Recommendations on scissors?

I'm planning ahead for Christmas this year, and my girlfriend does an enormous amount of sewing. Specifically, she spends a few hours every day dressmaking.

If I wanted to buy her the best shears I could find, where would I look, what brands would I be looking at, and what size(s) would be most useful?

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Reply to
mrsix
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I find scissors are a bit like cars and shoes: very much a try before you buy deal. Personally, I like my Fiskars and Kai scissors very much. Stainless steel and lighter than forged scissors of the same size, which is great for my small hand that suffer from Fibromyalgia. I've never got on with the sprung type.

Reply to
Kate XXXXXX

IMHO, the choice is way too personal to be made by someone other than the user, no matter how well intentioned. Why not give her a gift certificate, promising $$$ for her choice of scissors.

For instance, I have:

3 pairs of Marks/Mundial 9" pinking shears 2 pairs of Gingher 8" bent trimmers (one plain edge, one serrated edge) 1 pair of Wiss 8" bent shears 4 pair of Gingher 4" tailor's point scissors 6 pairs of Littauer scissors (for clipping embroidery threads but also very useful for unpicking seams)

I also still have my original pair of 12" Wiss pinking shears (no longer used, too big for my hands now), the set of three Wiss scissors (8", 5" and 3") in a leather case won for placing first in the 1954 Singer Sewing contest, and at least four pairs of my mother's scissors, most of which I still use on occasion.

And about a half dozen pairs of Fiskars and assorted inexpensive shears used for cutting paper, trimming the dog, etc.

Reply to
BEI Design

What a thoughtful gift idea; good for you! I'm pretty sure the 7" bent dressmaker Ginghers would be wonderfully welcome. They are excellent scissors and ! the nice Gingher people will adjust and sharpen them when they become dull. I think their fee is something like $7 and it's just like getting a new pair. However ! my Moma, who was quite superstitious, said it was very bad luck to give somebody a sharp present. When she gifted someone scissors or perhaps a pocket knife, she insisted that she had to sell it to them instead of 'giving'. 2¢ was the price. Polly

Reply to
Polly Esther

I second the idea that they are try-before-you-buy items. So I would recommend that you make her a custom gift voucher for a pair of dressmaking shears and give her that for Christmas. Then you can go out with her and buy them once she has chosen a pair that fits her hands.

Lizzy

Reply to
Lizzy Taylor

I agree with the others, it's a very personal choice. The spring loaded ones Kate doesn't like, I love.

Here's a good place to look at different kinds:

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Will give you some idea of pricing too. What you might think about doing is calling Atlanta Thread and asking if they do gift certificates. I'm sure they'd be happy to do something like that for you. Any of the suppliers would, Atlanta was just the first one to spring to mind for me. Then give her the gift certificate. Scissors would be a great gift, but there might be another tool she's really longing for, and she could use the GC for that.

Sharon

Reply to
mamahays

I'm also going to say that it's got to be tried in hand. For my money, though, I'll take the Kai standard shears, then the Kai professional shears, then other stuff. The Kai standard shears are very light in the hand, nice balance, very sharp, and they'll sharpen them for free if you mail them to the plant in Tualatin, OR.

Fairly complete catalog of Kai scissors at

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use the Kai N7300 for stuff like cutting 8 layers of cotton twill atonce. For a few layers of fabric, I reach for the N5250 or N5275s most ofthe time, and I use the N5100 for thread trimmers (get the lanyard, too.) Size for general purpose sewing shears: biggest blades she can comfortably open her hand with. For most women, that's 9.5-11" shears. Bent trimmer design, because you want to keep the blade of the shears flat on the table while cutting, and you want to cut from close to the pivot to close to the tip in one long stroke for best accuracy.

If she works a lot with lace and has to do precision trimming, then the lace scissors here (#1519):

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And if you just want some nice small handwork scissors in a very fancy case:
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Kay

Reply to
Kay Lancaster

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