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Dress straps

Dress straps

Perfect dress straps

vogue 8974

We often have to create straps for garments – you can see I have almost finished this 1950’s sundress with crossover straps travelling from the back to the front. Getting them flat and even in width is what we are aiming for so this week’s top tip offers a few techniques for achieving lovely straps.

Lemon straps

Lemon straps

  1. Press the straps right sides together – this helps to keep the strap width even as you have a pressed line to follow later on.

 

Straps rights sides together

Straps rights sides together

 

  1. Buy a rouleaux turner – they are excellent and will make life so much easier.

 

Rouleaux or loop turner

Rouleaux or loop turner

 

  1. Pressing – once you have stitched down one long edge and turned it through you are going to press your strap twice.

First pressing – with the seam line travelling down the centre of the strap – this allows you to press out any potential folds and press the seam allowances inside the strap over to one side consistently.

 

 

Press with the seam in the middle first

Press with the seam in the middle first

Second pressing – push the seam line to run down the edge of the strap and press – you should notice you don’t have any excess folds of fabric over the stitched line. You can also check the width of the strap by finding the original pressed line (step 1) is in place.

Pressed strap

Pressed strap

You may wish to add additional edge stitching if the strap is particularly long to prevent the strap twisting. Topstitching can also add a decorative effect.  Sometimes you may also wish to add a band of fusible interfacing to stabilise the strap and prevent is stretching.

In stitches,

 

Amanda x

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