How to move a side or waist seam dart - Video tutorial

How to move a side or waist seam dart - Video tutorial

In today's video, I'll be showing you a simple pattern adjustment that you can do to move along a side or waist seam. Darts are most often used to shape the bust or waist and are usually found in side or waist seams. Because we all have different bodies, you’ll sometimes get a better fit if you move the dart just slightly. In the video and diagrams, I'll show you how to move a bust dart up or down along a side seam and how to move a waist seam dart to the left or right. (Note, there are more complicated pattern adjustments where you can pivot a dart to move it to a different seam. I’m not covering how to do that in this post.)

How to lengthen or shorten the rise of a pants pattern

How to lengthen or shorten the rise of a pants pattern

One reason people often recommend starting off sewing a skirt rather than pants is that skirts are usually much easier to fit than pants. That crotch curve can create all sorts of fitting dilemmas and one of the easiest to solve is the rise, also called the crotch depth or crotch length. In today’s video tutorial, I’ll show you how to shorten and lengthen the crotch depth evenly across the front and back. And as a bonus, I’ll show you how to adjust only the back rise. This is a really simple pattern adjustment to make and very useful if you are petite or tall (like me!)

Two Ways to Make a Full Bust Adjustment - Lou Box Top SEWALONG

Two Ways to Make a Full Bust Adjustment - Lou Box Top SEWALONG

In today’s blog post and video, we will be showing you how to make a full bust adjustment to the Lou Box Top pattern. If you haven’t already read it, we recommend reading our post and watching the video about selecting your size and measuring yourself. To recap that post, we recommend making a full bust adjustment to this pattern if your bust/full bust is 4 or more inches larger than your upper bust. This pattern has plenty of ease but during the testing phase, we discovered that if you have a full bust, the hem of the top may lift up and look uneven. A full bust adjustment will help solve that issue.

Because the Lou Box Top is designed for both woven and knit fabrics, we have two methods for how to do the full bust adjustment (FBA for short). The first method will create a dart at the side seam. The second will have no dart. If you are using woven fabric you can use either method. If you are using knit fabric, we recommend the method without a dart.