was so much fun. Also very overwhelming, but a really cool experience. And basically, yeah, we sat, we took all the photos, submitted that, and then it all got turned into a book. And then by January of 2022, I was able to share the news.

Caroline: Oh my gosh, It sounds like an absolute whirlwind!

Daisy: It was.

Caroline: And truly so much work. Like, I admire anyone who writes a book, because it sounds like it’s a ton of work, not to mention a sewing book where you’re having to actually make the projects and then all the photography and all of that. But it came together so beautifully. It is not only gorgeous, but such a great representation of the content you make and your aesthetic. And all of the projects in your book are pattern-free, which is something that you do just regularly in your content. So can you explain what that means?

Daisy: Yeah, so pattern-free, I guess, is like, there are no paper patterns. You’re not tracing anything. You don’t cut out a pattern and lay that on your fabric. It just means that your pattern comes from your body dimensions. So the dimensions of your body, the measurements of your body, and then you put that into a formula and then it tells you how big to make the pattern pieces. And those pattern pieces you will transfer, or you would draw them onto your fabric or onto paper to create your own pattern. So it’s kind of like self-drafting. And I think all sewing sort of starts that way, but most, like, I guess, traditional or, like, mainstream sewing, uses a pattern. But I, I think that when you use your body measurements and use shapes, it’s just, sort of, like, this really stripped-back way of creating a garment. And I don’t know why, I just really love it. It feels like more, it’s like, yes, you have to do a little bit of math, but it’s not scary math. And I just love the challenge of it or like, the mental, the brain workout of it. I don’t want to make it sound hard. It’s really not.

Caroline: Mmhmm.

Helen: You’ve done the hard work by doing all of the, like, breakdown of the formula required. And I think it is a really great entry point for a lot of beginner sewists because the designs are so eye-catching, they’re so approachable, they look very doable. But you’re, like, tricking people into doing pattern drafting.

Daisy: Exactly!

Helen: Yeah, I love it. I think it’s really awesome. And it’s great to, like, get in touch with, yeah, your measurements, your body shape, your body size, and actually be able to make something that fits you without having to fit into this mold of a pattern, which is kind of stressful when you’re starting out.

Daisy: Yes. And I think also, because when you self-draft it for yourself, like you said, you’re, you’re learning how to draft a pattern. At its core, all clothing is made from shapes. And so when you start sewing in this way, it’s like you turn your brain into this pattern identifying, self-drafting identifying machine. And you’ll go to the shops and you’ll see a skirt on the hanger and you’ll go, “Oh my gosh, that’s made out of two rectangles.” And you’ll see something and you’ll go, “Oh, that’s a trapezoid, but that’s got a little semicircle cut out there.” So. It’s like, yeah, you’re tricking your brain into seeing how clothing is put together from the blocks, and then you carve away a little bit on the side to make the arm hole, or you cut out a neck hole, or you add some shape here by making it a trapezoid. Yeah, it’s just patternmaking.

Helen: No, I’m, like, thinking right now how adorable it is that, like, your aesthetic is, like, giving primary school and like, but also like, you’re talking about these basic building blocks of shapes. And I’m picturing, like, literal, like, children’s toy building blocks, like the square and the column and the triangle. And you, like, build these structures with them and they’re all these bright colours. It’s so perfectly you and for some reason it just, like, it all comes together. It just clicks.

Daisy: I think so.

Helen: Do you have any tips for people working with, like, pattern-free instructions? Is the process different in any way?

Daisy: When you are self-drafting a pattern, you have to let go of any expectations that you have that the final garment is going to be absolutely perfect. And I think that applies to anything that you sew, with a pattern or with a self-drafted pattern. That pattern, if it’s one of mine, or I guess if it’s self-drafted using shapes like squares and rectangles…your body isn’t squares and rectangles. So your body is curvy and it has contours and it’s not square, straight and up and down. So you have to forget the idea that it’s going to fit you perfectly and lose those expectations that whatever you create is going to be runway ready or look amazing and someone’s going to call you up and ask you to be on the front cover of Vogue or something like that. I think, yeah. So like, let go of any expectations and just think, “I’m making something” and “I’m going to create something.” I always say to make a toile, make a practice version when you are self-drafting, because In my case, the formulas are based off of my body and I’m only one size, so I can only base it off my size. And someone might have a different proportion of their, their body shape. So they might be bigger up the top and smaller down the bottom, or they might be one size all the way through. So you have to adjust things to work for you.

Caroline: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, and I mean that’s the case for all sewing projects, pattern or, or no pattern or self-drafted. Be ready to make adjustments and go through that process and, and you’ll end up with a better garment in the end. I really see you as kind of like a gateway into the sewing community for beginner sewists because I think your content is so accessible, a lot of it is free. I don’t know, it’s just like, you really pull people in and I think that your love of sewing and crafting is really infectious. And I wonder if you have advice for new sewists out there who are just starting out?

Daisy: Well, the same advice that I just mentioned, like, lose any expectations. Don’t expect that you’re going to be a master at this new craft as soon as you start it. Maybe you will be the exception and you’ll figure it out really quickly. But anything that you start as a beginner, I think it’s really good to be a beginner because it’s like training your brain: again, you’re, you’re not always going to be the master of something. And so, when you’re starting out, especially in sewing, be kind to yourself and just see it as a way for you to express yourself. Use skills that you maybe haven’t used for a while, sewing in a straight line or doing a little bit of maths, and let go of any feelings or expectations that you have that whatever you create is going to be perfect the first time. That’s probably my main thing. And I, when I used to teach workshops, I would always say something along those lines at the start. “You’re just here to create today. You’re here to make something for yourself.” It’s a little bit of self-care and it’s just something that you can do to give a little bit of love to your brain. And if you end up with a wearable garment at the end, then even better.

Helen: Yeah, that’s like a bonus extra if that happens to work out. Yeah, that is really good advice. It’s hard in, any time you’re trying a new thing, to put down that expectation that you’re going to be excellent at it. I know from personal experience I always want to be good at something when I try it for the first time, but it is a learning process. I’m wondering, of all the projects you’ve included in your book do you have one that stands out that you wear most often?

Daisy: Well, it’s really funny that you ask that because I don’t wear many of the things from my book anymore. My, my style has really changed, it’s evolved. Like I said at the start, it’s evolved a lot from when I originally wrote the book. That was a couple of years ago now. And I’m a little bit older and I’ve embraced my body a little bit more. So I still love all of the things that I’ve created in the book, and the Maya Ruffle Dress will always be one that holds a very special place in my heart, but the two pieces that I still have in my wardrobe and I wear the most: the Rosebud Raglan Top, which is named after my grandmother, Rosalie, and the Kama Dress. So the Kama Dress is made from squares again, and I made one of those to wear to my book launch party, and I also made one to wear to Frocktails recently. And I ended up wearing it to the TikTok awards with my friend Tom, and I’m going to wear it again soon to another event that I’m going to, so I would say that they are the most worn, but throughout my whole journey, I’ve worn all of the different projects in there heaps and different frequencies and amounts, but yeah, my style has changed quite a bit since I wrote all of those projects. So it’s like a little time capsule of my style from 2018 to 2022, maybe.

Helen: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And I can relate. Doing our patterns, I always get really obsessed with a certain pattern when we’re working on it. And then it’s always evolving because you’re a designer and you’re coming up with new things. So we’re always excited to see what you come up with next. Okay. Let’s take a quick break and we’ll be right back.

Caroline: Love to Sew is made possible by listeners like YOU! We are so grateful for the support of our amazing patrons and subscribers. If you love Love to Sew and you want to help support the pod, we have a new option for you.

Helen: You can now become a paid subscriber on Apple Podcasts! Subscribers get access to our monthly bonus episodes. It’s so convenient; if you already use Apple Podcasts, the episodes are right there in your feed!

Caroline: So, what are the bonus episodes? Well, we do a chatty catch-up on what’s been happening in our lives, share about the realities of running a small business, discuss new indie pattern releases, and talk about what we’re sewing right now! Many of our subscribers say these fun bonus episodes are their favourite, and if you subscribe, you get access to the full back catalogue. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew! We also do a mini-episode that deep dives into a specific topic. We get to discuss so many fun sewing techniques and answer specific subscriber questions about sewing!

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Helen: Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or visit our show’s page in the apple podcast app to become a paid subscriber. Thank you to all of our listeners, patrons and subscribers – you’re the best!

And we’re back. Okay Daisy, we’d love to talk a little bit more about your personal sewing. And one thing we noticed is that you use a lot of secondhand fabrics. And I know you like a thrift store, an op shop as y’all call them down there. Do you have any tips for finding good stuff at the op shop?

Daisy: Ooh, yes, I mean, this has been, I’ve been op shopping for so long now that I’ve really nailed it. It’s an art form to me at this point. One of the things that I’ve learned is that when you have a list, it could be a mental list. It could be a physical list that you have written down on some paper. You should have a list of what you are really looking for so that you kind of focus in and you really hone in on what you really need. It’s so easy to go to the op shop and just buy every cool thing that you find. But are you actually going to use it? Are you really going to sew with it? Or is it just going to sit in your stash for years and then collect dust and wonder why you picked it up when you could have left it behind for someone else to discover? So having a list is so important. And I feel like when you sort of speak or manifest that list out into the world, the op shop gods are going to hear you. And so I do, I have that list now. I have, it’s either a mental list or it’s little notes on my phone and it helps me to stay focused when I go in there. I always beeline it for the craft section because I usually know what I’m looking for, it might be there. So at the moment I’ve been looking for beads. I just go straight there. I’m looking for beads. But if I’m looking for linen I’ll look in the fabric section, but I often find linen in the clothing aisles or the clothing racks, and then I’m able to take the linen out of that and cut it out, cut out the fabric and repurpose it that way. So have a list and go straight to where you’re looking. Be focused.

Helen: I love this idea of having a, like, ongoing list that you can reference because it is so overwhelming and it’s easy to get sidetracked.

Daisy: It is. Yes.

Helen: I was watching your stories recently where you went to an op shop to get beads, like you’re saying, and somebody there, like, helped you find a bunch more beads that were in the back. So also, you know, asking the people that work there where the thing is that you’re looking for, they might know a secret stash.

Daisy: Mmhmm.

Caroline: We noticed you’ve also been doing a lot of patchwork recently, and it’s been so cool to see all of your projects. We wanted to ask you about your hexie quilt and how it’s been going.

Daisy: Yeah. So my hexie quilt is, I think you would call it, a third of the way finished, but that is a project I started back in lockdown. So in 2020 I thought, I love Liberty fabric. I would like to use it in a different way instead of just making clothes. And I discovered The Strawberry Thief, which is another fabric. store in Australia and they sell exclusively Liberty of London fabric. And I reached out to Robin for Sew It Yourself as well. And she provided some Liberty for the book. And around that same time we connected, she offered to get me started on a Liberty hexie quilt. So she sent me the first kit to get started and I was hooked. And I thought, “This is something that I’ll just work away at every month.” But of course, I got busy and I left it and I sort of forgot about it for a while and I probably had 30 Hexie flowers complete and they sat there for two years. But at the end of last year, I read this quote, by Rachel Burke, who is an artist here in Australia. She’s from Brisbane/Mianjin. And she said, “Stop hoarding your craft supplies and make something.” And so that’s kind of my, it’s my mantra, for the year. And I thought, I better get working on that hexie quilt and really make some serious progress on it. So I started sort of letting people know I’m working on it again. And people were cheering me on through the comments. And I felt like, all right, I’m going to do this. So I think I sewed about five or six flowers a week, sometimes more. And now I’ve sewn 96 hexie flowers because I want to make a queen sized quilt. And now I’m at the part where I have to stitch all the flowers together.

Helen: Oh my gosh. Yeah, hexie quilts, I feel like, are notorious for languishing in a pile because they do take so much work to get through making all those hexes.

Daisy: Have you made one?

Helen: I have not. I’m very intimidated. But it’s on my list, maybe one day. I wonder if you could explain to our listeners the process, like if they’ve never seen a hexie quilt and they don’t know what you’re talking about. How do you go about making these little flowers?

Daisy: So basically, you start with these pre-cut, they could be laser cut or you could cut them out yourself, hexagons of fabric. And I’m using two inch hexagons because I thought that would be faster, but it hasn’t really made it any faster. So you start with these hexagons of fabric and then you get these hexagons of paper. It’s sort of, it’s card, but they call it English paper piecing. And on the back of one of the hexagons, you kind of glue the edges and then you fold those edges onto the card so that you have this little stiff hexagon. And the reason you put the paper in or the card in is to hold the shape while you sew the hexagons together. So you start by sewing two together and you just sew along one edge, then you fold it out and then you add another petal and then you sort of go around in a circle and you sew all the petals together until you have a hexie flower. And the hexie flower has seven hexagons in it and they all have the card so they’re all a little bit stiff. And a lot of people have said to me, “What about the paper? Are you going to just quilt that in there?” And you actually take that paper out when it’s time to quilt. So all of the flowers, you stitch those together with the paper inside and then you remove the paper and you have your nice quilt topper.

Helen: Yeah, I feel like that’s the moment where you call all your friends over to help you remove the paper from your hexie quilt.

Daisy: Yes, I will definitely be doing that because it’s going to be, there’s, what’s 96 times 7?

Helen: Don’t do it. Don’t do the math, Daisy.

Daisy: 96 times 7 pieces of paper card to remove from the back of these flowers. So it’s going to be, that’s going to be a big one.

Caroline: Wow.

Helen: Yeah, they are a labour of love, but the result is so beautiful. And when you say that you’re sewing them together, you’re doing it by hand, right?

Daisy: Yeah. It’s been really meditative, actually, and just, you don’t even realize that you’re doing it after you really get started. I’ve just been watching Netflix or I’ll take it to, we went and watched our friends play music at a little pub and I just stitched away while they played.

Helen: Amazing.

Daisy: So you can kind of do it anywhere because they’re not so big.

Helen: Yeah, it’s true. They are really nice and portable. I’ve seen, like, lots of cool organizational, like, toolboxes for all the little hexies and stuff that you can really get creative with that part of it too. So all of them are Liberty prints and they look absolutely gorgeous. Do you have a method for how to combine them or are you just going totally random?

Daisy: I’m going totally random. At first I was following the advice of Robin from The Strawberry Thief. And she said, “Try to put dark hexie in the middle and then light hexies on the outside or vice versa,” or you could do a colour combination, but it’s all about balance. So trying to get warm colours, cool colours, dark hexies, light hexies. And I think when there’s a mixture of all of that in one flower, when they’re all put together into one quilt top, it will be really nice and balanced and scrappy and patchy. Cause that’s, that’s what I want. I want it to be a rainbow.

Helen: Yeah. Oh my gosh. It’s going to be amazing. I can’t wait to see it.

Daisy: I can’t wait to see it.

Caroline: You mentioned that your mantra for the year is to, kind of, use your supplies, like, you know, not let those things sort of sit around. I think on your Instagram, you sort of announced that 2024 is your year of DIY. Can you explain what that is?

Daisy: Have you ever heard about how people have a word that they set for the year? Like and it makes it…yeah?

Caroline: Yeah.

Daisy: So I did that last year. My word, I said a word, that was the first time I’ve ever done it. And you know what? It really helped me stay motivated to do what my word was. So as I came to the end of 2023, I started thinking, what could my word for next year be? And I came across that quote again, that “Stop hoarding your craft supplies and make something.” And I thought, you know what, this is going to be the year that I just make, I’m just going to make everything. So I decided to make my word “Do it yourself, DIY,” I guess it’s three words, but it applies to so many things. So for me, it’s…and it’s not just about making stuff and stop hoarding my craft supplies, but it’s also stop ordering Uber Eats and make your own dinner, because I will get into a craft spiral and I won’t want to get out of my studio. And I just want to keep sewing or I want to keep making. And so I’ll just order Uber Eats, but that is so lazy. So, yeah, so I guess it’s applying that word that you pick. In my case, I try to pick one that will apply to many areas of my life. And so this year, it’s all about using what I have. I have, I’ve collected a lot of craft supplies over the years and things that just sit in my cupboard because,”Oh, I’ll get to it one day,” or “I’ll get time to do that at some point.” And so I decided to sort of set myself this creative challenge, a personal creative challenge so that I could have a goal and sort of a schedule that I could try and stick to. And so my year of DIY kind of has a couple of subheadings. One of them is my gallery wall and to, to make something for my gallery wall every month.

I have a prompt word each month and that prompt word, it could be a crafty material, or it could be a type of crafting. So I’ve set those for each month of the year and it’s giving me kind of this direction. So I know in January, my focus is hexagons. So all I have to do is make stuff related to hexagons. In February, this month, it’s cardboard. So I’m going to try and do some projects that use cardboard because I have all these boxes lying around. I can make other things in the month as well, but essentially I want to use the things that I have in each of those months. So next month is beads, and I’ve been collecting beads because I have some ideas to make projects with beads.

And this has all sort of come from pitching a second book. So I pitched a second book and I went in a little bit of a different direction and I wanted it to be like DIY decor or kind of a follow-up to Sew It Yourself, but not clothing–making homewares and decor items. And unfortunately, they weren’t interested in that book, So I thought, “Well, I’ve got all these ideas. I’m just going to share them for free!” And a lot of the ideas that I’ve shared so far and the ones that I have for the rest of the year are from that pitch. But as I’ve been doing this year of DIY it’s like, because I’m flexing that creativity muscle or that DIY muscle, my creativity has been insane. I’ve opened up the floodgates or I’ve, I’ve come out of this…I was in this really big burnout after writing the book and it really took me a long time to feel like I wanted to create again. And I feel like finally I’m there and all of these ideas and new ideas that weren’t even on the pitch are just coming out of me. And so I have to let them keep flowing.

Helen: I absolutely love this. And you know that publisher is going to come crawling back in a year and be like, “I want to do it. Let’s do it.”

Caroline: It’s their loss. My goodness.

Daisy: But I think, I think I could put all of that stuff into a book and sell the book again, but one of the things that got me started as DIY Daisy and helped me grow to where I am now and even get that opportunity to share and to create Sew It Yourself in the first place was sharing those free resources. So now I’m just doing it more for, there’s no goal. I don’t want to put them into the form of a book. I just want to share this inspiration and these ideas so that it exists. And then anybody that wants them can get them for free. And if they inspire an idea for you, or if they encourage you to make a shadow shelfie or a whatever, or a hexie flower, or, or get interested in hexie quilting and English paper piecing, then my job is done. And it’s so rewarding to share those, those free resources. I’m sure you know, as well, like, when you give a list of where to buy cool fabrics or free sewing patterns, when you share that stuff and give people the tools that they need to start on a craft that you love so much, it’s so rewarding.

Caroline: Yeah, it is incredible. And can others join in on the challenge? Like, have you released your monthly prompts for the year? Is this something you’re encouraging?

Daisy: Yeah! At first I wasn’t really encouraging it. Like at first I just, I just wanted to do it for myself because I wanted to see if I could do it. But then people started saying, “Oh, I want to have a go.” And because I’m sharing the one tutorial for my gallery wall each month, there’s actually been more than one so far, but people have used a couple of them. And so, I’d say yes, you can definitely join in. The prompt list is on my story highlights and there are only two months that I don’t have prompts for. So that’s November and December, but I’ve got a while till I get there. I can figure out what those prompts might be. Yeah, so there’s, so next month is beads and the month after that is paint, so. There’s so many things you can paint, but I have a couple of fun and really easy projects in mind that use some found materials or things you might find at the thrift store or at the op shop. So hopefully it will become a thing and people might join in with me.

Caroline: Ooh, that’s so awesome. And this episode, we’re recording a little bit in advance, so this episode’s coming out in April, which: paint, right?

Daisy: Paint is April. So, I’ve actually been collecting all this furniture that I want to repaint as well. So there’s always going to be one project that goes on my gallery wall, but then there are other projects that fit into that prompt that also use paint. So stay tuned.

Helen: So fun. I love that you’re branching out into other things. And of course, your name, DIY Daisy, is just perfect for anything. Literally. Yeah. So good. Well, one of the other things we wanted to talk about a little bit is social media, because you do such a great job with your photos, your fun off-the-cuff videos. You’re very personable. And we sometimes hear from listeners that they’re having a hard time making social media content that maybe resonates with the sewing community or not really knowing how to interact with the new sewing community, as it were, very video-focused. What are your thoughts on that? Do you have any advice for folks out there?

Daisy: Yeah. It really has changed a lot since, since we started back in, well, I started back in 2016, I think it was, but it’s really changed the way that, I guess it’s to do with the algorithm and the fact that they really want videos. So I guess my advice would be to embrace it. Maybe you don’t want to talk on the, on video. That’s okay. Don’t talk. You can do a voiceover or you can just write a caption. I think whatever your goals are, so if your goal is to be a sewing content creator, then the way that you make content might be different. But if you just want to participate in the sewing community and connect with other people and get inspired or learn new things, then I don’t think you necessarily have to make video. Just share however feels comfortable for you. I would say, find somewhere that you can be consistent and take a photo of your garment or your finished project or find somewhere that you have good lighting so that you can set up your camera and film or ask a friend to film you. I always used to go, when I was out and about and I would see a colourful wall, I would ask a friend, “Oh, can you take a couple of photos of me in front of that colourful wall?” And that’s just how I captured those outfit shots. But if you want to be, like, a content creator and your goal is to work with brands or get some free fabric or something like that, then the way that you share content, your goals, should probably be different, which would be, I would say, you need to give something back to the sewing community. So I guess it could be inspiration or it could be resources and education or entertainment. It could be any, it could be any of those things. Yeah, it just depends what you want to be online,

Helen: Yeah, you really don’t have to be everything to everyone either. Like you said, if you don’t want to talk to the camera, you can do top-down videos showing tutorial content. If you have a strong sense of humour, a strong point of view, comedic timing, then yeah, maybe you’re more entertainment. If you really enjoy putting together outfits, you can be more inspiration-based, but there’s lots of different things you can do. And you’re so comfortable, it seems, in front of the camera. Have you always felt that ease or did that come with time?

Daisy: No, I started off, I would hear myself and go, “Ew, is that my voice?” But when we were in that lockdown time, I mean, I’ve always been, everyone will always say, “Daisy’s a little bit dramatic.” I’m very expressive. And dad always jokes, “Isn’t it lucky we sent you to drama class?” Like that’s, that’s like one of his running jokes. ‘Cause I’m apparently very, very, very dramatic. But when I started hearing myself talk on camera I was, I would cringe and I would think, “Is that what my voice sounds like?” But then I started just doing my op shop hauls on my stories and I would just practice and start to get more comfortable with what I sounded like and then it just sort of became a little bit more natural. But one thing that I always try to keep in mind and, an old friend shared this with me, is when you’re talking to your stories, pretend you’re talking to a really good friend or pretend you’re talking to your sister. So I will, the way that I do a story as if it’s, as if I’m speaking to my twin sister, Aurora, on FaceTime, so you’re kind of getting a sister chat, if I’m sharing on my stories. I’m just, I speak to my stories like I’m speaking to her and it comes out very naturally. And then I can listen back to it and think, “Oh, I don’t sound weird.”

Helen: I’ve never noticed you sounding weird, but no, I mean, even just doing this podcast, like it’s, I listen back to the episodes, not all of them, but it is so weird hearing your own voice and you, you cringe at all of the little things that nobody else notices.

Daisy: Exactly.

Caroline: It takes time to get used to it, I think. But once you like, it’s like muscle memory or I don’t know, like exposure therapy or something.

Daisy: Yeah. But it’s also practice, right? Because I, I remember I used to use a lot of filler words, and even now I’ll pick up on days where I’m using, obviously “and like” are filler words, but I’ll pick up on days where I say “you know” a lot, sometimes it happens because you might have a conversation with someone who uses those filler words quite a little bit more. And so then you, you subconsciously, it gets buried in your brain and you have to use those as well. So some days I’ll, I’ll hear myself using all these filler words and I’ll go, “Oh, what am I doing? Stop saying um!” And then other days I’m, I’m really having a good flow and I’m just talking like, like I’m a genius or something.

Helen: Yeah.

Caroline: I love it

Helen: You’re like, “I am nailing this.”

Daisy: Exactly.

Caroline: That was an excellent tip though. I’m, I’m going to use that because I find the hardest content to make is when I’m, I’m, you know, staring at the camera and talking to it and trying to connect with an audience. And thinking about talking to my sister or my friend, I feel like that would make it so much easier. So I’m going to try that.

Daisy: It really does. Yeah.

Caroline: So what’s next for DIY Daisy, other than this huge challenge that you’re doing this year?

Daisy: Well, I think that’s kind of it. Like, I just want to get through this year and know that I’ve created and I’ve shared. It’s bringing me a lot of joy by just creating and seeing other people enjoy what I’m making. That’s always been what my, my goal is. I just want to be happy and I just want to have a happy, colourful, creative life. And I want to experience lots of things that other people have made as well. So I don’t have any plans to write another book. I don’t have any plans to go on any adventures. I’m just, I sort of like, I’m focusing on my work and I really love my work as well. And I’m just, I don’t know. I just, I want to cook more. I want to make more and connect more. And that’s, that’s kind of all my goal is right now. Nothing else. Oh, and actually I want to grow some flowers. I’m growing flowers.

Caroline: Ooh!

Helen: Ooh! That’s very on-brand. No, gardening is amazing. I absolutely love growing flowers.

Caroline: Well, we can’t wait to follow along with you on your creating and making journey over the next year and beyond. Can you tell our listeners where they can find you online, where they can follow along?

Daisy: So I’m @_diydaisy on Instagram and TikTok and I’m diydaisy.com.

Caroline: Amazing. And if you want to check out Daisy’s book, it’s called Sew It Yourself. And yeah, we’ll link all of this up in the show notes. Thank you so much for coming on the show, Daisy. It was such a pleasure.

Daisy: Thanks for having me.

Caroline: Bye.

Helen: Thank you. Take care. Bye.

That’s it for today’s episode of Love to Sew. You can find me, Helen, at Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co. and Caroline at Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns. We’re recording in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.

Caroline: You can support Love to Sew and get access to bonus content by subscribing on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. You even get access to the back catalogue of bonus episodes. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew. Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or check out our podcast page on Apple Podcasts for more info.

Helen: Head to lovetosewpodcast.com to find our show notes. They’re filled with links and pictures from this episode. If you’d like to get in touch with us, leave us a message at 1-844-SEW-WHAT. That’s 1-844-739-9428 or send us an email at [email protected].

Caroline: Thank you to our amazing podcast team. Lisa Ruiz is our creative assistant, Jordan Moore of The Pod Cabin is our editor. And thank you for listening. We’ll talk to you next week.

Helen: Bye bye!

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We love overalls and jumpsuits! In this episode, we talk about choosing the right style for you, matching it with the perfect fabric, and the pattern adjustments that are super important for these all-in-one garments. Plus: indie patterns, installing hardware, and more! And in the listener question section, we give some gift ideas for the sewist who has everything.

The transcript for this episode is on this page at the end of the show notes.

Show Notes: 

From the Listener Questions Section:

Previous Episodes Mentioned:

Some of Helen and Caroline’s Jumpsuits and Overalls:

Resources:

Sewing Patterns:

Tools and Notions:

Transcript:

Helen: We are recording today on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish and Kwakwaka’wakw peoples, including Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, Musqueam, and K’ómoks first nations.

Hello and welcome to Love to Sew. I’m Helen, the designer behind Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co.

Caroline: And I’m Caroline, the owner of Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns.

Helen: We’re two sewing buds who love to sew and it’s all we know how to talk about.

Caroline: And in today’s episode, we cover both overalls and jumpsuits. We talk about choosing the right style for you and matching it with the perfect fabric. We also chat about the kinds of adjustments that are super important for these all-in-one garments and how to know if you need them. Plus, indie patterns, installing hardware, and more.

Helen: If you love to sew, this is your show.

Hi Caroline.

Caroline: Hi Helen, how are you?

Helen: I’m good, thanks. How are you?

Caroline: I’m good. I have to say, I, I kind of see you as like, the queen of overalls, and by extension, jumpsuits.

Helen: I know, and I love, love, love both of those garments and pinafores, which we’ll mention today a little bit as well. But I love a bib, I guess, is the takeaway.

Caroline: Yeah. She loves a bib, everyone.

Helen: She loves a bib. And you know, we don’t have a jumpsuit pattern in the Helen’s Closet collection yet, but I do want to mention that there’s one coming your way soon.

Caroline: Oh my gosh, exciting. I can’t wait for the world to see this pattern. It is gorgeous.

Helen: Thank you. Yes. I’m so, so pumped. And Caroline, I know you love a jumpsuit as well, and I can’t believe we haven’t covered this in an episode yet. So this is going to be fun.

Caroline: I do love a jumpsuit. I love an overall. I mean, what’s not to love, really? But I guess we will get into it. There maybe are some things not to love.

Helen: This is going to be a very pro overalls and jumpsuits episode. Okay. We’re going to kick things off today with a question. This question comes from Scott. “Hello, Helen and Caroline. My wife is an avid seamstress/sewing person? and also an avid listener of your podcast. She sews almost all her own clothing and has made quilts for all of our nieces and nephews. Five birthday quilts, one wedding quilt, and a sixth coming up for our nephew that’s old enough to decide what he’s into. I know she has bought both fabric and patterns from you. But getting to the point, I’m not a sewer and I’m in need of gift ideas for my wife’s big birthday. She’s a leap year baby, so this February 29th, she turns both 10 and 40. What sewing gift do you give someone who already has all the equipment they need to continue their sewing hobby and enough fabric to last them a lifetime? Long arm machine is a no-go. We don’t have the space for that bad mamma jamma.”

Caroline: Oh my gosh, wouldn’t that be amazing? I love this question. Thank you so much, Scott. I definitely have some ideas. Actually, as you were reading this email back, I was like, “Oh, I need to add this idea and this idea.” But first, we want to wish Scott’s wife JJ a belated happy birthday.

Helen: I know, 10 years old already?

Caroline: Oh my gosh, where did the years go? You’ve gotten so tall, JJ.

Helen: But seriously, it sounds like you’ve accomplished so much, all those quilts and clothes, and of course it sounds like you really love sewing, which we are always a fan of. So I think we’d get along.

Caroline: I think so too. Okay, I think we should get to some gift ideas because we have quite the list today. It sounds like she probably has everything she needs to sew. So let’s talk about some unique tools and maybe upgrades that she might want.

Helen: Yes, a beautiful tailor’s clapper or seam ripper from TimberNotions would be so nice. They’re handmade from lots of different hardwoods. And even if she has one of these already, having this, like, custom handmade wooden version of it makes it extra special.

Caroline: Whipstitch Handmade has really fun quilting rulers. Some of these are iridescent, some have rainbow confetti or gold flakes in them. These are so cute.

Helen: So fun! A pair of quality scissors like 8” dressmaker shears by Gingher or Kai are great. These can last a lifetime. Also, LDH has some really fun scissors, again with the iridescence and the cool colours. Thread snips or embroidery scissors by those companies are nice too. You really can’t have too many pairs of snips, in my opinion.

Caroline: It’s so true. And I feel like every sewist has, like, a different type of snip that they prefer, so a nice little assortment is always a good idea.

Helen: Yeah.

Caroline: The Pattern Magic Books by Tomoko Nakamichi are such a great resource for advanced sewists. They’re all about manipulating patterns to create special effects.

Helen: They are just really fun to browse through too. I have them in my collection. I have not yet attempted any of it, but I love looking at it. A set of Gutermann or Mettler thread is always nice. Then she has a bunch to choose from without having to stop by a craft store. Some sets even come in really cute little gift boxes. Again, you can never have too much thread.

Caroline: Jen Hogg, who was on the Great British Sewing Bee, has some really cool notions in her shop. Our fave is the seam circles. They’re, like, little wooden circles that help you add or subtract seam allowance accurately.

Helen: Ooh, very cool. If you have a bigger ticket gift in mind, we have a few ideas. If she doesn’t have a serger yet, getting one as a gift could be a total game changer. We both have the Juki MO654DE. We talked about it on the show many times. We both absolutely love it. And it’s a relatively affordable machine. It comes in around 5 or 600 bucks.

Caroline: Yeah, and a dress form is also a super nice thing to have, especially if she’s interested in making her own patterns or draping. You’re just going to make sure you get something that is her size or a similar size.

Helen: Mmhmm. Or at least, you know, exchangeable.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: If you really want to knock her socks off, a trip to somewhere like Camp Workroom Social would be a dream gift for a sewist. And what an amazing gift to receive. That would be so special.

Caroline: Yes! I did think of another little small ticket item that I think would be so cute. Like, a pack of labels, potentially, would be really cute. Something to add a little bit of flourish to a garment. Also, Kylie and the Machine has those amazing magnetic pin dishes that I think make amazing gifts, so that would be a good option too.

Helen: Oh, there are so many good ones. I mean, buttons as well. There’s so many cute buttons. And I know from the outside looking in, it may seem like us sewists already have everything we need, but we do love having multiples of things or different versions of things or just fun versions of things. So don’t be shy if you’re listening. Maybe someone sent this to you encouraging you to get them a gift. Just go for it. They’ll probably love anything you get them if it’s related to this beautiful hobby.

Caroline: I love it. I wish it was my birthday. I need to bookmark this part of the episode and send it to a few people.

Helen: Yes, everyone needs to send this to their loved ones to give them ideas.

Caroline: Okay, I think it’s time to stop dreaming about prezzies and get into the show!

Helen: Overall, I think this episode’s gonna be a blast.

Caroline: Yes, Helen, let’s jump right in!

Helen: Okay, overalls and jumpsuits are related. I mean, they both have a pair of pants as the base and include a top part as part of it, but they can be really different, too. Like, a pair of canvas overalls is pretty far away from a flowy silk jumpsuit, style-wise. But even for those two garments, the fitting advice has some similar things. And that’s why we’re going to cover them both in this episode. So we can talk a little bit about how to fit the whole body, head to toe.

Caroline: Yes, let’s cover what the difference is between them. So, in general, overalls are more casual, they’re made with heavier fabrics, and they have a bib rather than a full top. In general, jumpsuits tend to be dressier, they’re made of lighter weight fabrics, and they have a full top. But there are exceptions and overlaps. Like a boiler suit is made of heavier weight fabric, it’s more casual, but it has a full top. And there are some overalls that are made of lightweight, drapey fabrics and have gathers and stuff.

Helen: Yeah, there’s definitely middle ground. And there’s lots of different names for these garments too. So here are some to keep in mind when you’re searching for patterns or inspo online. British people usually say “dungarees” when they’re talking about what we would call “overalls” here in Canada and the United States and I’m pretty sure Australia. But they have dungarees in Australia, right? Is that a different thing down there?

Caroline: Yeah, I don’t know. Somebody let us know.

Helen: Let us know down under what’s going on with the dungarees.

Caroline: We just talked about boilersuits. They’re also called coveralls or flight suits. These are utility-style garments that have a full shirt and full pants and they are traditionally worn for work like painting, gardening, or working on cars. They can be very utilitarian or a bit more fashion-y. I have to say, I love the term “flight suit.” It just makes me feel like a pilot when I wear it.

Helen: Absolutely. I also love “boilersuit.” It makes me feel like a really hardcore mechanic, which is awesome.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: There’s also rompers, onesies, and playsuits. These are usually not those workwear style garments, hence the more cutesy style names.

Caroline: What? You don’t think I can fix a car in a onesie?

Helen: I mean, I call my little, like, boilersuit onesie that I have in my garage for doing yard work and stuff, I call it a onesie. So, again, it’s all, like, mixed together.

Caroline: Sometimes overalls that have shorts are called shortalls.

Helen: There’s also bodysuits, catsuits, and unitards, and those are names for tightly fitted stretch jumpsuits.

Caroline: Yeah. Another one that I love: a catsuit. Like, who could put on a catsuit and not feel bomb? Incredible.

Helen: I know, they’re so fun. I’ve never made a catsuit, but now I want to.

Caroline: Yeah. Well, whatever you call them, jumpsuits and overalls are very popular in the sewing community. They make a big visual impact because they cover you in a big swath of fabric. And they feel a bit unexpected and very stylish.

Helen: You can find overalls and jumpsuit patterns to suit many different skill levels, but in general I think they tend to be an intermediate to even an advanced sewing project, just because they can be a bit challenging to fit and you’re dealing with a top and a bottom in one, so typically there’s details involved that make it more of an intermediate sew.

Caroline: With that said, sewing your own jumpsuit or pair of overalls is a great idea because you can fit them to your body, and it’s notoriously difficult to find a ready-to-wear jumpsuit that fits well. I can attest to that. I have yet to find one.

Helen: I know, it’s so challenging, and with online shopping being so ubiquitous these days, like, good luck buying a jumpsuit online that arrives and fits you. I mean, come on. Of course, we do need to mention a couple of drawbacks to overalls and jumpsuits. The first being going to the washroom. I mean, if you’re wearing a jumpsuit, you pretty much have to use the bathroom topless. And sometimes with overalls, you have to undo the straps and then they fall down behind you and it’s, like, a whole thing. So just putting it out there, it’s a little awkward.

Caroline: Is there anything more terrifying than being in the washroom when you’re wearing a jumpsuit, which is around your ankles, you’re fully naked, and then someone tries the door? Like, has that ever happened to you? I don’t think I’ve ever jumped so high.

Helen: It is very, like…

Caroline: It’s just an immediate like, “Oh!”

Helen: You’re so vulnerable when you don’t have any clothes on in a public washroom. Like, it feels so wrong.

Caroline: Like, jump scare of the century. We also have to mention wedgies. It’s a risk. It’s a risk.

Helen: It’s a risk. And even if you get a pair of overalls or jumpsuit fitting you perfectly, you still might end up with a bit of a wedgie as the day goes on, when you’re walking around, or maybe to get that perfect fit in the waist and the torso and the legs, you ended up with a little bit of a wedgie. It’s really hard to make that perfect balance. So wedgies are kind of a part of the package deal, unfortunately.

Caroline: Can I add another one, on the fly? My jumpsuit that I love, my Blanca Flight Suit. It’s really hard to get out of.

Helen: Oh.

Caroline: That zipper goes all the way to my crotch and I still, when I first started wearing it, needed literal help to get out of it when I went to the bathroom. Like, Natasha had to come into the bathroom with me and pull it off of my body.

Helen: Oh my gosh. Do you think that if you’d made it like a size up, like a little looser, it’d be easier to get out of? Or is it more about the closures?

Caroline: Yeah, it’s definitely like, a slim fit and it’s like getting it off the shoulders and arms that was the hardest. Yeah, I think maybe if I had, I don’t know, maybe I could make an adjustment next time, but who knows if I’ll, I’ll ever be making another one.

Helen: You just have to imagine you’re a beautiful butterfly trying to emerge from your cocoon and you’re, like, wiggling out of the jumpsuit.

Caroline: But it’s, like, just to use the washroom, so it doesn’t feel very, like, cocoon-y. I just want to pee.

Helen: No, it’s an excellent point because if you have any mobility issues or maybe you’re a wheelchair user, overalls and jumpsuits can be a little bit trickier to get on and off. So that’s a consideration for sure.

Caroline: Yeah, you could get the look of a jumpsuit without these drawbacks by making a faux jumpsuit. Just choose a top and pants pattern and make them from the same fabric. And as a bonus, you’ll have more versatility in your wardrobe since you can pair the top and bottoms with different garments.

Helen: Another option would be to take a jumpsuit pattern and finish the top and pants separately, so you’re kind of chopping it in half. You probably would need to alter the waistband for the pants, or maybe add one, and you might want to be able to tuck in the top, so you could lengthen it at the hem. Although a crop top could look really cool with a faux jumpsuit as well. I’m a huge fan of a faux jumpsuit, and the Gilbert Top is, like, the perfect topper for a faux jumpsuit. And then you put like an elastic waist pant on the bottom. You’ve got yourself, like, wearable pajamas for outside. So good.

Caroline: Helen, I love this because I know that you are working on a Gilbert with an elastic waist pant faux jumpsuit as we speak.

Helen: I am. Head to toe in one of the Blackbird Fabrics exclusive prints. Y’all might remember this one. It’s, like, a black base with these bold white squiggles all over it. And I’m doing Gilbert on top and June on the bottom, our June Pants. So I think it’s going to be so cute. And it will be done by the time this episode comes out. So we’ll have a picture for y’all.

Caroline: Yes, it’s gonna be chef’s kiss. I cannot wait.

Helen: Yeah, me too.

Caroline: And honourable mention goes to pinafores. I feel like I had to put this in there, since we’re talking about all these different styles, because if you like the look of an overall, I feel like a pinafore is like an overall, but in dress form. And we really love them. So maybe you can dip your toes and try a pinafore first.

Helen: Dip your toes. You know, you don’t have to take it off fully to go to the bathroom and you don’t get a wedgie. So it’s really kind of amazing.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: All right. Let’s get into the nitty gritty of overalls first, and then we’ll talk a bit more about jumpsuits later. The style range for overalls is pretty wide. You can make utility-style ones from denim with all the top stitching and rivets. Or you could make midweight ones in linen for a sleeker look. And you can even make lightweight and flowy ones that look quite dressy.

Caroline: Overalls are for anyone who wants to wear them. They are not for a certain age, gender, size, etc. If you want to wear overalls, you go for it.

Helen: Yeah, I want to share a story here because my mother-in-law, Laurie, who some of you may recognize from some of our blog posts and Instagram posts, she absolutely loves wearing overalls. And she’s made the Yanta Overalls and the Ruby Overalls and she wears them all the time and she gets so many compliments from people around her age saying how much they love them too, but, “Oh, I could never wear them. Oh, you’re so brave to wear those overalls,” that kind of thing. And she always encourages them that “No, no, no, it’s okay. Like, we’re allowed to wear overalls too. They’re not just for kids or not just for young folks.” And I really love that she’s encouraging other people. And I get it. If something’s outside your style comfort zone, it can be really hard to wrap your head around trying it. But we do want to just emphasize that if you want to try wearing overalls, of course, you’re allowed to wear overalls. There are no rules for who’s allowed to wear whatever.

Caroline: Mm hmm. It’s so true. I say go for it. And if you’re thinking about trying out an overalls pattern, here are some elements to think about when you’re shopping around. First up, you want to think about how you want your overalls to fit. Are you looking for a fitted waist or a relaxed waist? Some overalls have a waistband, others have elastic or a drawstring cinching it. Relaxed waist options skim over the waist, going in one piece from the bib down to the pants hem.

Helen: And speaking of the pants, how do you want the leg to fit? Pretty much every pant leg is represented in overalls patterns. You can get wide, tapered, straight, skinny, flares, even full-on bell bottoms. Tons of fun options to choose from.

Caroline: And you also want to think about, what length do you want? Do you want long pants? Do you want them to be a little bit cropped? Do you want to make yourself a pair of shortalls?

Helen: Shortalls! I know, is it “short alls” or is it “shortles?”

Caroline: I think shortles is actually a lot cuter, but I feel like maybe harder to understand.

Helen: Shortles sounds like a Pokémon to me.

Caroline: Yeah, it does. I was gonna say, I feel like if you’re unsure about what length you want, especially if it’s your first time making overalls, I would go long and then shorten as needed. Because I find with overalls, I almost have to end up making them longer than I think I do. ‘Cause when you’re bending and sitting, everything sort of rides up. And I like my pants to be long enough. So just don’t risk it.

Helen: I agree. And if you’re worried about stepping into that more juvenile territory, then avoid the shortles, because that definitely gives it a little bit more of that playful romper style.

Caroline: I don’t know what makes you think that. “Shortles” sounds very adult to me.

Helen: Shortles! Shortles! Okay, you can also think about how you want your overalls to function. So are you making these for work or are you making them purely for fashion? Like, I love having overalls for gardening. I have a pair dedicated to gardening. So whenever I’m going out in my garden, I just throw them on. I actually have two pairs because I have a pants pair and a shorts pair depending on how warm it is outside. Caroline, I know you have some work overalls, right?

Caroline: I love having overalls for pottery. I have my Yantas that I wear all the time when I’m doing pottery. I also have something like a WIP that I don’t care to admit is still a WIP, but it’s another pair of Yantas that I was making for pottery that are so cute. Why are they…why are they in the sad pile?

Helen: Our next sewing date, you got to finish those. Are those the cream ones?

Caroline: Yeah, the cream ones with the patches. Yeah.

Helen: I think cream is a great choice for work overalls. It might seem, like, counterintuitive, because of course they’re going to get dirty. But that’s kind of the beauty of it, especially if you’re doing something like painting or pottery. That, like, visual display of your work on your body is really kind of cool. People do love to wear overalls for things like crafting, painting, woodworking, even working on job sites. If you have a job that involves you going to job sites, overalls can be a great option for something you can make for yourself that you can also wear to work.

Caroline: Yes. And the kinds of overalls that I would wear to a job site are maybe different from the ones that I would wear for a barbecue or a cute date. They have to be roomy enough for me to have a full range of motion. They have to be heavy enough so that they won’t wear out quickly. And they definitely have to be machine washable and dryable.

Helen: Yeah, and overalls that aren’t for work are gonna have very different parameters. Like, I wouldn’t worry as much about them holding up with wear. And you could choose patterns made for lighter weight, maybe drapier, softer, comfy fabrics.

Caroline: And I would say that’s not necessarily, like, a hard-and-fast rule, because I feel like sometimes, a pair of, like, hard-wearing, cool, heavy-duty overalls could look really cool for like, everyday fashion and doesn’t necessarily have to be used for work. But I wouldn’t necessarily go the other way around. Like, I wouldn’t wear a pair of linen overalls to do gardening, you know?

Helen: Yeah, they might just get worn out and ripped in the knees and things like that. It’s much better to use, like, a denim or canvas in that situation.

Caroline: Yeah.

Helen: Okay, well, we have a lot of indie patterns that we want to recommend today. You know, I love wearing overalls, as I mentioned, and we do have two patterns over at Helen’s Closet. We have the Yanta Overalls, which are a little looser in the waist and more of that workwear style-inspired. And then we have the Ruby Overalls, which are more cinched in the waist with a bit of elastic. And those ones are really fun because you can make them in drapey fabrics. I’ve made them in Tencel twill and they just feel so good. You get that leg drape, that swish when you walk, and then the bib is really comfy. And so we have enough variety there for you to make whatever kind of style you’re looking for.

Caroline: Yeah, and the Yanta overalls, you made Sam a pair, right?

Helen: Yes, I did. I have a whole blog post about how I adjusted them for him, because he’s quite tall and he had some specific requirements that he wanted for his workwear Yantas. So we have a blog post up about that where I shared all the muslins that I made and all the adjustments I made to make them work for him.

Caroline: Love it. They turned out so cool. And the Yantas go up to a 58” hip, if anyone’s wondering, and the Ruby overalls go to a 62” hip.

Helen: Yes.

Caroline: The Erin Dungarees by Tilly and the Buttons are super cute. You can choose between straps that tie into bows at the shoulders or straps that end in a knot, which you thread through buttonholes. They have a slim fit, tapered legs, and princess seams on the bib. And these ones go up to a 61” hip.

Helen: The Riley Overalls by True Bias have a slouchy fit and a traditional style with lots of jeans details, top stitching, belt loops, jeans buttons, sliders, and clasps on the strap. And speaking of the straps, they cross over in such a beautiful way at the back. And this pattern goes up to a 61” hip.

Caroline: Huge fan of these overalls. These are definitely on my, like, dream to-make list. Although they feel quite intimidating with all those jeans details.

Helen: You can totally do it. One step at a time, we always say.

Caroline: I know, I need that pep talk. The Sloane Overalls by Victory Patterns are almost like a jumpsuit because the top is a square neck bodice with princess seams. It fits really closely. The pants have a slim fit and a tapered leg and the best part is the long exposed zipper down the center. And these overalls go to a 48.5” hip.

Helen: These ones, it’s my turn to say, are on my list, Caroline, and I am intimidated by the fitting aspect of these, but once you nail that fit, holy moly are these ever sexy and cool. They look so good.

Caroline: They’re so chic, right? Yeah, I would not be doing gardening in these. Just, I feel like you wouldn’t have that range of movement.

Helen: No, these are, like, you wear to, like, a gathering with your friends when you know your ex is going to be there.

Caroline: Yeah, absolutely.

Helen: Okay, the Pincha Overalls by Ready to Sew are a cross between overalls and an apron. They have an intentionally very wide waist with ties at the side, so you can pull it to the front and tie it closed. Gives them a very sculptor-in-the-studio look. And they go up to a 61.8” hip.

Caroline: Yeah, I was gonna say, these would be perfect for, like, if you’re a painter or even, I think, pottery would work for this because you really get that range of motion with the sort of pleat-y things on the side. They’re very cool. And the Burnside Bibs by Sew House 7 have a sleek, almost minimalist look. They have slim straps that cross over and thread through belt loops at the back waist to cinch them. They go to a 65” hip. I feel like the Burnside Bibs are like a cult favourite pattern in the sewing community. They’ve been around for so long. I see so many sewists wearing this pattern. It’s definitely beginner-friendly. I think it’s very cool. It has stood the test of time. Still would love to make it.

Helen: Yeah, and I think fitting-wise, it’s a little easier because it does cinch in with that, like, tightening of the strap. So not only do you get to customize where it sits on your shoulders, but you also get to customize how much of a cinch you want at your waist.

Caroline: Yeah. Okay, so: fabrics. The style of your pattern is probably gonna dictate what kinds of fabrics to use. You want to check out the suggested fabric section of the pattern instructions to see what ones will give the best results.

Helen: Overalls that are more traditional workwear style will pair well with medium to heavy bottomweight fabrics. We’re talking denim, twill, canvas, and corduroy.

Caroline: Avoid stretch denims unless your pattern recommends them. You can end up with overalls that fit you in the morning and that are way too big in the evening.

Helen: If your overalls have any gathers, drawstrings, elasticated sections, or ties, medium weight fabrics will work best. Woven linens and lighter cotton twills are a good choice. If you go into that denim/canvas territory with the heavier weights, you’re going to have a hard time threading things like elastic through those casings or making those smaller drawstring elements.

Caroline: A lot of times there’s a range of fabric weights that will work for the same pattern. You just want to be aware of the pros and cons of each choice. For example, heavier weight fabrics will hold up better with a lot of use. They will look best in overall patterns that are more structured, but they’re less comfortable than lighter weight fabrics.

Helen: Lighter weight fabrics are more flexible, which makes them more comfortable, but they can make structured overalls look a little sad and droopy. So if there’s not a lot of structure to the garment pattern, then things can kind of start to sag.

Caroline: Mmhmm. And you get to decide what balance to strike. It kind of depends on the pattern too. A lot of indie pattern companies are happy to give fabric advice for their patterns. So feel free to DM or email them to ask if the fabric you’re thinking of will work or not.

Helen: Totally. And one last piece of fabric advice from my personal experience: It is really tempting to choose, like, a really fun or bold colour for overalls. I mean, ask me how I know, honestly, but I don’t know why, for some reason, it just feels like the right thing to do. And you’re making something so fun, like a pair of overalls. I personally gravitate to those fun colours and bold prints, but the wacky overalls in my closet just do not get worn that much. There are a few sewists out there who would rock them regularly, but for the majority of us, neutral overalls are going to be worn way more often. So nowadays I would choose like a classic denim, black, navy, olive green, even cream, and maybe save the pop of colour for the top that I’m pairing with it or the accessories and let the overalls be a neutral.

Caroline: Yeah, I feel like you could also throw in a pop of colour if there’s, like, a lining on the bib or pocket lining or something, or even with the buttons.

Helen: Yeah. And I don’t want to deter anybody because I’ve seen some absolutely incredible floral, amazing overalls and things like that and they can be so much fun. And if that’s your style, then obviously go for it, but that’s my two cents.

Caroline: From the queen of overalls. Let’s move on to sewing overalls because we definitely have some tips. And first and maybe the most important tip that we have would be to make a muslin. If you wouldn’t sew pants without making a muslin, you don’t want to sew overalls without making one. and if you need help with pants fitting we do talk a lot about that in Episode 184, which we will link in the show notes for you.

Helen: Yeah, when the pattern piece is one big long piece, meaning it goes from the top of the bib to the hem of the pants, making adjustments can be a bit weird. And it’s hard to look at tutorials for how to do adjustments and translate that into your pattern that involves both the pieces put together. So this is why making a muslin is so important because it gives you room to experiment. We mentioned Sam’s Yanta overalls before, and I did a lot of experimenting getting the right fit. And it was a really fun process that in the end resulted in a pair of overalls that fits him perfectly. So it was so, so worth it.

Caroline: Bust fit is less of an issue with overalls, but you still might need to lengthen or widen the bib to get the right fit. With a larger bust there’s more chance of a gaping bib along the top edge. This is hard to avoid. The best thing is to try to keep the strap attachment points from being too far apart, which makes the gaping more pronounced.

Helen: Yeah, exactly. Again, the muslin is going to help you fit the bust area. You can add length and width to accommodate a larger bust. But ultimately, like, it has to go over your bust and you might find that your breasts are kind of spilling out over the sides or you have that gaping along the top. So tweaking it and trimming it until it’s absolutely perfect and then moving ahead is the way to go. Working with heavyweight fabric can be tough if you’ve never done it before, so use a jeans needle or a heavier weight all-purpose needle.

Caroline: You also want to lengthen your stitch length slightly when you’re sewing with a really heavy fabric and potentially reduce your tension. Definitely play around with your machine on some scrap fabric.

Helen: When you reach those really bulky areas, you can use a hump jumper or a jean-a-ma-jig, or just several pieces of cardboard under the back of your foot so that it stays level when you’re starting a seam. A needle case also works really well for this if you have one kicking around, one of those cases that carries your machine needles.

Caroline: And you can use a lighter weight fabric on the facings if you want. This is a great place to use up your woven cotton scraps.

Helen: Yeah, and it’s so cute too. A little pop of lining just for you.

Caroline: Love it.

Helen: There’s also overalls hardware, which might seem intimidating, but if you can sew overalls, you can definitely add those strap sliders and clasps. Don’t be scared. And people will be shocked to learn that you did it yourself. Just make sure you tell them that it’s really hard to do and, like, you’re kind of a big deal.

Caroline: There is something about adding like overalls hardware or jeans hardware to a make like this that just, like, takes it over the edge from looking more homemade to looking more professional, ready-to-wear finish. So definitely a way to, like, up your sewing game a little bit.

Helen: Yeah, and they’re really not that hard to install. Like, the button is the hardest part, and then the slider you just slide right on there. So maybe a little bulky, but you can, you can wrestle it on there.

Caroline: And jeans buttons and rivets are a little bit more challenging maybe than overalls hardware, but still definitely doable. You just need a hammer and a hard surface that won’t be damaged by the hammering. The back of a cast iron skillet works really well. Or you can get the cutest little anvil for your sewing room. They are adorable and small and I love them so much. We sell them at Blackbird. You can also get overalls hardware and jeans hardware and all that stuff at Blackbird.

Helen: Oh, you know what? That should have been on our gift list at the top of the show. Mini anvil?

Caroline: It’s true! Oh my gosh, mini anvil! I could make a whole business just talking about anvils, to be honest.

Helen: Love to Anvil. Okay, most overalls patterns can be hacked into a pinafore, as we mentioned earlier. Such a cute look. Adding a skirt can be as simple as slashing the pattern where you want the waist to be and adding a rectangle of gathered fabric. Or you could mash up the pattern with a skirt pattern that you like. Keep in mind that this will be easiest for loose fitting overalls and skirt patterns. You can still do it with more fitted styles, but you’ll need to add closures potentially, like a button or a zipper. And the side seams are a good place to put that. We have an article on our blog about how to make a ruby overalls pinafore and it’s quite simple to take the legs and just chop off that crotch curve and make a skirt.

Caroline: Cute. Okay, one last thing before we move on to jumpsuits. Be prepared to get a lot of compliments because people love overalls.

Helen: Oh my gosh, do they ever. I swear, every time I wear my Yanta Overalls out in public, somebody asks me where I bought them. Every time. It’s amazing.

Caroline: I love it.

Helen: Yeah, you will get so many compliments, which just makes it all the more worth it.

Caroline: Okay, it’s time for a break. And when we return: jumpsuits!

Love to Sew is made possible by listeners like YOU! We are so grateful for the support of our amazing patrons and subscribers. If you love Love to Sew and you want to help support the pod, we have a new option for you.

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Caroline: So, what are the bonus episodes? Well, we do a chatty catch-up on what’s been happening in our lives, share about the realities of running a small business, discuss new indie pattern releases, and talk about what we’re sewing right now! Many of our subscribers say these fun bonus episodes are their favourite, and if you subscribe, you get access to the full back catalogue. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew! We also do a mini-episode that deep dives into a specific topic. We get to discuss so many fun sewing techniques and answer specific subscriber questions about sewing!

Helen: And we are still on Patreon! If you subscribe over there you can get access to the bonus episodes, behind-the-scenes photos, and a special 15% off discount code at our superfan patron tier. That discount applies at Helen’s Closet, Cedar Quilt Co., Blackbird Fabrics, and BF patterns. If you shop with us regularly, it basically pays for itself!

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Helen: Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or visit our show’s page in the apple podcast app to become a paid subscriber. Thank you to all of our listeners, patrons and subscribers – you’re the best!

Caroline: We’re back with jumpsuits. Let’s talk about it.

Helen: Yes, let’s talk about it. Jumpsuits also run the gamut when it comes to fit, function, and fabric. There’s so many options out there, from oversized mechanic-style boilersuits to flowy, beautiful rayon playsuits. And there are even knit jumpsuits, the ultimate in comfort.

Caroline: Jumpsuits can make an excellent special occasion outfit. They’re great for performing on stage, attending a wedding, or going to Frocktails or prom. It’s a cool opportunity to use a unique fabric or a large-scale print. Just like overalls, people love jumpsuits. You’re going to get all the compliments.

Helen: Yes. I love wearing a jumpsuit to a wedding. Slightly unexpected, and you’re even more comfortable. It’s just the best.

Caroline: I know! You kind of feel like the coolest person there, I feel like, when you’re wearing a jumpsuit and everyone else is wearing a dress.

Helen: Yeah, or just like, anytime you’re wearing a jumpsuit, the coolness factor is upped for sure.

Caroline: Yeah, definitely.

Helen: Okay, so here’s some options to think about when you’re shopping for a jumpsuit pattern. Do you want the fit to be tight or loose? A super fitted jumpsuit is going to be a little more challenging to fit, but it can be such a showstopper. A looser jumpsuit that maybe cinches at the waist with an elastic will be better if you’re in the mood for a quick project, and it will also be super comfy to wear.

Caroline: Do you want sleeves or would you prefer a tank style? Shorts or pants? Elastic waist, fitted waist, loose waist? All questions you should be asking.

Helen: Yes, and some patterns even have multiple options, which is nice, like a pants view and a shorts view, or maybe sleeved and sleeveless. So you can make one view this summer and the next view next summer.

Caroline: Yeah. Here are some indie jumpsuit patterns to think about. The Zadie Jumpsuit by Paper Theory is the perfect combo of relaxed and chic. This one has a wrap bodice and closes with a tie belt, so you don’t have to worry about zippers or buttons. I’ve seen so many gorgeous versions of this one on Instagram. Definitely check out the hashtag. I would call this another sewing community cult favourite. It goes up to a 57.5” hip. I feel like this pattern works so well for different styles. Like you can make it in a gorgeous viscose print and wear it to a wedding. You can make it in linen and wear it on a Saturday. Like, it runs the gamut.

Helen: Absolutely. I am a huge fan of this pattern. I’ve made many and it’s just so comfortable. I really, really enjoy this one. We’ve talked about the Blanca Flight Suit a little bit by Closet Core. This one has more of that boilersuit vibe. It has a collar, it’s got set-in sleeves, a zip down the front, plus all this great top stitching details, porkchop pockets, and a self fabric belt. I love the details on this one. It goes up to a 63” hip.

Caroline: The Nova Jumpsuit by True Bias is a knit tank jumpsuit. You can cinch it with elastic at the waist or you can leave it loose. This is the ultimate in loungewear and it goes up to a 59.5” hip.

Helen: Another personal favourite of mine is the Amy Jumpsuit by Closet Core. This one is like secret pants. Because it’s like a flowy tank with really wide legs. If you’re standing still someone might mistake it for a dress. But then you start walking and the pants start flowing and it’s just so gorgeous. You can belt it or leave it loose. It’s a really nice one for dressing up and a great one for going on vacation. This one goes up to a 48” hip.

Caroline: The Tate Romper, this is a newer pattern by Small Museum and Jessilou’s Closet. This is so fun. It has a bandeau bodice and spaghetti straps and then big gathered pant legs. It’s cuter than I’m making it sound. I think this one could be casual in a linen gingham or dressy in, like, a solid Tencel twill. It goes up to a 65” hip. It’s super trendy. I don’t know, I’ve been seeing this style of romper all over the place and I’ve seen some amazing versions in the sewing community. It’s a really cool pattern.

Helen: Yeah, this one, like, blew up last summer and I feel like this summer is going to be even more versions of this one. It’s very popular and it’s so cute and looks crazy comfortable, let’s be honest.

Caroline: Yeah, it’s another one of those ones that you can’t really tell, like, is it a dress? Is it a jumpsuit? What’s happening, you know?

Helen: Mmhmm. And it looks so elegant because it has that bandeau top and then it’s almost like this columnar silhouette where the fabric just drapes down from there. So it’s just, like, ultra comfy and so elegant looking. Great for a wedding also. The Kielo Jumpsuit by Named has this really cool wrap detail that ties at the front. It’s designed for two-way stretch knits, but it’s definitely not loungewear. It looks really fancy if you make it in the right knit. Great for when you want to look dressed up, but still be really comfy. That one goes up to a 55.9” hip.

Caroline: Now let’s talk about fabrics. A lot of the overalls fabrics we talked about are kind of the same for jumpsuits. I think the main difference is that jumpsuits in general are made with lighter weight fabrics. That’s because most jumpsuits have less of a utility vibe to them. There’s a lot of crossover between fabrics that are good for dresses and fabrics that are good for jumpsuits, but there are a couple of things to keep in mind here.

Helen: Yes. Choose a fabric that’s tightly woven enough so that it won’t pull apart at that crotch seam. This isn’t a problem with dresses because the seams aren’t as stressed, but with pants you want to keep this in mind so when you’re sitting, bending over, it’s gonna hold the stitches in that area and you won’t have a wardrobe malfunction issue. Double gauze and chiffon are probably not good choices for a jumpsuit. Linen, twill, and chambray are all better choices because they have that stable kind of weave.

Caroline: Yeah, and another thing to keep in mind is that jumpsuits usually aren’t fully lined and it’s not easy to wear a slip under them So unless you want a sheer look you want to make sure that your fabric is super opaque.

Helen: Yeah, you could always wear, like, those bike short kind of style undies underneath. That would be a good way to wear a slip without wearing a slip and achieve that if your fabric’s transparent. But ultimately, who wants transparent pants? Not me.

Caroline: Yeah, not me either.

Helen: Another fabric type you’ll see a lot more in jumpsuits is knits. It’s pretty rare to see knit overalls, but there’s definitely knit jumpsuits out there. Make sure to choose knits that have good recovery. That usually means at least 5% spandex. And recovery is when the knit kind of snaps back after it’s stretched. So knits that don’t have good recovery can bag out, leaving you with that droopy butt situation.

Caroline: Nobody wants a droopy butt. If you choose a heavier weight fabric for a sleeved jumpsuit, it’s going to be warm. So, kind of like wearing jeans and a jacket, but you can’t take the jacket off, quite literally. So you might not get to wear it all year round. Same goes for lighter fabrics in the wintertime. So just keep that in mind.

Helen: For shorter summer playsuits, fun colours and prints are so great because it doesn’t cover you from top to toe. So you can choose really bold stuff without it being overwhelming. Longer jumpsuits are a longer swath of fabric, so keep that in mind when you’re fabric shopping. For classic boilersuits, try, again, those darker neutrals. It can get a tad, like, clown-esque if you choose a really brightly coloured print, but it’s also, like, an amazing, show-stopping, unique look. So if you have a vision for where you’re going to wear that, then power to you.

Caroline: I take offense to that, Helen. I’m joking. I actually, my Blanca Flight Suit is in what I think is a bold, bright, floral, kind of 70s vibe print. And when we were designing that print, I remember from the jump, I was like, this is the colour I’m going to buy. This is what I want to make with it. Like, I absolutely knew it was perfect for a flight suit. But to each their own. Like, if you know that you’re not going to wear a bright printed boilersuit often enough to make that amount of work worth it, then maybe pick something more neutral that’s going to get more wear because it does take a lot of effort to make a full-on, like, boilersuit flight suit vibe.

Helen: Yeah, exactly. Whereas making like a little rayon summer romper would be a lot more of a quick sew and you probably get a lot of wear out of it in a bolder print during the summer months. And that’s, kind of, for a very specific season, right? Okay, let’s talk fitting with jumpsuits. I mean, even more than overalls, jumpsuits need to be fitted. So again, you’re gonna want to make a muslin. Jumpsuits are complicated because you have to fit the top and the pants, plus you have to make sure they’re meeting at the right point on your torso.

Caroline: When you’re choosing your size, look at where your measurements fall on the chart. You’re likely going to be a different size on the top and the bottom of your body. Grading between sizes is a totally normal part of the fitting process. Cashmerette has a good guide on their website that will show you how to do it. So we’ll link that up in the show notes. You got this.

Helen: And when you’re starting to fit your muslin, make adjustments one at a time starting at the top of the garment and moving down. Fit the bodice without the pants attached and then maybe attach the pants when you’re ready to start making adjustments there.

Caroline: Length adjustments are important with jumpsuits. Too short and it’s wedgie city over there. And too long and it’s droopy butt city. These are not cities we want to visit, people!

Helen: I don’t want to go there. Either of those places.

Caroline: No. But the goal with the fitting process is to have the bust point, waist, and crotch hitting you in the correct places for your body. So look out for that and take the time that you need to get that fit right. It will absolutely be worth it.

Helen: Mmhmm. So there are three main length adjustments to keep in mind. The first is shortening or lengthening the bodice above the darts or bust point. The bust point is the fullest part of your bust, usually located about an inch inward from the dart. If the bust point is too high on you, you might need to lengthen the bodice above the darts. If it’s too low, you might need to shorten it above the darts. You might also just need to move the dart, but these are all things you want to consider when you’re looking at that bust point.

Caroline: The second adjustment to check for is lengthening or shortening the bodice below the darts. When you’re trying on your muslin, make sure the seam line at the bottom of the bodice is hitting you at the right place. If it’s not, you wanna shorten or lengthen the bodice below the darts. And then you can attach the pants and start fitting them.

Helen: The last length adjustment to check for is the pants rise. If you need to lengthen the rise, you’ll know because either the pants will be giving you a wedgie or they’ll be pulling down from the top. If you need to shorten the rise, the crotch will be super dropped and feel like it’s hanging out in between your thighs.

Caroline: Yeah, I think some patterns have like a bit more of a dropped crotch. I’m thinking of the Zadie Jumpsuit in particular, but it kind of works because you’re often making that pattern out of a drapier fabric and having that, sort of like, range of movement is really nice and comfortable. So it’ll definitely depend on the pattern that you’re using, I think.

Helen: And your personal preference. You definitely want to make sure you move around in your muslin, because jumpsuits can be a little bit restrictive in your movement. So bend over, sit down, walk around, crouch, make sure you can pick something up off the floor to make sure that it has enough ease for you to move around comfortably. That’s when you might notice that you need to lengthen that rise. If you try to bend over and there’s just, you know, like, your shoulders are pulling back and you just can’t.

Caroline: Oh my gosh, Helen, I’m starting to think that my flight suit might not fit me quite right because I have this distinct memory of, like, dropping a pen in front of my team and having to pick it up. And it was extremely embarrassing because I could barely reach it.

Helen: Gosh, that’s so funny. But like, it looks amazing when you’re standing.

Caroline: Yeah. I know it looks incredible. What can I say?

Helen: Worth it. Totally worth it.

Caroline: Worth it. For more complex jumpsuits though, you definitely want to give yourself time. A flight suit or fitted jumpsuit is not a quick project. So break it up into sections and you can totally tackle it.

Helen: Yes, you absolutely can. Caroline, this episode’s got me so excited about our jumpsuit pattern that’s coming out. Can I tell you a little bit about it?

Caroline: Yes. Tell me. If it’s not out by now, it will be soon. So you gotta plug it.

Helen: We’re aiming for like, April, May launch. So, you know, maybe it will be out now, but it will be coming soon. And it’s called Lockhart. It has a fitted bodice with princess seams and spaghetti strap or wide strap options. A fitted waist, and then you can either do pants or a skirt. So there’s a dress view as well. And I think this pattern is just absolutely perfect for wedding guest attire, maybe even bridal attire. Those special moments like prom or Frocktails, things like that. Or you can make it more casual as well, but it’s just like a great kind of neutral jumpsuit that you can build upon. You know, we love a good wearable basic.

Caroline: Yes, I love this pattern so much. I’ve seen you wear it a few times and it looks incredible on you. I know you’ve been working on it for a while and it’s one of those labours of love that you’re gonna feel so good when it’s out in the world and you get to see people making it. And I love the name. I feel like it’s so fitting, because it is the perfect garment to wear as a wedding guest. And Lockhart, I mean, come on!

Helen: Lockhart! I know.

Caroline: Is there a double meaning there? I don’t know.

Helen: I love it for, I mean, I wore it to every wedding I attended last summer, which is what inspired me to give it that name and to make sure that there was both dress and pants views because I enjoyed wearing both dresses and jumpsuits to the wedding. And so there’s so many different options and so many different lengths for both the pants and the skirt. So it’s really, like, super customizable.

Caroline: Yay! I can’t wait for that to come out. All of this chat makes me want to move like all of my overalls and jumpsuits to the front of my closet. I feel like I’m gonna look amazing this week.

Helen: Me too! I’m totally gonna dig out all of my crazy printed overalls and just wear them. Caution to the wind!

Caroline: I feel like maybe the week that this episode comes out, I might kick myself for saying this, but we should wear, like, only overalls and jumpsuits. No?

Helen: Yes! Absolutely we should. Let’s do it.

Caroline: Let’s do it. That’s it for today’s episode of Love to Sew. You can find me, Caroline, at Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns and Helen at Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co. And we’re recording today in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.

Helen: You can support Love to Sew and get access to bonus content by subscribing on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. You even get access to the back catalogue of bonus episodes. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew. Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or check out our podcast page on Apple Podcasts for more info.

Caroline: You can head to lovetosewpodcast.com to find our show notes. They’re filled with links and pictures from this episode. And if you’d like to get in touch with us, leave us a message at 1-844-SEW-WHAT. That’s 1-844-739-9428. Or send us an email at [email protected].

Helen: Thanks to our amazing podcast team. Lisa Ruiz is our creative assistant, Jordan Moore of the Pod Cabin is our editor. And thank you for listening! We will talk to you next week.

Caroline: Buh-bye.

Helen: Bye.

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In this episode, we interview pattern designer, sewing teacher, quilted coat maker extraordinaire, and snappy dresser Natalie Ebaugh! She talks to us about her design process, her long career in the sewing community, and how she puts her amazing outfits together.

The transcript for this episode is on this page at the end of the show notes.

Show Notes: 

Find Natalie Online:

Some of Natalie’s Projects:

One of her (Many!) Gorgeous Quilt Coats

Ace & Jig Collab

A post shared by ace&jig (@aceandjig)

The Bestie Bag Natalie Made from Upcycled Jeans

Natalie’s Style Phrase is “Homebody Gorpcore Exquisite Corpse” (Featuring the Jeans Hack We Love!)

Sewing Patterns Mentioned:

Other Mentions:

Transcript:

Caroline: We are recording today on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish and Kwakwaka’wakw peoples, including Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, Musqueam, and K’ómoks first nations.

Helen: Hello and welcome to Love to Sew. I’m Helen, the designer behind Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co.

Caroline: and I’m Caroline, the owner of Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns.

Helen: We’re two sewing buds who love to sew and it’s literally all we want to talk about.

Caroline: Today we’re interviewing pattern designer, sewing teacher, quilted coat maker extraordinaire, and snappy dresser Natalie Ebaugh. She tells us about her design process, her long career in the sewing community, and how she puts her amazing outfits together.

Helen: If you love to sew, this is your show. Hello, Natalie. Thank you so much for coming on the show today.

Natalie: Hi, how are you guys?

Caroline: We’re good.

Helen: We’re doing so well. We’re really excited to chat with you. Can you please introduce yourself to our listeners?

Natalie: Sure. My name is Natalie Ebaugh. I’m a fiber artist, quilter, general sewer of all things, sewing instructor. I wear a lot of hats. I’m also a retail manager and I live in Alameda, California.

Caroline: Awesome. And we always like to ask our guests how and when they learned to sew. So can you tell us about that?

Natalie: Oh yeah, so, the first memory I have of sewing is like a lot of people with my grandmother. But it was really just, like, one project. We made Christmas ornaments. My sister and I drew out little characters and then my grandma helped us sew them up. So they’re really funky little Christmas ornaments. So that was really my first memory. And then I didn’t get into sewing in earnest until I was in high school. And my sister and I were friends with some neighbours of my dad. So, it was a family with three girls, and then the parents were both musicians, and there was another family nearby who were also, kind of, musicians and into the arts and that kind of thing. So we would go over to their house, and Jenny, the mom, had a sewing machine. She also was a knitter. And she really let us, surprisingly, like, just thinking about it now, I probably wouldn’t be the same way, but she let us just do whatever we wanted with her sewing machine. And so that’s kind of when I became interested in it.

And, really, my older sister, she’s three years older than I, her name’s Lauren. She got really into using patterns, vintage patterns, and making her own clothing and in high school. I really looked up to her and I still do. But I was like, you know, she’s making all this cool stuff, and clothing was always an interest of mine, so I kind of followed her. And where she has a much more technical approach to everything she does, whether it’s painting or knitting or sewing, I am a bit more experimental. And so I started teaching myself to sew, just messing around and reinventing the wheel a lot of the time. But I felt like it was my own thing, that I didn’t have to answer to anybody. I could just mess around and make whatever I wanted, whether it was good or bad, it didn’t really matter.

So I started making my own clothing. We would go to the Goodwill bins, which were near our house. And we would just buy a bunch of bed sheets and old clothing and make new things out of them. And it was very experimental. And I remember the first time I wore something I made to high school was a shirt. It was like almost, it was kind of a tunic, but I had made it out of a pillowcase. And it was very simple. And I just remember telling, people being like, “Oh, that’s so cool. That’s such a cool top” or whatever. And I was like, “Yep, made it out of a pillowcase,” like…

Helen: Of course! You gotta brag.

Natalie: Right. Yeah, and I mean, at the time, it’s hard to think about it now, 20 years ago about, yeah, probably about 20 years ago. Like when I was coming into high school, it was really not cool for you to shop at thrift stores. Like, you got teased a lot for it and it was considered, just I mean in in you know, among children, among kids. It just wasn’t cool. And now it seems like it’s, you know, it’s very mainstream. Which is great that people are more conscious of reusing and recycling and upcycling and all of that. But yeah, it just wasn’t as much of a thing, but that’s really where I think my sewing, kind of, roots are, is just like the reusing and making new from old. And it really stemmed from just, like, trying to be resourceful with the materials that I had. So those are my sewing roots. And then I did go on to art school. I went to Maryland Institute College of Art and I studied fiber arts. So that’s where I had my more, you know, traditional education and sewing where I learned a lot of techniques and really honed my skills and whatnot. So I have a little bit of both traditional and non-traditional.

Caroline: Oh, it’s so cool to hear about that because I feel like you still, that thread of upcycling has continued on throughout your journey as a sewist and we’re still seeing you do some really cool upcycling projects today, which we’ll talk a little bit about later. But we did also want to ask you about your time as a fabric buyer at Stonemountain and Daughter. Did that influence you as an artist and maker as well?

Natalie: Definitely. so, when I left college, I promptly moved back to the West Coast. I really liked living on the East Coast, but I think it made me realize that I’m really a West Coast person. There’s just, like, a difference in sense of humour and, you know, there’s just cultural differences and I really missed. I’d always wanted to, I grew up in Portland, but I always wanted to live in California. My family’s from the Bay area. And so I moved out here, in with my sister. She was living in a house with some other people and one of my roommates at the time worked at Stonemountain and she got me a job there. She got me an interview. And after school, I really didn’t know that much about, you know, even though it was a fiber program, you can really only go into so much during. Your program, you know, it’s pretty structured and you do a lot of stuff. You might take a weaving class, a pattern, you know, drafting class, a, you know, on and on and on. But, we didn’t really explore fabric itself and the different types of fabric. So when I started at Stonemountain and Daughter, I really approached it as a secondary education and I really wanted to soak up as much as I could. Because there was such a wealth of knowledge there in the staff. There were many staff at that time who had been working there for 20 or 30 years. They had been sewing for a long time. So there were really a lot of variation and, like, the generations of sewing within the staff there. And everyone was so generous with their knowledge, because, of course, we’re all working and we are talking about sewing all day. Like, it’s what we love to do, it’s what we love to talk about. So I really learned a lot, especially when I became a buyer, because I was firsthand, looking at everything that was available, whether we were carrying it or not.

So, sometimes, we would have a fabric rep come to the store. That’s how we did a lot of the buying. They would come to the store, so that could be a fabric rep from, you know, maybe Robert Kaufman. You know, quilting cotton, those are pretty straightforward buying sessions because it’s, Robert Kaufman does have a fashion line as well, but they, it’s, you know, you’re picking prints and colours and whatnot. But then when it comes to fabric jobbers who are people buying up, and lots from maybe designers or maybe from each other, you know, there’s a lot of swapping around in that industry. And these are people who have huge warehouses, they’re all over the country. But they’ll come and show you swatches of what they have. And that was really my favourite part, is just seeing what is possible, what is out there. And I learned how to identify fabrics. I learned about blends and different processes of making fabrics and kind of just also the fabric industry is really interesting. It’s definitely dying down a bit, you know, I’m not in it now, so I don’t know what it’s like right now, but it was a lot of older generation people who had been doing it for a long time and it was just kind of slowing down a bit. So I know there’s newer fabric companies that are coming out and there’s always something new. So I’m sure it’s a lot different, but I definitely, just knowing what was out there in the world was really interesting to me. So yeah, it was a really great experience.

Helen: Ooh, it’s really cool to hear about it. And I can totally see you excelling at choosing fabrics because you do such a good job of pairing fabrics. I mean, really, like you manage to put things together that I wouldn’t think of and they look fantastic. So I could see you bringing a lot to the table as far as selecting interesting things for a store. And one of the things that we noticed initially about your work, was when you were making and selling those stunning one-of-a-kind quilted jackets and we were wanting to hear a little bit about how that came about.

Natalie: Yeah, well, and to continue just about how buying kind of influenced my making is. I really learned how to, I guess, recognize patterns in my own curation of fabrics and prints and colours. So when you’re buying, you might not be doing it on the same day. With a bunch of reps, you’re kind of, it’s kind of spaced out. But as you continue to buy, you realize that you do have specific colours, palettes, specific textures. You kind of notice those patterns as you’re doing it, the longer you’re doing it. So I think that did help me kind of figure out what patterns I want to pursue and what kind of, I don’t know, whether I want to change up, you know, the palette I’m working with or not. You just become more conscious of your choosing and your, kind of, curation of it.

So, to answer your question, I started getting into quilting right at the tail end of my senior year of college. And I was doing my, kind of, thesis show, which was a kind of fashion show event and we were to make a collection and mine was, again, very, like, upcycled. I cut apart clothing and sewed it back together. And some pieces had 3D elements, like stuffed elements to them. And some of them were kind of on the quiltier side. And, so I started making quilted panels. Again, very self taught. I was just kind of making it up as I went. And I started making these panels and inserting them into jackets or making them into sleeves. And then I just wanted to keep doing that. And I thought, “Oh, it would be, like, really cool to make a quilted jacket.” I had found this book in the fiber department that was donated called Quilts to Wear, which is a book you can still find. And it had all these examples of different styles of quilted jackets, and it really inspired me.

I think quilts have always, I’ve been really drawn to them because they are this kind of living history in a piece of fabric, in this object. And there’s something really interesting about wearing that. To me, you know, clothing is just, you know, it’s living. It lives with us. We make marks on it. It stretches out, you know, on and on. It’s, so I, I was just drawn to the idea of making a quilted jacket. So I started playing around and the first one I made was with a lot of fabric, actually from Stonemountain and Daughter, before I worked there even, and I used some really thick polyester batting and I shoved it through my really dinky, like, plastic machine that I had. I can’t believe it actually sewed anything. ‘Cause I was really putting a lot of stress on it. And I made my first jacket. I think that was a year after college. And then I just kept going and trying different styles. This was even before I was really using patterns. I didn’t really use a sewing pattern until after college, which is kind of interesting. Like. I had drafted a pattern, but I hadn’t used a ready-to-wear pattern, or like, a Big Four with instructions and everything, until after college. And yeah, I just started experimenting and then I just had this drive to make them. I couldn’t even really explain it.

It was just something that felt really good to me, and I just really wanted to do it. I’ve always had this drive to drive forward to make things, and I don’t always know what it’s leading to, but I have to do it. And at that point it was the quilted jackets. So I was making them for a while, and I started applying to craft shows because I felt like that was the arena for me. I didn’t know where else. So I applied to a few shows and then I actually decided to put together a show in Oakland, which ended up being called Good Omen Market. And we did that for a few years, and that was just, I wanted to create a show where aspiring crafters could sell their pieces and, kind of, get a bit more exposure, ‘cause I felt like that’s what I wanted. And I think I’ve always been a bit of a community facilitator. I don’t really think of myself as, like, a leader, but I like to make space for people to come together. So yeah, I just kept on doing craft shows. I started doing, um, I did West Coast Craft, which is a big craft show in San Francisco, and now they’re in other places like LA. And then I was contacted by the designers from Ace and Jig, and they just contacted me on Instagram, and we collaborated on some jackets. So their brand is no-waste. So they save all of the cutoffs from their factory and then they send it out to artists and do collaborations, which is really cool.

So yeah, I was really, I was making a lot of jackets for a while there. And I get a lot of joy out of people seeing the unexpected, in clothing especially. People are like, “What are you wearing?” You know, they’re like, so delighted to see just like this, I don’t know. This, like, now, now it’s, you know, more people are wearing quilted coats, and I definitely, I’m, I did not originate the quilted coat, but it was just fun to make them and see people’s reaction. And, you know, people would just get really excited about it. And I, I love to share what I make. So wearing something you make is a great way to do that.

Caroline: Yeah, I think this was around the time that I started following you, when you were making these coats for Ace and Jig, and I just remember being in awe of your use of colour and pattern and your creativity. And following you on Instagram was, and still is, such a joy, because that, like, your love for making just comes through. And you’ve, sort of, taken that through so many different almost, like, eras of your career over the years. Yeah, I want to close this thread for a second and just share with our listeners what you have going on right now. So you’re kind of doing a lot of different cool things. You co own a pattern company. You make really awesome content online. And I really want to plug your Patreon that you launched recently. So can you tell us a little bit more about what we can expect from that Patreon?

Natalie: Thank you. Yeah. So, I started renting my first studio almost a year ago and I really want it to be a classroom, a learning space, a making space. And right now I do work full-time at my retail job. So I tried teaching some in-person classes and it was, it was just a lot with my schedule. So I scaled that back. And I did do some live online classes, which were fun, but it can be stressful. And you’re also always working around your schedule. So my partner, Matt, really encouraged me to pursue Patreon and we really love filming these classes together. So each month there’s two classes you can take. It’s $8 if you just want one of the classes, $12 if you want both of the classes. And you can watch them and they’re all project-based. You make a project from start to finish. One of the tiers is called Quilty Homebody. And that tier is focused on making things for your home environment. It’s also quilt-focused. So a lot of what we make will involve quilting techniques, and I’m really trying to incorporate projects of all levels. And then the other tier is Style Enthusiast. So we make things to wear, whether it’s, you know, upcycled jeans or, you know, there’s, there’s all kinds of things. So I’m really trying to offer a range of projects, but it’s always going to be, you know, something that is very true to me and my style. There are a lot of resources online for learning how to sew. And I know that I have a very specific perspective, so I want to encourage people to explore sewing and explore creating, and that’s definitely what I’m trying to create there.

Caroline: Well, Helen and I are obviously big fans of Patreon. We love the platform. And I’m so glad that you found a way to, sort of, share your creativity and do a little bit of teaching in a way that is sustainable for you. So I definitely encourage our listeners to go check that out. I know I’m super inspired by some of the little peeks that you share on Instagram.

Natalie: Yeah. And my partner Matt does all of the filming and editing and he just does such a great job. He’s been extremely supportive of me, so I really just want to give him a shout out.

Caroline: Oh, well, we love a supportive partner.

Helen: Hi Matt! That’s wonderful.

Caroline: Yeah, one of the things I wanted to ask you as well, just because you’ve been involved in the sewing community for so much of your adult life, how have you noticed the community changing over the years?

Natalie: Yeah. It’s so hard to gauge, I think, because, my, like, primary platform for interacting is Instagram, like a lot of people. And Instagram has just changed so much. And for me, it’s hard to know if I’m just, rose-coloured glasses, like, thinking about how, “Oh, things used to be this or like this or this,” but I feel like there used to be more connection. Just direct, you know, you got to see exactly what the people you were following were posting. And now I definitely see a lot less. And that’s just the algorithm, you know, I think it’s just how that app has decided to go. But I also, a couple of years ago, I just started having carpal tunnel symptoms and I have tendonitis and I had to take a big step back from sewing for a while just to recover. And I feel like I stepped back a bit from the sewing community because it was, it was just making me sad that I couldn’t be involved. So I have to say, I don’t know what the sewing community is like now, if there, if it is really centralized anywhere.

I just joined Making App, but I haven’t really explored it too much. I feel like I’m always looking for that community…when I worked at Stonemountain and Daughter, we really had our whole in-person thing with all of our co-workers. And I was actually talking to one of them recently about how much sewing all of us were doing. And I think it was because we were excited that everyone working there was making stuff and we got, you know, fresh new fabrics all the time. And maybe there was a little bit of a competitive edge going on too, but we were just, like, sewing so much stuff at that point. And I often compare my sewing now to when I was in my early- to mid-twenties and I’m not doing the same amount of sewing and I’m not as involved in the sewing community. So I definitely feel a bit, I don’t know, insecure about that, even though, or just, you know, sad. But things just change, I guess, you know?

Caroline: I get it too. We’re all, like, on our own journey, right? And I think it’s really normal to, especially when you first, like, discover, get into the sewing community, or maybe start a new job like you did at Stonemountain, like, getting so excited and sewing a lot. And then you sort of realize, like, “Oh, I maybe don’t wear all the things that I sew” or “Maybe I’m discovering that I can slow down and that’s really enjoyable as well.” So, but yeah, no, it’s really interesting to hear your perspective on that. I also feel kind of attached to the way that Instagram was, quote unquote, back in the day, but we all have to accept where it is right now as well. And I think there’s positives and negatives to both.

Natalie: Totally. Yeah. And I’m still finding very meaningful connections with people who I chat directly with, or just comment with on Instagram. I’m still making new friends on there. So that gives me hope. You know, it, it may not feel the exact same, but like, it’s still a great tool for finding your people, I think. Yeah.

Helen: Yeah. We actually have an episode planned for later in this season about sewcializing online, because the landscape has changed so much. And we’re excited to talk about how to find those connections in case you’re missing them. So if listeners out there are relating hard, we got you.

Caroline: Yeah.

Natalie: Yeah. Yeah. It’s a, it’s an interesting time. I know like I feel like at this, in this season of my life, I feel very comfortable socially. But know in the past, like, going to sewing events really intimidated me or, you know, I, I felt like I would show up and kind of just shut down a little bit just from being overwhelmed. And if you can find a way to create that kind of in-person community on whatever level that is, whether it’s, like, going to get coffee with someone or, you know, having like a little sewing circle or crafternoon or whatever, I think that can make you feel…like, I recently hosted a knitting circle at my studio. And it was just so wholesome and, like, exactly what I needed. And there was so much laughter and there were many people who came who I only know through Instagram or on Instagram, or maybe they follow me and I didn’t know them yet. And they live in my neighbourhood. Like just having those moments of in-person. I’ve also done, like, coworking with people online or cocrafting on Zoom one-on-one, because sometimes doing a big Zoom thing can just be too much. So I think trying stuff out, you can still have those really meaningful, wonderful experiences with people you meet online.

Helen: Oh, a hundred percent. A hundred percent. Thousand percent. Okay. Selfishly. I want to circle back for a moment here and talk a bit about quilting again, because I love your patchwork. It’s so fresh and interesting, a total feast for the eyes. And we were wondering what’s your process like for choosing fabrics when you’re doing these, like, multiple different fabric pieces. You know, do you sketch it out? Do you just throw it together? Like, how does it go?

Natalie: I’ve never been a sketcher. I’ve tried, but I think the experience of quilting, piecing, especially for me is, it has to be improvisational and it has to flow and that doesn’t mean I’m always using specifically improv kind of blocks, like sometimes I’m using traditional, more traditional blocks, like you know half-square triangles or whatever. But it’s all gonna be in the moment. And I think a lot of my style comes from, like, all through my, kind of, my education. So, like, grade school, middle school, even high school, I’m just not a book learner. I’m, like, a kinetic learner, I guess. I don’t know what the term is, but I, I learned by doing and making and trying, doing things with my hands. So when I was growing up, school was very boring for me. I just felt like it was an overwhelming amount of, just like, words that are thrown at you. And felt very rigid. And once I got my hands on a sewing machine and nobody was there to tell me what was right and wrong, it just felt so freeing for me. And I could make up the rules. I could have no rules. All of that. So when I got into quilting, I think I was a bit intimidated at first because, you know, there are pockets of the quilting community that really like rules, is how I, kind of, put it. Like, some people really like to have guidelines, which is totally fine. If that’s your style.

When it comes to piecing and quilting, like, I want sewing to be approachable. And when you have all these rights and wrongs that you have to go by, you just can feel like you’re messing up all the time. And that’s why I really love quilting and improv quilting, because you get to make up the rules. You get to change things whenever you want. And that’s really how I approach my piecing. I’ll start with a palette, you know, I’ll start pulling fabrics and oftentimes it’ll be like, I’ll look in my stash, and I kind of just go with my intuition. I go with the flow. I just grab what catches my eye first. And then, you know, I start kind of digging through what I have and putting colours next to each other. And I’m always looking for a palette that is creating tension or creating a mood. I’m definitely, like, I go by mood. So it’s like, do you want to create a very, like, airy and dreamy feel when you look at something? Do you want to, you know, what do you want to convey? I feel like I use clothing and how I dress and I use colour and print and in my piecing, i’s all about, like, how do you create a mood? It is very intuitive and I’ve had people ask me before, like, how do you go about it? And for me, it’s all about just, like, trying stuff and not getting attached to anything. And, you know, maybe sewing some things together and then cutting them in half and adding something else in, and you just keep on going until you look at it and you just your whole body says “yes.” You know, like you kind of have to really listen to yourself, and I think that when you start learning a craft like quilting and it’s very rule based, or anything really, when you start learning something and there’s all these, you know, boxes that you have to tick, you kind of forget about the creative part because you’re really having to pay attention to, are your points matching up? Is your seam allowance consistent? You know, on and on and on. And you forget that, like, being messy and imperfect is really important too.

Helen: Yeah, I love hearing you talk about this because I’ve been really enjoying exploring improv lately and it is such, like, a freeing way to do sewing that I didn’t really experience when I was making garments. Because there’s a process that you go through, and yes, you know, you’re choosing fabrics or maybe you’re hacking a pattern or something. There’s lots of creativity involved. But that freeing feeling when you’re just slapping fabrics together and like, you start to feel like this unstoppable train, like, you’re like, “I’m doing it. I’m doing it. I’m doing it.” And it’s, like, looking so good. And then sometimes it’s not, and you just rip it apart. It’s just so fun. And I love listening to you talk about it. And I also think it’s fascinating that your first experience with a sewing machine made you feel freedom. Like, and I think lots of people can probably relate to that, but I think also a lot of people have the opposite feeling where they feel like they need to follow all these rules and do everything right, And it’s stressful, and maybe there’s a teacher telling them they’re not doing it good enough, and like all this stuff, but you were like, no, this is like my window into a whole new world, and you just felt like, so free.

Natalie: Yeah. And we don’t have time to get into it, but sewing is so underplayed as just, it’s such a technical thing. You’re operating a machine. You’re using a pattern. Like, it’s engineering. Like, it’s difficult. And it’s been so, like, downplayed. Like, when people offhand, like with the best of intention, to me, or like, “Oh, I really want to learn how to sew” or, you know, they want to do this, they think it’s easier than it is. And I try not to squash their dreams, but it is so technical and you really have to put a lot of hours into the technical part. You know, learning how to thread a machine. You also have to learn how to figure out why it’s doing something weird. You know, like it’s not just about, like, best-case scenario, the machine is running and you’re just having to manage what’s under the needle, that’s also it. You also have to learn how to handle different fabrics, ‘cause they all handle differently. Like, there’s so many, so many things, that if I knew that going into sewing, I don’t know if I would have gotten into it, just because I would have been so intimidated. But because I was unsupervised, I was like, “Yeah! Like, let’s mess around!”

Helen: Yeah, the ignorance is bliss factor, is really…

Natalie: Absolutely. So I try to encourage that. Or convey that in my content that I make or in my projects because, like, you should mess around and try things out and it’s okay if it’s bad the first time or the first 10 times or doesn’t work out. I think that one of the downsides of Instagram is that it’s created this, kind of, focus on the finished product, you know, and showing off the finished, shiny product that just appeared, and it’s magical, you know, like it’s just there. When really, like, the hours of time and all the mistakes and redos and on and on. Like, I, I try to convey that, like, it’s, that’s all a part of it. And that’s all part of the fun, like, and the not fun and, like, it’s all just about the growing.

Caroline: It’s so true. Like, all of those things can be true. It can be hard and challenging and a big learning curve. It could also be really fun and freeing and creative. So it’s like all of those things at once.

Natalie: Yeah. And, and sewing was really the first thing that I felt likeI connected with, like, immediately. I didn’t feel really connected in school. I’m sure a lot of people feel that way, but it was the first thing that I was really drawn to and I knew I always wanted to do it, always. So I really followed that and through my time sewing, like, at first I didn’t want to use patterns because I was too impatient. I didn’t want to read directions. So I just didn’t use patterns for a long time. And then I started working at Stonemountain and we sold patterns in there. You know, a lot of my coworkers used them. And so I thought, okay, this hasn’t been my thing in the past, but maybe the instructions are there for a reason and I should start reading them. So that’s, that’s what I did. And I kind of started opening up my modes of learning and revisiting things that hadn’t worked for me in the past. And trying things and trying them again. And I think to be a lifelong learner, that’s really how you have to approach it. Like, I never think about being an expert at anything. I always want to be learning something. I never want to know everything. Cause if I’m at the end of something, like, that’s no fun. You know?

Caroline: Yeah. so true. It’s a lifelong journey. Okay, Natalie, this is such a fun convo. We’re gonna take a quick break and we will be back in a second.

Love to Sew is made possible by listeners like YOU! We are so grateful for the support of our amazing patrons and subscribers. If you love Love to Sew and you want to help support the pod, we have a new option for you.

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Caroline: All right, we’re back. Okay, let’s talk about the pattern company that you co-own with Liz Ford. It’s called Daisy Chain Patterns. I would love to know, first up, how you and Liz met.

Natalie: Liz and I met working at Stonemountain, actually. She was also a buyer and a manager there and we worked together. I kind of bounced around a couple of times and moved back and forth from the Bay Area. And so I worked with her for a little bit before I moved away. And then I moved back and we worked together for two or three years. I think it was a total of maybe four, almost four years that we worked together. I left Stonemountain in October of 2020 and I was doing a bunch of different projects. I was doing stuff with Ace and Jig. I had a couple classes that I filmed with CreativeBug, and those were for two quilted coats, and they told me that I needed to make a pattern for these so that it could be included in the class, but then also I could sell it on my own. And patternmaking was something that I had been thinking about for a long time, but I had always held myself back because I didn’t know how to grade patterns. There was just a lot of the process that I didn’t know how to do. And I was telling myself that I had to do everything, which just isn’t the case. Like, just ask for help. So I reached out to Liz, and I knew that she and I worked really well together ’cause we had worked very closely in the office there, and she had just had her first child and was home. And it was in the middle of the pandemic or in the beginning, I can’t remember. But we started chatting and she was into it.

And so we focused on the two quilted jackets. So we did the Liz Quilted Liner Jacket, which is named after Liz, and then we did the Ara Quilted Overcoat, which is kind of a short sleeve, quilted coat. And those were the two, and we got them done in time. We found somebody to grade them for us, who we paid. My whole thing was that I could spend the time learning how to grade, which might take me a while, and I might not be that good at it, or I could find somebody who has devoted their career to it and I could pay them. So that’s what I did. And we wrote the instructions. And Liz is a really great business partner, because, you know, we bring different things to the table. We have similar aesthetic, similar style, but she’s really good at getting me to focus on the technical bits and, really slow down and redo things until they are really good. ‘Cause I am not a perfectionist at heart. But I do love when things feel really good. So it’s great to have her and be partnered with her because she is very thorough. And we also like similar things. We’re really inspired by vintage clothing and, yeah, she’s great to work with. So it’s been really fun so far.

Helen: Oh, that’s really exciting to hear about. And it’s cool that you kind of had this, not aversion, but you weren’t familiar with patterns for a long time, and now you have a pattern company. How does that feel?

Natalie: Yeah. I mean, it’s great. I think to me, I am not a very technical pattern drafter or designer. I did study it in school, but it’s not my comfort zone. But I do see that there is a lot of value in making a simple garment that really shows off either your piecing or your quilting or the fabric that you choose. And that’s really what I’ve focused on so far. One of our latest patterns, the Winona Vest, is a much more technical pattern. It has all of these amazing pockets that are very different and multi-use and multi-entry to them. So that was kind of my foray into that. But as far as, like, fitting, I’m not super comfortable with fitting. But I still think there are a lot of different ideas and shapes to explore that aren’t focused on that. So I think there’s a lot of room within the garment, pattern world for stuff like that.

Caroline: Yeah, Helen and I were talking before we got on the call with you about how, like, you have such a different perspective with the patterns that you create. They’re so unique. They’re really fun. Like you mentioned, they have that sort of vintage-inspired vibe, but I just love that they’re, you know, just not same-same. They’re not basic. They’re very cooland fun and different. I wonder, do you have any, like, style icons or favourite decades that you, sort of, reference as you’re designing?

Natalie: It’s hard for me to pinpoint, because, like, I am inspired by like…my Pinterest is just, like, an explosion of things. I would say, like, mid-60s to mid-70s, I find a lot of inspiration from just, like, the shapes and the nostalgia and all of that, but I don’t know if that comes through totally in what we do. I think a little bit. But I’ve always been inspired and in school, I did a lot of what they called “performance garments.” So, you know, they’re not straightforward costumes like you would wear in a play, but they are garments that are made for performance art pieces, so they change or they, you know, have different elements to them that are performative or interactive. And I think that can kind of translate to what I make. Like, you know, all of the pockets are a big thing for me. I’m not somebody who wants pockets in everything I wear, but I like a statement pocket. Like, I like a big pocket. I like a layered pocket. I like something that can be, again, have like hidden parts in it. And I think it’s all about having that, like, interactive garment that you wear but is also a cocoon that you can kind of, you know, get cozy in, or something that you can carry secret things in, or carry all of your things. You know, it’s like, there’s kind of this intersection of, like, utility and also, like, functionality, but also it, it just looks like maybe something familiar, but unfamiliar at the same time.

Helen: Yeah, totally. And we love your personal style. I think you mesh that, like, comfortable, approachable vibe with this super fashion-forward edge that is very unique. And it’s so fun to watch you put together outfits on Instagram. And we were wondering, how long does it take you to get ready in the morning?

Natalie: Well, my partner is often asleep when I get up, just ‘cause we have different schedules. So I’m usually crawling around in the dark trying to just think of what I have. But I’m definitely somebody who, I rewear a lot of stuff. Recently I filmed a class for some jeans that I altered and I wore them, like, three days in a row, you know, with just different things.

So, in grade school, I wore uniforms, and I think kind of call back to having a uniform, like, I usually will always have, be wearing, like, layers, and I’ll kind of fixate on certain things in my closet for a while before I switch them out. So I’ll wear the same pants a few times a week and try it different ways. I feel like my style changes a lot, but also there’s, like, a through line. I don’t know what it is, but I do like to explore different trends and put my own spin on it a little bit.

Caroline: Yeah, Helen and I did an episode called What’s Your Me Made Style a couple seasons back where we had our listeners kind of describe their style in, like, a phrase. I wonder what yours would be, at least right now.

Natalie: Yeah, it’s so hard. At least for, like, winter. I feel like it changes, definitely, on the season too. Right now…do you know what gorpcore is?

Caroline: No, I’m gonna look it up though.

Helen: Is it like, gorp like granola?

Natalie: Yeah. So, so gorpcore is this style right now that is kind of focused on wearing, like, technical gear, like, like, hiking gear, but as fashion. So, I’ve seen it a lot on Instagram, of course, but I think I’ve been influenced by that a bit because I’ll be wearing, like, a lot of vests which feel very outdoorsy. And then, you know, a lot of casual things like denim. I don’t know. I feel like my style is very, like, Exquisite Corpse. Like, there’s a lot of clashing of what’s going on. Like, sometimes I’ll be wearing something very feminine and soft but then, you know, with like, sneakers. And then I throw in, like, my weird big pants that I like to wear. And so each layer is, just doesn’t really go together, but then somehow, at least to me, it goes together.

Helen: You make it work, just like your fabric pairings, right? You just, like, find this way to make the clash so delicious.

Natalie: Yeah. It’s, yeah. I feel like my style is like, homebody, like, gorpcore, exquisite corpse.

Helen: I love that.

Natalie: You gotta be cozy. It’s gotta be a weird combination. And then, yeah, it’s gotta be functional.

Caroline: Can we do like a, can we make this into like a, gorpcorpse or something?

Helen: Gorpcorpse.

Natalie: Yeah, yes, there you go.

Helen: I’m a real gorpcorpse, if you know what I mean.

Natalie: Yeah!

Caroline: Oh my gosh.

Helen: I ate so much gorp growing up, so I feel like I could really get into gorpcore, yeah.

Natalie: Same. yeah. yeah. I like it because, I do really, like, I have to wear comfortable shoes. I spent a lot of time, growing up, wearing uncomfortable shoes. And now that I’m in, like, my 30s, I’m like, nope. So I’m very into comfort dressing for sure.

Helen: Yeah, I love that. Okay. We also wanted to touch on your upcycling because you have so many cool jeans that you’ve upcycled into, like, other jeans, or you made the Blackbird Fabrics Bestie Bag, the BF Patterns Bestie Bag, and you made it all out of upcycled jeans. And that was so cool. So, I guess, yeah. Why are jeans such a great option for upcycling in your opinion?

Natalie: I think I really love a secondhand pair of jeans because, kind of, calling back to talking about quilts and and like wearing quilts, but just in general, like how clothing is such a living, fabric is such a living, breathing thing that shows our life, you know, on it. And when you get a secondhand pair of jeans, like you can just see all the, where they wore their, you know, their wallet or whatever was in their pockets. And you see all the fade lines and the, the patina of it and, I don’t know, I just love the feel of it. I love the look of it. I love something that is worn-in and, like, well-loved and I also love cutting things apart, as we know. So I think it just kind of goes with that, kind of remixing of things, whether it’s clothing or it’s quilting. There’s always jeans at the thrift store. I think I also just love the feeling of denim. Like it feels so sturdy, something really nice about that. It feels like it’ll just be around forever. I love the way that it wears and it fades. And, you know, there’s such a big culture around denim too. I think a lot of people have a connection to it. It’s just a really kind of mythical fabric.

Helen: It’s fun to, to keep your old jeans and your partner’s old jeans. I do that. I have a pile in my sewing studio because they do make such great upcycling materials. And you know, you can mend the crotch a few times. I’ve definitely mended the crotch multiple times on some of my jeans, but eventually they bite the dust and it’s time to turn them into something else. And that’s always exciting too.

Natalie: Right. And I feel like I spent so much time looking for the perfect pair of jeans. Like there’s always this kind of like, idea out there That, you know, in fashion, at least that, like, you’re looking for your perfect pair of jeans that fit you perfectly. And when I started doing, kind of like, upcycling denim and just cutting open the leg, a few people started doing that on Instagram. And it was just like, I know that. That kind of trend has happened in the past too, like in the seventies and the nineties. And I love that those, even upcycling trends kind of get recycled too. And people spark an interest again in those techniques.

Helen: Mmhmm. Yeah, me too. Okay, I have to ask you about a specific project because you’ve made these really cool jeans where you’ve opened the side seam and inserted a triangular shaped piece of fabric to turn them into really cool bell bottoms. And I really want you to tell me how you did that so I can copy you.

Natalie: Well, we, we also just, Matt and I, just filmed a class for Patreon for that. Yeah.

Caroline: You gotta sign up for Patreon, Helen!

Natalie: That’ll be released this month.

Helen: I know, I do.

Natalie: But it’s, again, it’s like one of those things that I feel like, taking apart jeans just seems really complicated, but it’s literally just ripping out the side seams. And then the triangular part that I’m inserting is not shaped in any way. I’m sure you could get more technical with it. But I have just literally drafted a triangle that’s like, you know, however long I want it to be and then however wide I want it to be. And you can play around with how wide that triangle is, because obviously it’s gonna change the shape of your pant leg drastically, depending on how big or small it is. So some of the jeans that I’ve made in that, with that technique have, like, a 14 inch wide panel at the bottom. And so they’re, they’re huge, you know? And, some of them are more of just, like, a regular wide leg. So just depending on how big you want that triangle to be, it can be, um, it can change it quite dramatically, but you can always baste it in to see how it looks. But I get in the class, I go through, you know, how to draft that piece and play around with it. But I also did it with pieced fabric that I quilted to some canvas so that it is the same weight as the denim, but then it’s like a panel, a quilty panel, which is very fun too.

Helen: Ooh, I’m gonna do that one.

Caroline: Yeah. That’s so smart. I was wondering how that would’ve worked, with the pieced kind of patchwork vibe with the weight of the denim. So that is a great tip to quilt it to a piece of canvas. Take notes, Helen.

Natalie: Yeah, yeah, and then you don’t have to use, you know, any batting, obviously. You just sew it directly onto your canvas or twill, whatever you have. It’s a great, especially if you’re doing improv piecing and you just have kind of random blocks that are around, that’s a great project, to use them in.

Caroline:Yeah, so cool.

Helen: Yeah. so, so fun. Okay, we’ll link that up in our show notes, your Patreon, so people can go and take that class.

Natalie: Yeah, it’s a fun one.

Caroline: All right. We just have a few more questions before we wrap up. On your Instagram profile, you call yourself a fiber artist and designer, which is absolutely true. I’ve noticed that sometimes sewists have a hard time calling themselves artists. I wonder what your perspective is on that.

Natalie: Yeah, I think it’s probably a complicated answer that has a lot to do with how society interprets sewing and hand crafts and then how we kind of internalize that and want to, kind of, present ourselves to the world because it is a little bit, it can be intimidating or you can feel a little self-conscious if you’re naming yourself something that you’re not sure if you are or not. But I don’t remember when it was, so, when I was in art school, you know, the joke was that like, nobody who graduates from art school actually does the art afterwards. That’s the joke, but I was very determined to prove that wrong. And so, that has always just been, like, my mission to be a working artist and to make a living from what I do. Most of the time I am making maybe a little bit of money from what I do and my day job is supporting me. But I also got some advice at some point, that, you know, nobody is going to promote you. Nobody’s going to, like, discover you from the outside and be like, “Oh, you’re an artist.” You know, like, you can call yourself that now. You can take that name and you have to kind of make that decision for yourself. You have to decide that you’re going to promote yourself. Like I remember after school, I was so self-conscious about telling people about what I made, like, “Oh, I make these quilted jackets, and yeah, I sew sometimes,” but I was so insecure about it. And then after a while, I got more comfortable telling people, like, “Yes, I sew for a living” or “Yes, I am an artist. I make this and this.” And it is a scary place, I think, sometimes, to claim that. But nobody’s gonna tell you that that’s what you are. You know that that’s what you are. And I don’t know, I don’t know why people are more hesitant about it. I mean, I definitely have times, like right now, I haven’t been sewing or creating as much as I would like to be. So I feel kind of sheepish sometimes being like, “Yes, I’m an artist,” but it’s about how you live your life. And it’s not only about production, you know, it’s about how you curate your space around you or how you interact with the world. There’s so much more about it than just producing. So that’s my long answer.

Caroline: Yeah, it’s a great answer.

Helen: I love that answer because I think, yeah, we set all these weird arbitrary benchmarks for ourselves to whether or not we get to have these titles and whatnot. And I think everybody struggles with that and feeling like a fraud or whatever it is, however you want to call it. And I mean, it is just so relatable. And I do think that sewing is art. And even if you’re just making clothes for yourself to wear, using other people’s patterns, I think you’re an artist because you’re making creative choices in that process. And you are basically painting yourself, like, you are the canvas. So there’s lots of interesting ways to think about it. And I encourage all of our listeners out there who are doing any kind of fiber art to, yeah, call yourself an artist. Here you go. I’ll give you permission.

Natalie: Yeah.

Caroline: We’ve also heard you say that your sewing machine is like an extension of your body. And I wonder if you ever really, like, lose your sewjo and how you continuously stay inspired, especially when your professional life is so intertwined with sewing.

Natalie: Oh my gosh. Yes. Many times I have lost my drive. It could be a physical thing like, you know, the, the carpal tunnel. And that’s hard because maybe you want to do it, but you physically can’t. And then you kind of get out of the flow of being in the sewing space, whatever that is, whether it’s, like, your dining room table, or if you have a sewing room. And sometimes I get out of it where there’s times when I have so many ideas in my head and then I just get so paralyzed by what I want to make. Like, I’ll have a day off and I’m like, “Oh, I want to start this project. I’ll cut this out. I’ll do this and this.” And then I just can’t seem to get started because the task feels too big. So it happens to me all the time. And teaching the classes has helped me get back in the flow, but there’s still things, like, you know, I would really like to make myself a pair of jeans. I’ve tried making jeans from start to finish twice and neither time worked out. I feel like this year is going to be the year. But getting started on that project feels intimidating too. I also have a problem of starting projects and not finishing them. So, which nobody can relate to, I’m sure.

Helen: Yeah, that never happens to me.

Natalie: So I think that is a mental wall for me as well. When I think about those projects that are sitting there unfinished, it’s like, I don’t want to start another project, but I also don’t want to work on those projects. So what usually helps me is picking something bite sized or, you know, really, you know, approachable, small project that I can complete and feel really good about. Or just trying to turn off my brain and start the project. Because if I did that, instead of thinking about the project, I would save a lot of time.

Helen: Yes. Hard relate.

Natalie: Yeah. I am a very, like, I know I use the word intuitive a lot, but I try to listen to myself, because I have spent a lot of my life with anxiety. Just like, you know, you start getting in a, in a doom spiral as I call them. And a lot of people call them. And everything starts feeling overwhelming. And I’m trying to train myself to just, before, like, when I see myself going down the spiral, just step back. And just turn off the brain instead of letting myself continue that. Because it is a habit that you can get into, of focusing on, “Well, if I want to do this project, then I need to wash the fabric and I need to print the pattern and then this and then this” instead of just enjoying the process, you know.

Helen: Yeah. I totally relate to this because I always have so many things that I need to work on and want to work on but sometimes that just gets in my way because there’s so many things to choose from. So I’ve started just picking. I’m like, “Just pick something. It doesn’t matter. You’ll be happy as soon as you start.”

Natalie: Yes. When I first started knitting, I was at a knitting circle and someone there was talking about how they set up. They had some app that was like a roulette table that you literally put all your projects in and then it chooses for you, which I think would be good.

Helen: Oh my gosh. Unless it lands on something and then you’re like, “Nah, I don’t want to do that one.”

Natalie: Yeah. Yeah.

Caroline: Then you know.

Natalie: Like, try again.

Helen: Yeah, then you know, right? It’s like when you’re doing the magic eight ball and you don’t get the answer you want.

Natalie: Yeah. But, yeah, sometimes it’s good to take overthinking out of it.

Helen: Yeah. Override. Yeah.

Caroline: Okay, before we end this episode, we want to switch gears for a quick sec and ask you about your beautiful black kitty named Dale.

Natalie: Oh, Dale.

Caroline: We love Dale. Is he named after someone? How did you get him?

Natalie: Yes. Dale is, he’s about 11 and a half. So, I adopted him right after I graduated from college and I was living in Napa, California. So I adopted him from the Humane Society there. And they were having a two-for-one special on black and orange cats. Not because of Halloween but for, like, the SF Giants or something because that’s their colours. And I was like, well, “I definitely can’t get two cats. Like, I’m 21 and that’s not a good idea.” So I knew that I could only get one cat. And he was the first cat that I held and he was just like, he was three months old. So he was like, really little, he was just like purring, making biscuits. And his name at the shelter was Otto Von Biscuitmaker, which I think it is just the most incredible name. And it’s funny that I didn’t keep it, because it is a great name, and we do call him that sometimes. But I was like, okay, I can’t hold any other cats. Like, if I do, I’ll just cry. Like, this is the cat I’m taking. And I was watching a lot of King of the Hill at the time. It was my favourite show. And the character Dale Gribble, if you’re unfamiliar, is just this weirdo. He’s, like, a conspiracy theorist. He’s just, like, a weird, goofy neighbour. He’s always doing really stupid things. And I loved the character. I thought he was so funny and I just knew that I wanted to name my cat Dale Gribble. So when I went to fill out the paperwork, they asked me what his name was, and I said “Dale Gribble.” And then they just assumed that Gribble was my last name, and I had to clarify.

Helen: Oh my god.

Natalie: I was like, “No, that’s just his last name.”

Helen: I love that.

Natalie: Yeah, he’s, he’s Dale. And I mean, I know how much of my personality he is, but it’s when, like, other people ask me, whether it’s, like, you guys asking me, which just touches my heart so much, but also like friends when I haven’t seen them for a while, they’ll be like, “So how’s Dale?” And it just, I, like, almost cry every time because he just, we’re just very, very bonded. We’ve had, obviously, a long time together and he’s just a funny guy. He talks a lot. And Matt and I are just obsessed with him. I love dogs too, but I just am a cat lady deep, deep in my core.

Caroline: Aww. Yeah.

Helen: But is Dale the cat a conspiracy theorist, is my question.

Natalie: Yeah, I’m, I am sure he is. He is.

Helen: He’s always muttering away.

Natalie: Yes, he has a lot to say.

Helen: Oh, so cute. Does he ever get involved in your sewing projects or get in your way?

Natalie: Oh, yeah. He, he did, especially when I sewed from home, like, you know, I had a sewing room. I used to have a sewing room in my house and there was cat hair all over everything. And it was just, like, the classic, if you leave something important, he’s going to make a bed on it. And then that’s how I like to blame all of my unfinished projects…I’m like, “Well, now he has it, so.” And of course, now at my new studio, that’s outside of my house. I’m like, “I wish I could bring him here.”

Helen: Yeah.

Natalie: The ironing board was definitely his favourite perch for a long time.

Caroline: Oh, well, thank you so much, Natalie. We had such an amazing time talking with you today.

Natalie: Yes, thank you so much. It has been such a pleasure and such an honour and you guys are so lovely to chat with. I really appreciate it.

Caroline: Yeah. Well, tell our listeners where they can find you online.

Natalie: So my instagram is my first and last name. So it’s @natalie_ebaugh and that’s e-b-a-u-g-h. And I also have links there for my other things. So I have my studio website, which is sewingwithnatalie.com. And then on Patreon, I believe it’s also under Sewing with Natalie. So that’s where you can find me. And then our patterns are @daisychainpatterns on Instagram and daisychainpatterns.com.

Caroline: Amazing. Thank you so much. We’re going to link everything up in the show notes for our listeners. I know Helen and I are super inspired. We were just talking about upcycling some jeans in time for this episode coming out. So we’ll see if we actually get to it, but thank you so much again for coming on. It was such a great chat.

Natalie: Thank you!

Helen: Okay, bye.

Caroline: Okay, bye.

Natalie: Bye.

Helen: That’s it for today’s episode of Love to Sew. You can find me, Helen, at Helen’s Closet Patterns and Cedar Quilt Co. and Caroline at Blackbird Fabrics and BF Patterns. We’re recording today in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.

Caroline: You can support Love to Sew and get access to bonus content by subscribing on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. You even get access to the back catalogue of bonus episodes. That’s over 75 hours of Love to Sew. Go to patreon.com/lovetosew or check out our podcast page on Apple Podcasts for more info.

Helen: Head to lovetosewpodcast.com to find our show notes. They’re filled with links and pictures from this episode. And if you’d like to get in touch with us, you can leave us a message at 1-844 SEW-WHAT. That’s 1-844-739-9428. We live for your voicemails. So please call us. Or you can send us an email at [email protected].

Caroline: Thank you to our amazing podcast team. Lisa Ruiz is our creative assistant. Jordan Moore of The Pod Cabin is our editor. And thank you for listening! We will talk to you next week.

Helen: Buh bye!

Caroline: Bye!

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