Sewing delicate or bias cut materials
I love using silks, chiffon and other delicate fabrics in my projects, but as lovely as these materials are, they just don’t want to be sewn into neat seams. Either the fabric gets caught in the machine or your seams end up too tight or wavy. It’s always your most cherished silk fabric that the machine decides to eat up!
This trick is useful for bias cut seams but can be used any time a material needs some extra stability.
Simply place some thin paper underneath when sewing (in my case, pages from a Chinese catalogue of some kind! Most phone books and catalogues have the perfect type of paper for this) and watch a temperamental silk turn into a dream to sew.
When finished, gently rip off the paper along both sides and pick out the remaining bits with a set of tweezers.
Customer response :
I bought a stack of tissue paper (the kind you use for giftwrap), put it on a cutting board which is safe for a cutting wheel, and slice thru it using a guide of some sort. I have a large clear plastic (13 x 13″) thing with slits at intervals. In no time you can cut enough strips to last a year. You will be more likely to use paper strips if you have them cut already.
Signed: Messed up seams because I didn’t want to leave the machine to cut paper!