All of us here at Spool want to wish you a very happy holiday! It’s been another creative, fun and fabric filled year. We are so thankful to have so many wonderful customers we can count as friends. You guys are the best!
Spool will be closed Thanksgiving day, but we will be open our regular hours of 11-6 throughout the weekend. Do stop in and say hello! If you have family visiting, we’d love to meet them.
Happy Thanksgiving!
It’s the new Liverpool Dress from Amy Butler! Elizabeth did a lovely job stitching this up in a new Brandon Mably print. Fortunately for me, our shop mannequin just happens to wear a size Medium as well! I love a shirt dress, and I have to say I think this one is pretty close to perfect. A dress is the easiest thing to wear. It makes you look well put together, and all you have to think about is accessories. I can see myself wearing this to work (would everyday be too much?) or running errands. Pair it with boots and a pretty scarf and I’d be ready for a party!
As usual, Ms. Butler, gives us many options for this dress. It can be a shirt, a tunic, a short dress, or a long dress. Set-in sleeves can be short, elbow length, 3/4 length, or long. Ours is a long dress with elbow length sleeves. Each version has a tab collar and button placket with double dart shaping in the front and back, and a self tie belt stitched into the side seams. These options will easily take you through the seasons. If you made it in a home dec weight fabric, it would be a handsome jacket!
We are having a class in the Liverpool Dress in January. This will be a fun, workshop style class, in which we will demonstrate the crucial parts of the pattern, while you sew at your own pace. Here’s the details:
Liverpool Dress Class- $80 plus materials
Saturday, January 23 & 30: 10AM- 2PM
We recommend that you have previously made garments using a pattern, and that you come to class with all of your fabric pieces cut out and ready to sew.
Materials: Pattern, thread, 2.25- 4.75 yards fabric depending on size and style chosen. 4-7 buttons. 1/4 yard fusible interfacing.
Please call the shop to reserve your space. See you there!
With everything that’s going on this time of year, it’s fun to have a quick project that can give you a little crafting time and make your holiday table look lovely all at once. Placemats are just the thing! We just got a shipment of Shot Cottons and new prints from Kaffe Fassett. These soft hues are so autumnal, all I wanted to do was see them them all next to each other, arranging and rearranging the perfect color combinations. There was only one thing to do- make up some design rolls STAT!
A Design Roll is collection of fabrics each precut into 2.5″ strips by the width of fabric, and rolled up into a neat little package. Don’t worry, I use a fabric die cutter to ensure accuracy! Ours contain 30 strips of fabric, 5 of each print. Once the cutting is taken care of, the sewing can commence. I put together these placements in the blink of an eye. One Design Roll will make 8 placemat tops!
Here’s what I did:
1. Using a 1/4 ” seam allowance, I sewed together 9 strips- making an 18.5″ x 44″ strip set for each.
2. Then, I cut each set into 14″ blocks along the long edge, creating the perfect 18.5″ x 14″ placemat size. I got 3 mats from each strip set.
3. I cut a backing & heavy weight fusible interfacing to 18.5 ” x 14″ for each placemat, and fused the interfacing to the backings. To make 8 placemats, you’ll need 1.5 yards of each.
4. I layered and pinned the fronts and backs, then machine quilted through all the layers. I did a different random design for each and used a few different thread colors.
5. I bound each placemat with premade bias binding. You will need 2 yards for each mat. We have a slightly iridescent one at the shop that gives a little holiday shine.
Done and done! I love how pretty they are, but love how fast they were to make even more. My Kaffe Design Rolls are available in the shop and online. Now, which one to play with next?!
We had an amazing Saturday in our Jump Rope Dress workshop with Oliver + S designer, Liesl Gibson. Look at all those cuties and their dresses! The students had a wonderful time with Liesl, who is so knowledgeable and so sweet. Her stitching expertise got our eager seamstresses well on their way to creating truly beautiful garments.
Liesl did demonstrations throughout the day, to illustrate the crucial points in making this adorable dress. She covered button plackets, collars, set in sleeves, and gathered pockets. Whew! The ladies in class got to work!
Everyone had amazing focus and it really paid off. Here’s Eve working on the dress placket. She is using one of my favorite new Kaffe Fassett prints. I can’t wait to see a photo of her niece wearing this beauty.
Even though we all worked hard, there were plenty of laughs, as shown by Julie with her Lady Gaga-style ironing!
It was really fun for me to see everyone have their own “Eureka!” moments with their sewing after having Liesl’s careful instruction. Seeing Liesl is always a pleasure for me, and I feel as though I could talk to her forever about sewing, business, and life in general. If you missed this weekend’s workshop, never fear! We are already talking about having her back in 2010. Thanks so much to Liesl and everyone who came and made her feel welcome!
There’s not much that’s better than a shiny new sewing machine! We recently got 6 new machines for our classroom at Steve’s Sewing, Vacuum & Quilting. For our beginner machine, we have the Baby Lock Natalie. She is a real workhorse and with such a pretty logo! We got 2 fancier machines as well – a Baby Lock Crafter’s Choice, and a Bernina Activa. These machines practically do all the work for you!
One of the questions I am most asked is the best place to purchase a machine. I always recommend that people buy from a sewing machine dealership. It’s important to try out various machines and speak with an expert about which one works best for your style of crafting. They will be able to help you learn to use your new machine, and repair it if need be.
For those of you who live locally, you know there isn’t a sewing machine dealer in Center City, and you may be thinking of a new machine for the holidays. A quick 30 minute ride to King of Prussia will land you at Steve’s. They deal in Bernina & Baby Lock machines, provide product support, and can repair any brand of home sewing machine. With a friendly and knowledgeable staff, they will help find the right machine for you. Jenny, the store manager, told me that they will even ship to Philadelphia for Spool customers if you can’t make it to them.
If you decide to purchase a machine at Steve’s, be sure to ask for Jenny and tell her we sent you. Then bring your receipt to Spool for 10% off your next purchase. You know you’ll want to stock up on supplies for your new baby!
Amy Butlers new line, Love, has new fabric components – one of them being flannel. Ours arrived yesterday and it’s ridiculously soft, pretty and bright. At 44″ wide and $10/yard, these would make luxe quilt backings or linings for jackets and scarves. When I saw it, I immediately thought pajama pants!
Growing up, my grandparents always sent us new flannel jammies for Christmas. It was the one present my brother and I were allowed to open on Christmas Eve. We would put on our soft, new PJs, get into our beds and try to listen for reindeer hooves on the roof. Seeing these new flannels made me want to make myself some Pajama Pants
for the holiday season- and maybe some for my brother too!
If you’d like to make your holiday season more cozy, we have a PJ Pants class on November 29 & December 6. This project comes together quickly, and is a great place to start if you haven’t yet used a pattern. Once you make your first pair, you’ll be able to begin checking everyone off your gift list!
