projects in progress

Sounds lovely. I dearly love self coloured embroidery. :)

I'm playing with Wild Ginger's Boutique and celebrations at the moment... And looking to get their Curves before September! I'll admit I've gone from a sceptic to a religious convert in a week! :P

I use the same pattern pieces for outer and lining when doing this. The one I'm doing at present gets sewn at neckline and down the back, and the hem (with seam splits in it) and armholes (no sleeves) get hand finished. :) Silk crepe de chine, lined with silk shot habotai!

Pray! ;)

Honestly, it just takes practice: the more you sew seams the better you get at them. Go slowly rather than trying to do them too fast. I always think it takes less time to sew a seam once slowly than to sew it fast and unpick it and sew it again... On light weight fabrics, lessen you presser foot pressure.

The lining should be just the *tiniest* bit smaller in each dimension (but especially side-to-side) than the fashion fabric. I usually don't cut the pieces differently, rather I line up the pieces with the lining about an eighth of an inch beyond the fashion fabric when I sew them together. Test this out: place the lining and the fashion fabric pieces together, fashion fabric at the bottom. Then use a paper towel tube (or something similar) and "roll" the two together. When you finish, the lining will protrude a bit beyond the fashion fabric at the far edge. It's the same when you sew them together, the "inside" needs to be a bit smaller then the "outside".

Beverly

If you use patterndrafting software, this would be simple to achieve by just changing the seam allowance from 5/8" to 1/2", and printing one set of each.

At least this is true of the Wild G> The lining should be just the *tiniest* bit smaller in each dimension

Pattern drafting software!!! (I requested mine for a combined birthday/wedding anniv. present about three years ago, and I swear by it rather than at it).

Olwyn Mary in New Orleans.

We TRIED to tell ya! Been nagging for years!! Glad you finally came to your senses.

Olwyn Mary in New Orleans.

One of these days I'll give it a try. Right now I'm really enjoying doing it the old fashioned way. Cut myself a master pattern out of cardboard and am having a blast slashing/spreading and moving bits around. I don't know if doing it on the computer would have quite the same amusement value :)

-Liz

I just have to ask what you do with all those separate sheets you print out. Tape them together? And is that what you use for the pattern? Is this what everyone who uses pattern drafting software does?

Phae

Good for you. :) It's not as difficult as most people think.

One really good use I can see for pattern software is the manipulation of existing designs from the many pattern companies. Otherwise, you're reinventing a lot of wheels. Giving me a quick way to make that latest Montana suit or that 1942 vintage pattern fit my very non-standard figure would be fabulous. But I know of no pattern software that can do that. No patterns are yet digitized--- sold on CD instead of or in addition to paper. Moreover, when you want to print a pattern you have to tape lots of separate sheets together or take your CD to a print shop since there is yet to be a home device for doing that to scale. I'm still waiting for someone to explain the advantage to me or the time savings. I just don't see it unless you're doing totally original and complicated designs from scratch.... end even then, I have my doubts given the current technology.

Phae

I started out taping them, and quickly learned that was too fiddly. Now I use a liquid glue with a small applicator tip, like Elmer's Gel School Glue. It's cheap, and applies a thin line of glue, which is all you need for the 1/4" overlap of the tiles of paper pattern. Also, I just use

8.5" X 11" paper, but many use legal-sized paper, or even larger, which means fewer tiles.

Phae, you can pretty much copy any design with the Wild Ginger software, at least (I'm not as familiar with the other programs; someone else can speak to them). It's basically a computer method of flat pattern drafting, which is how most patterns are created, anyway. (Except for draped patterns, which is a whole 'nother animal).

First of all, the software c> One really good use I can see for pattern software is the manipulation

I could see doing a combination. Use the drafting software to make a custom sloper, perfect the fit in muslin, make a master from the muslin, and use that forever after. The first step of drafting the sloper took forever - I used the Armstrong text and a lot of swear words.

-Liz

See, this is why I like the software. After all that swearing and drafting, all you end up with is a sloper! Then you have to apply wearing ease, design ease, plus design details! It's a lot of work, from my point of view.

I demo the software a lot for pe> I could see doing a combination. Use the drafting software to make a custom

Actually, my best sticking tool so far has been a 'glue tape' thing: lays down a layer of slightly tacky glue that sticks hard when you press it down. That works a treat.

This was one of the points that put me off initially, but in fact as all the sheets are numbered and labelled and have lining up points, it doesn't really take long, and you wouldn't have to do EVERY sheet in a big skirt: you could glue down the ones with the lines onto dot&cross, and save time on all the blank acreage in the middle! :)

I'm

We have explained it over and over on these boards. You just aren't prepared to listen. It comes with a money-back guarantee. If you were willing to try something instead of just making nasty comments, you might learn something.

Olwyn Mary in New Orleans

No, but some of us find it utterly tedious. I am also numerically challenged, in part die to the dyslexia, and this takes all the agony out of that bit.

So had I but...

If you are an awkward fit, this software allows you to make and store a set of personal measurements that make a sloper that fits really well. Thereafter, it allows you to design whatever you like, from boned wedding gowns to bras and swimsuits, tailored jackets and slinky frocks and print out a pattern that is made to those measurements.

Getting the sloper to fit and re-printing it takes less time than re-drawing it by hand, even with stick-together time. You get expert guidance through the process, and then that sloper set of adjusted measurements is what the patterns are based on.

Just look at this: I want to have a certain design for four bridesmaids, all different sizes. With this I can do that and have a design exclusive to that bride for less time than doing it by hand, and for less time and effort than taking a commercial pattern and fidgeting with it for each of the gals to make it fit, and it will be sized for all of them. I don't have to worry about it not going up to a size 28 or down to a size six, and I can even make a kids version. For simpler designs without waistlines I'll probably (heresy to the purists, I know!) get away with not making a sloper, and just doing a toile of the dress itself.

ALL flat pattern making is based on a sloper drawn to the specific measurements of the customer. This is a CAD package for doing that process: it then makes the design pattern for you, with whatever seam allowance and ease you like, and all you do is tape it together and run with it. There are certain pre-set items in each package, but the editor allows you to to slash and pivot, add style lines and alter things to your heart's content.

The different programs allow you to do different types of clothing, based on different types of sloper... You need a different sloper for a leotard from the one for a coat, for example, and different again for a wedding dress or a boned basque. Yes there is a learning curve, but having started as a complete sceptic and utterly reluctant pattern drafter, I can now say after making two slopers for myself (neither of which is 100% right yet, but BOTH of which fit me better than any commercial pattern I've used in the last 30 years!) that once I have learned to drive the software properly, it will be much better than any commercial pattern I have ever used, INCLUDING my current rave pattern for my very tall bridesmaid that is hand drawn and cost £45!

As for the time saved in trying to find patterns exactly like the designs my customers want, buying the closest, and then altering them to do what is required... Well, it could have saved me DAYS of work! :) One day I may find room for and own a 36" plotter, but meanwhile the taping exercise isn't too onerous, and one becomes deft and speedy very quickly. And that part can always be delegated to boys with a bent for sticking things together and a need to earn a little extra pocket money. Put them on piece-rates, and deduct the cost of spoiled sheets from the total. :P

Question, Kate (or maybe Karen M. or Melinda): If you absentmindedly grabbed a sheet to make a shopping list or write down a phone number, could you direct the program to print *just that one sheet* again? Or would you have to print the whole thing?

Beverly (still debating with myself)

I'm going light this summer, as I'll be moving in mid-August. I have to finish the new Minstrosity banner tonight, and I have another bodice all cut that needs to be finished, but then things start getting packed up for the move.

One bit of fun - I painted myself green and dressed up as the Statue of Liberty to try and win an IKEA gift card on Tuesday. Didn't win the big $250 prize, but got a $25 gift card, an IKEA umbrella, and a free breakfast at their cafe. It helped me get the couch I will need for the new apartment (finally scaling up from a studio to a 1BR)

------------------------------------------------------ Wendy Z Chicago, IL (Moo) Wench Wear Costumes

#525 AIM=wendylady525"Though she be but little, she is fierce""It's the little ones you have to watch out for...""I'm not short - I'm concentrated"--------------------------------------------------------

What I'd like to know is exactly how you move a specific design from the paper pattern into the software--- the specifics. Let's say I have this complicated asymmetrical Vogue Miyake pattern I want to alter to fit me. How do I employ the software to make that happen? What steps must I take? That is what would be helpful to me.

I really hate to point this out but it really does not take that many individual elements or variables to arrive at so many permutations. With a blouse, for instance, if you have just ten each of different collars, sleeves, hems, dart arrangements, closures and pocket details, you already have one million permutations! So that is no big deal. And that is not to say that they're all going to look decent together either.

However, assuming that it was easy enough to spit a useable pattern out of such software without having to redraft it by hand anyway--- and that has yet to be demonstrated--- it might be useful for changing details on a basic pattern, already calculated to your personal measurements, that already exists in the software--- created either by you or the software designer.

That remains true for any method of pattern making, not just via computer so that reason is not operational for me. What I want to know is why it is better, easier or whatever to use these mini-CAD programs as opposed to drafting by hand.

But let's say I don't want to create designs. Let's say I am completely happy with Montana, Miyake or... maybe.... vintage Worth or Schiaparelli designs. I want to know what the designer suggests in the way of fabric or notions and how to best put the thing together without having to start from zero. I want those unique details that make it a designer original. But it would be oh so nice to have software that could somehow alter those patterns to fit me without having to make a muslin each time or go thru several pattern iterations to arrive at the right adjustments. That's what I want software to do.

Please understand that I'm not trying to give you a hard time. I really want to know!

Phae