Here's a fun fact about me that you may not know. When I was in college, I worked as a seamstress at "The Buckle". I did so many hems, tapers (it was the 90s), darts, zippers, buttons, shorts, etc. that I can probably do it in my sleep.
While the idea of hemming a pair of pants--let alone jeans--may intimidate you, don't let it. It's as simple as folding paper. I made my share of mistakes too. In my first week on the job I broke so many needles just because I was trying to treat the factory-style sewing machine like it was my little home machine. It had so much power that it would just take off like a rocket and I'd break the needle instantly! Oh, crap.
The store didn't have a supply of these industrial machine needles, but luckily there was a store in town that did have them. Just as the store manager was starting to get frustrated with my incompetence, I finally figured out how to manage the powerful machine as well as a couple of simple tricks to make the thick seams easier to sew through.
 |
| Try on the jeans. Roll them up to the length you want. |
Step one. Put on the jeans or pants and roll up just one side to where you want the new hem to be. Then take them off and lay them out smoothly on an ironing board. The next thing I do is iron the cuff. I do it because I love ironing things. No, really I want to have a visible crease line to follow. Again, just leave the other pant leg alone. It gets shored up later. If you try to do both separately you have a greater risk of them not being the same length when you're done. I've tried it both ways, and trust me this works just fine.
 |
| Press the crease. |
After you've used the iron (nice & hot & steamy is great), turn the pants inside out. Unfold the creased side and lay it flat. I like to use a fabric marker (the ink you see disappears with water and/or time) to mark my folding and cutting lines. See below:
 |
| Fabric markers are awesome! |
What you see is that I used a ruler to darken in my crease that I made earlier with the iron. This line marks the bottom of the pants after we hem them. Now, since I intend to mimic the look of the existing hem, I measured its width. I doubled that width and drew the cut line. You can see then in the photo that the cutting line is just above the existing hem.
What if your cut line falls within the existing hem? I would then use a seam ripper and take the hem out, press it, then mark the cut line. It does take more time and energy, but trying to cut through the thick hem would nearly be impossible. If that seems like too much effort, you might be asking yourself if that tiny of a hem will make enough of a difference in your garment.
 |
| Stack the pant legs. |
Stack up both of the pant legs now. Concentrate on smoothing them out and making sure they are even with one another. You don't need to worry too much about the upper half of the pants, just make sure the bottoms are lined up and you're good. Oh, and make sure your marked one is on top.
 |
| Cut BOTH at the same time along your cut mark. |
You want to make sure your layers stay stacked securely while you cut. You don't want them to get skewed in any way. As long as your scissors are nice and sharp you will be fine. If you're not entirely confident, you can always pin them together to secure them.
 |
| Ta-Da! |
At the side seams, fold the edge just up to the line and pin.
So, each pant leg now has 2 pins--one on each side seam. Use your fingers to press a fold all the way around. The pinned parts should help keep everything even. Use the hot iron to make a more intentional crease when you have it folded all around.
Once you've pressed, repeat the process. Start at the side seams and pin, then continue around until you've folded all the way around. Press again. I can't stress enough how important it is to press as you go. I also believe in pinning. Just a few--they do serve a purpose, especially when hemming. It's so easy for any kind of fabric to twist or stretch during the sewing process, resulting in a wonky hem. You don't want that.
Okay, here comes the fun part where you can release all of your frustrations. Get a hammer. Take your jeans to the floor, and whack those super thick seams 7 or 8 times with the hammer. It will crush the fibers and really help you sew through with much more ease. The industrial machine at the store was designed to tear through denim like it was butter, but even that machine did not care for those thick side seams.
 |
| A very dark picture of a hammer. |
 |
| Sew the hem. |
Sew the hem. I use guide marks on my machine to mimic the placement of the stitching on the original hem. I always slow way down and ease my needle through the thick parts even though they've been crushed.
 |
| Finished product |
And they're done. You can buy the same thread used in popular jeans at any fabric store. You know, the yellow, the orange, etc. It's there.
So, there you go. It's not difficult and usually takes me around 10 minutes or so to hem a pair of jeans.
What does a person do with all the leftover parts? At the time I worked at The Buckle I was taking a class called Fiber Manipulation. Yes, you're jealous. I loved college.
For one of my art projects in the manipulation class, I convinced the store manager to let me keep the "garbage" that was left over from my work. They were extremely tight with the security at that place, so I actually had to have the garbage bag checked before I could leave with it. It consisted of all of the cuttings from the hems, little wedges of fabric, holey pieces of jeans, etc.
I took it all home and below is what I came up with:
 |
| Big Blue |
This monster mountain of denim stood 3-4 feet tall and was quite heavy. It won a $50 Honorable Mention prize at a show at the Design College. You can see that I was way into smocking at the moment. I remember making this with pliers and huge curved upholstery needles just to work it through the material. What a beast that was!
 |
| Smocking Detail :) |
Happy Hemming Everybody!
No comments:
Post a Comment