Sewing Tip – How to Eliminate Thread Build Up Sewing Hemlines

I’m currently working on the step by step photographed tutorial for my next sewing pattern and was including my little tip for eliminating thread build up when sewing hemlines and I thought I’d share it here with you too.

It’s just a quick little tip but it really give a nice clean neat finish when sewing a hem.

This example is a dress with a 1/2″ hem allowance.  As it’s a doll’s dress it’s only a tiny little hem and if there was any thread build up on the outside of the dress it would be really noticeable.

Ok.. On to sewing the hemlines

Finish the raw edge of the hem

First off finish the raw edge of the hem using either a Zig Zag or an Overcast stitch on your sewing machine, or serge the edge to provide a neat clean finish.  In my example I’ve used a 3 thread narrow edge finish using my BabyLock serger.

Fold hemline up by 1/2″ and pin in place

Let’s start sewing…

Begin stitching on the back of the dress near the side seam without back stitching… that’s the important part… don’t back stitch to lock the stitches in place as this is what causes thread build up.

Simply lower your presser foot insert the sewing needle and begin stitching the hemline working your way all around the hem.  As you get close to where you started your stitching be sure to line up your needle with the stitches at the beginning of the hem and trim off the thread tails.   Then continue to sew over the previous stitching by about 1/2″ (1.2cm) or a finger width.  Again don’t back stitch!

There’s no need to back stitch as the overlapping stitches lock the threads into place and keep the hem nice and secure.   For a little added security if you are concerned that your stitches might come loose you can reduce the stitch length of the overlapping stitches to around a stitch length of 1 but it’s not really necessary.

 

Here you can see what the overlapping stitches look like from the inside… well… actually you can’t really see them too well which is why I’ve had to point them out to you 🙂

I find it’s a great way to sew hemlines as it provides such a neat clean finish without any thread build up.

And here’s what your hem stitching looks like from the right side.  This is a pretty close up view… remember this is a little doll’s dress with a 1/2″ hem allowance, and it’s still pretty hard to see where the hem stitching starts and stops.  It would be even less noticeable when using a matching thread.

Here in this example I’ve use a contrasting thread for the hem and it’s still barely noticeable unless you really look closely for it.

So there you go that’s my little sewing tip for sewing hems and eliminating thread build up.

You can use this technique to finish and hemlines on any garments.  It’s great for sleeve hems and pants hem finishes too now that you know…

Til next time

Happy Sewing

xx Chris

 

 

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