I am making dresses for my bridesmaids and am trying to choose fabric. Is crepe-back satin difficult to work with? I‘ve heard that regular satin is quite slippery? I don‘t want the dresses to go wrong!Thanks for your help!
All you really have to do is get enough oxygen to a fire in an enclosed space, and something that burns hot, like coal or charcoal. Bellows are very effective for that. You don't need modern technology to smelt iron. modern tech is based on the ideas of ancient tech, after all.
Invented by the Chinese, about 5,000 years ago, it's called a double force blower similar to a billows, but it blows both ways, it was able to blow enough oxygen into the furnace to increase heat to the point of melting iron. When carbon was added to the mix (Charcoal) it made STEEL. Edit: Originally meteors that fell from the sky were call gifts from the gods and it took many years to find a way to melt them. The weapons that they made were better than the weapons of copper or bronze that were in use at the time. It was found that the red earth, could be melted, and a stone like the ones that fell from the sky could be made here on earth. Iron was born. Harder than the green sand, that made copper, it was from the GODS! It changed the world
It is a problem fabric but if you give yourself plenty of time and work slowly, you'll come out all right. Be realistic about how much time you need for each dress. It will take months to finish all the dresses. Cut on the bias if you can afford the extra fabric. Just place your pattern pieces carefully because there will be diagonal grain lines and you want to control the direction of the lines. Use a fine cotton or cotton/silk thread. Use a walking foot to counteract the slipperiness. If you use pins, pull them out before the needle gets to it. Use a size 10 needle and a wide stitch, and a slow pedal speed to avoid puckering at the seams. Make sure your bobbin is wound slowly, for even thread tightness on the bobbin. Pull the seams tight in front and back as you sew, without helping it through the feed dogs. Practice on some long test pieces first. Hold them up in different light and see what I mean about the grain lines. Look at the seams and see how badly they pucker. A little puckering will be there even on a store-bought gown. Good luck! .
Crepe satin is easy to work with, more so that silk satin or fine crepe. It is slippery but that's easy to take care of if you use plenty of pins while sewing seams. One thing that I would encourage is to place your machine on a large surface so that the fabric doesn't hang over a table edge. Gravity is not satin's friend, especially while sewing, and the fabric's weight can pull things askew. Be sure the peices are well supported while being sewn. The weight of fabric hanging down can cause more trouble than anything else. If you have one of those extenders for the sewing machine arm, like the ones quilters use, then use that when sewing your dresses. When cutting the fabric try to keep the width and length on the table or somehow supported, over hanging edges can distort the fabric as it's being pinned and cut. Crepe satin should be sewn with a good long staple polyester thread and a new sharp needle. Pins should also be sharp with no burrs, so polish off any burrs with a crocus cloth or that little strawberry sharpener attached to the tomato pin cushion. burs will snag the fabric. Try not to unpick seams, again that can snag the fabric. Test press scraps of fabric before sewing, too much heat can discolour some satins and try to keep all pressing on the wrong side. If it's a polyester crepe satin, then the raw edges can be overlocked on a serger for a professional finish. If you don't have a serger, the zig zag stitch will work, or you can use pinking shears. Use a low temp melt fusible interfacing, use a light weight non woven. Crepe satin hold it's shape well once sewn. Other than that, I can't think of anything special, I've sewn it so many times and I can't remember one project that caused any major problems.
