FASHION : Step-by-Step Sewing Tips for the ‘Designer’ Look
Celia Morrissette is one woman who truly has it made.
Employed by Vogue/Butterick Patterns to keep home sewing alive in America, she makes store appearances wearing clothes made by 12 company seamstresses.
The only drawbacks, from an outsider’s point of view, are the labels. They have the pattern number printed in ball-point pen on them, bringing to mind the inside of a military uniform. But Morrissette isn’t complaining.
Dressed in an Anne Klein suit, Vogue Pattern 2067, she explained: “It’s a big help having the number there. Sometimes I need to look.”
She had just finished a show-and-tell session at the House of Fabrics in Glendale, and, much to her satisfaction, the audience had failed to distinguish the authentic Perry Ellis, Anne Klein II or Bellville Sassoon from the pattern, allowing Morrissette to expound the virtues of home sewing.
The Perry Ellis full-legged pants and double-breasted short jacket, for example, cost $92.50 made from scratch, or $400 store-bought. The pleats had been changed to face toward the zipper to give “flatness in the tummy area.”
And if the pants had been for Morrissette, who is 5-foot-3, she would have had the wide legs reduced “about 1 1/2 inches so they wouldn’t be so overwhelming. That’s the beauty of sewing,” she told the all-female audience that was standing among bolts of fabric.
In town to promote “The Vogue/Butterick Step-by-Step Guide to Sewing Techniques,” published by Prentice Hall, Morrissette talked about techniques that add “to the designer look,” such as the hand-worked buttonholes and saddle stitching on her bright blue suit. College student Lisa Bogue, who had come in to buy the book and won it instead in a drawing, asked for tips on making a flawless suit lapel. An English major at Cal State L.A., she explained she was “almost ready to get out of college and I need suits. But all the ones I’ve seen are $200 and made in a rayon gabardine that wrinkles.”
Bogue said she began sewing, and not that long ago, with a lace T-shirt. “It was so exciting. But I still can’t sew silk.”
Morrissette gave two tips: Use cotton thread and put tissue paper, which can be pulled out later, between the layers of fabric “so the material doesn’t slip and bunch.”
The Vogue/Butterick ambassador explained she was introduced to sewing in a 7th-grade home economics class. “But it isn’t taught in many schools anymore. It’s going to become a dying art. Perhaps it should be called ‘creative sewing.’ People will spend $100 for a handmade sweater and yet the word homemade has a negative connotation.”
But the art isn’t completely dead: “We’re finding the career woman is spending more time at home. She’ll make something for the house first, because it’s easy; there are only straight seams. She has success doing that and then she makes something for her children. She gets positive reinforcement from that and then will make something for herself, not only to save money but because she enjoys doing it.”
The savings can be substantial: “If she buys a lined skirt, she’ll pay close to $100. If she makes it, she doesn’t even need a yard of fabric. There are two seams, a waistband and a zipper. It’s so easy, including the lining, which is set into the waistband. Using even the best quality fabric, she can make the skirt for under $35.”
Morrissette suggests that a beginner “use material with a little print or texture, because a solid will show mistakes more easily.” Elasticized shorts and simple tank tops are good starter pieces.
Along with the book, help is available from the Vogue/Butterick hot line: (800) 221-2670 and ask for consumer services. Of course, the hours can be a little tricky. Morrissette recalled that when a woman in Kansas City learned the hot line operates from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, she complained: “All my questions are at 3 in the morning.”
