Wednesday, June 23, 2010

additional notes for supporting tape and split sleeves

This is a response to the enquiries from Rebecca and Shams in the last post.

-How the supporting tape look?
This is what I called "the supporting tape". It is called "woolly spin tape" in Japan. It's a elastic soft tape that is actually braided bundle of "woolly" fine elastic threads, I guess. I overlocked the edge of the neckline, inserting the tape under the stitches on the wrong side of fabric. Then I folded the edge in and stitched straight from the front.

-What is the advantage of "split sleeve"?
I still don't know how you call this type of sleeves in English, but I think I can explain what I like about them. I like split sleeves because (1) they are comfortable as much as raglan sleeves are yet they look less sporty. Also, (2) they are quite magnanimous to hobby sewists.

I prefer the appearance of set-in sleeves because they look less sporty than those raglan sleeves would usually do (from the front, of course). I have no problem with wearing raglan sleeves when I play sports because they are comfortable, but they tend to look too casual on me most of the time. Split sleeves are one of good solutions, imho.
Also, I think they are easy to fit when talking about sewing. Set-in sleeves need the right shoulder point to achieve a neat look, but split sleeves allow narrower shoulders as well as broader shoulders and stretchy fabrics as well as less stretchy fabrics to use the same pattern to fit wearers, because of their rounded shoulder seam. Easy fit. Not loose fit. I do like it.

I've taken some pictures to complement my writing. I hope you can imagine what I told about it.



Happy sewing!
yoshimi

P.S. I definitely need iron-on hemming tapes or a stick glue, for basting, to sew this curved shoulders neatly.

9 comments:

  1. At least in the english knitting world, that's known as a "saddle shoulder". Not sure why ;).

    Thanks for the great descriptions!

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  2. Thanks so much for your insight, Yoshimi!!

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  3. >Jenna,
    Thank you! Yes, the curved seam reminds me of it, actually!!

    >shams,
    No problem, thanks for coming back here to check my answer!

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  4. Thanks for answering my question!

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  5. Thankyou for those close-up photos. Your buttonholes are perfect!

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  6. I'm overwhelmed by your meticulous details and I so love reading about them. Wish there's a place selling all these notions here in HK.

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  7. Yoshimi! Thank you for introducing me to Tamanegi-Kobo (though in reality I do not like tamanegi!). I just purchased the Fujiko pattern from them. They make it very easy for international shoppers with the PDF download and paypal! Chotto abunai desu ne ...

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  8. Thank you for leaving your comments, ladies!
    >Mariko, you are so right! It's easy to purchase PDF patterns from TAMANEGI-KOBO in English, because the site has many notes for the international shoppers in English. The only problem it might cause at the moment is the instructions, which are not written in English (but well illustrated). Said that, patterns are quite well-visualized (I hope you understand what I mean) about what to do, and I never thought them confusing. Fujiko is easy construction, so you'll have no problem with sewing it at all! (The real problem is that what you exactly pointed out. hehe, too many purchases because of the easy transaction...) I wish many pattern makers including Japanese ones to consider PDF patterns as well as paper ones in a common language among us, for me in English, so that we can share the experiences of sewing with the world without feeling much guilty about GHG cost for shipping patterns.

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Thank you for your comments!!