Laminated Fabric - 10 Tips

Summer.  That's my excuse.  Two weeks away from my blog has me feeling a bit guilty, but I have enjoyed guests at the cabin and a few peaceful sewing days.

Mom and her bucket

My mom visited and I was able to give her the bucket she had requested when we went fabric shopping last month.  She will be able to use it as a waste basket in her sea side decorated powder room because the inside is laminated cotton fabric and will stay nice and clean.

Working with Laminated fabric was fun and not near as hard as I thought it would be.

 10 tips for sewing with laminated cotton fabric:

 

1.  Don't let the fabric store fold the fabric.  Have them roll it.  (Mine was so creased from the store)

 

2.  Pressing the fabric on the wrong side works just fine.  I used a hot, dry iron to press the WRONG side of the fabric and eventually removed all the creases from tip #1.

 

3.  Use a heavy duty needle.  I used 100/16 Jeans/Denim Needle and never had stitching issues.

 

4.  Use a walking foot.  I didn't put tape or oil on my pressure foot, I just used my walking foot through the complete project and it worked like a dream. 

 

5.  Take longer stitches.  I used a stitch length of 3.0 on my Janome and it seemed to work great.  I even back stitched with no problems.

 

6.  Do not use pins on the project unless they are in the allowance that won't be seen.  Those holes from the pins will stay...

 

7.  Fabric glue works great to hold pieces temporarily until they are sewn.  I used a drop of glue to hold the handles in place until they were stitched. 

 

8.  Clips instead of pins.  I used double pronged hair clips to hold seams together instead of pins.  (As a hairstylist, I have lots of uses for hair clips.  They work great for holding binding in place, also.)

9.  After reading other tutorials about interfacing and laminated fabric, I opted to use "sew in" interfacing instead of fusible on the laminate.  Moisture could affect the fabric and make it wrinkle and I didn't want to take a chance of ruining the fabric.

10.  This was very scary for me...   For the binding on this bucket, I needed to use the laminated fabric.  I turned my iron to a cool to warm setting (not hot..lol) and folded my 2 1/2" strip of fabric in half (wrong sides together) and pressed the outside of the fabric.  wwhhew.  It's all good.  It wasn't crisp, but it worked better than finger pressing and no melted vinyl on the iron.


Other useful sites and tutorials to help conquer laminated fabric: 
http://www.rileyblakedesigns.com/laminate-tips/

http://www.amybutlerdesign.com/pdfs/Laminated_Tips.pdf

http://www.justlaminates.com/p/sewing-tips-for-laminated-fabric.html

http://www.craftsy.com/article/tips-for-sewing-with-oil-cloth-vinyl-laminated-cotton

I loved mom's bucket enough to make one for myself for a Friday finish that I am linking up with Amanda Jean over at Crazy Mom Quilts , Sarah over at Confessions of a Fabric Addict. and Karen over at Sew Many Ways.

Fabric Buckets Lined with Laminated Cotton Fabric

The pattern is Bucket Brigade by Atkinson Designs.  These are in the Large 12" x 11" size.   Fabric in the blue bucket: laminate-Andover Fabrics, High Tide by Jane Dixon, main fabric-Moda, Cuzco by Kate Spain.  Fabric in the pink bucket: (Hobby Lobby purchase) laminate-by Brother Sister Design Studio, main fabric- Northcott, Earth Series1 by Diana Leone.


This is where my nuttiness comes from....

Mom showing one of the many uses for fabric buckets

HAPPY FRIDAY!