Artisan Square didn’t fail me. The lovely Ann (winner of the first Great British Sewing Bee) offered these advice on working with lambswool interlining:

• “You don’t  need to preshrink it – it’s not suitable for use in anything that’s going to be laundered.”
• “It will take heat and steam that you would use on wool, but shouldn’t need much.”
• “It’s a knit – treat it as such.”
• “Don’t stretch it at all when pressing – use a light touch just to smooth it if necessary.”

See the full discussion thread at Artisan Square.

The discussion also confirmed that this one from Bergen Tailors & Cleaners Supply Corp in the US is the real deal. It has thin open criss-cross threads that runs diagonally and thick fluffy threads that run length-wise. It’s stretchy in one direction (cross-wise), but stable in the other direction (length-wise). Someone else identified another US source for it, but this one is a bit more expensive. 

…which I missed 🙁     (Photo Credit: Houser of Pinheiro)

I’m totally gutted that I missed last last Saturday’s London Sewist Massive Meet-Up. Judging by Did You Make That and the Sewing Princess‘ blogs, it was a total blast. My biggest mistake it seems was not being subscribed to the organiser’s blog (House of Pinheiro) yet. (Thanks Google, for making it difficult to keep on top of my blog subscriptions with your threat of impending Google Reader retirement.)

That and having a doctor’s appointment booked for the day. Bummer.

With that in mind, I’m posting advanced notice that I will be visiting NYC June 6-11 (Thursday – Tuesday). Anyone free to meet up for sewing chat, fabric shopping, gossip, whatever? Email me at piackdy(at)gmail(dot)com if you’re up for meeting up! (Sorry for the inconvenient email address format – trying to keep spambots at bay.)

Cheers!
Pia

If you’ve read my pattern reviews before you’d know I’m big on mug shots. I wish everyone post them. I find them really useful when deciding to go for a pattern or not.

I’m very glad Vogue & Butterick seem to have started showing mug shots for their new patterns – at least on their websites if not the pattern envelope. Now they just need to get the model’s hair out of the way, and maybe choose plain fabric in colors that would really show up the style lines! But it’s a step in the right direction in my book.

Doesn’t entirely replace the pattern review communities like Pattern Reviews, Burdastyle, or sewing blogs of course. Fit models are still models with unrepresentative body shapes. Seeing examples of a design on different people really brings the pattern to life. And frequently you get great ideas from their different creative interpretations of the same pattern. But it’s good to see pattern companies taking note of online trends.

What about you? What would cinch the deal for you when it comes to pattern selection? (For a project that is. I know I’m not the only one to collect patterns just because I can!)