how to make a denim skirt, denim skirt flat felled seam, how to make a flat felled seam

How to Make Your Own Clothes..., from Your Very First Stitch to the Runway

Flat-Felled Seam Denim Skirt...

How to turn an ordinary Skirt pattern into a Flat-Felled Seam Denim Skirt

Turn an ordinary denim skirt pattern into an adorable skirt with strong and decorative flat-felled seams.

	You can turn an ordinary skirt pattern into a denim skirt with flat-felled seams. Flat-felled seams are the seams you find on your denim jeans. It is a strong seam and looks very professional. It looks nice if you have a contrasting thread color. Follow pattern directions for pinning and cutting out your skirt.
	You may use a flat-felled seam on side seams, front seam, and back seam. DO NOT use the flat-felled seam on the seam that requires a zipper. For the skirt shown here, the zipper went in the back, so a regular seam was stitched there. Unlike a regular seam pinning and sewing the seam pretty sides together, a flat-felled seam is pinned and sewn UGLY sides together using a 5/8" seam allowance..
	Once you have pinned and sewn your seam trim ONE of the seam allowances down close to the stitching line as shown in the photo.
	The biggest secret of a perfect and professional looking flat-felled seam would be to PRESS it flat. Press it again and again. Fold the seam allowance that you did not trim, under 1/4" and PRESS, PRESS, and PRESS, and pin as shown in the photo.

Stitch close to the fold that you just pressed. Stitch as straight as you can keeping your line even.

This photo shows a flat-felled seam sewn with contrasting rust color thread against the blue denim.

Notice the 2 lines of stitching. The first was formed by the seam stitching you did. The second was formed by the folding, pressing, and then stitching you did.

Top stitching and flat-felled seams must be done neatly and accurately to achieve professional looking seams and garments as shown in the photo.

To Learn More About Making Your Own Clothes we suggest Christine Haynes book Chic and Simple Sewing . It's our favorite sewing book to use for beginners in our studio, and patterns are included. We also recommend Project RUNWAY DVDs to view as an excellent guide for fashion design.