Trousers (pants) are worn quite wide at the moment and also long, giving a large "break". Can anyone tell me how to do a hem (at the end of the leg!) which is "dropped"; that is, longer at the back than at the front. Due to the angle, the turned-in material no longer distributes itself evenly inside the leg. Any hints on how to cope with this? Thanks.
I HATE HEMMING!!!! So I do it as quick and dirty as I can.
Once, my DFIL presented me with *nine* pairs of trousers to hem exactly as you describe. I used two methods. One was to put a tiny tuck in the fabric at each seam and stitch each tuck down carefully by hand. The other was to run a gathering stitch along the bulky hem edge, press it dead flat and then stitch it with the machine.
The second method works much better than you might imagine, especially if you're doing flares.
HTH,
One approach is to make the hem as narrow as possible.
Another is to face the edge instead of hemming it.
Joy Beeson
To give the front hem edge a little extra ease so that it can be stitched without puckering the trousers, I sometimes undo part, perhaps half, of the turned-up portion of the side seam and inseam seams and spread them open just a little. If you do this it's a good idea to secure the partially opened seams with a few whip stitches.
Doreen in Alabama
Thank you all for your helpful replies. I will first try Doreen's method on an old pair! Joy, what does "facing the edge" mean in this context? TIA
Hee! I'm jumping in here because I faced a hem myself this morning! LOLOLOL!
Facing a hem is what you do when you've stupidly neglected to leave enough excess fabric to turn up much of a hem (say you've only got 1/4" to turn up, for example). In my case, I made two little nightdresses for my great-nieces and *forgot to leave anything for hems!!!!* (I can't believe I did that!)
Since I was running very low on the nightdress fabric (a 'Dora' satin print), I just cut some strips of nice cotton voile and used that for my 'hems'. I sewed it onto the bottoms of the nighties, overlocked the raw edge, pressed the stitched-on bit upward and then caught up the hem by hand just as if it were a real hem.
Just cut a bit of fabric the length of the required hem and as deep as you want your new hem to be. You place it, right sides facing, on the outside of the hem and sew along where the extreme end of the garment will be. Then, you turn it inside out, press the 'seam' you've made and hem as usual.
I've used extra-wide bias tape for this purpose and it works very well, especially for a slightly shaped garment, such as an A-line dress or flared trouser legs. Careful pressing makes the difference, I find.
HTH
When using facing to deal with a curved hem, you need to cut a facing the same shape as the bottom of the trouser leg. (This is easy when making from scratch, because you just copy the pattern used for cutting the leg. When altering, you'll have to lay the leg on paper and poke pins through the pants to make your facing pattern.)
When applying a bias-tape facing, as mentioned in the previous post, you can get away with sewing a straight facing to a curved hem because the tape is very narrow, and it stretches. (Try to ease it on when the curve is concave, and stretch it a bit when the curve is convex.)
Another plan is to leave just a seam allowance at the hem, turn it to the inside, then applique' something over the raw edge: bias tape, narrow all-cotton twill tape (polyester tape doesn't have enough give), rick-rack, seam binding, hemming lace, ribbon -- anything you can find and like the looks of that will bend around the curve.
And that will stand up to being cleaned the same way as the pants. Don't forget to wash it first, if the hem will ever get wet.
Joy Beeson
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