Now that your body and the lining are each together, it’s time to sew them together. This is hard to illustrate but I’ve tried. The next step is to sew all of the outside edges together, right side facing in. Pick a spot to start. I’ve chosen a shoulder seam. Just align the lining and the body and start sewing all the way around. The seam allowance is 1/4″. There’s a notch at the center back neck of the lining and the shell if you prefer to start there. In the photo below, mine is aligned at the shoulder seams, the lining is to the left and the shell to the right.
Below, mine is sewn all the way around. You don’t need to do any trimming -which is why the seam was designed for 1/4″- put you can trim that center front rounded neck corner with a pair of pinking shears if you like.
Now it’s time to do the sleeves. In the picture below, I’ve laid the jacket out with the sleeves just so; you’ll need to match the lining to the shell side.
Below, I’ve folded the jacket over onto itself, shoulders matching. I want to make sure I have those sleeves aligned properly
Below, I’ve got the sleeves stacked correctly in preparation for joining.
Below you’ll see that I’ve turned up a portion of the lining sleeve. Do the same. Once folded, stick it into the end of the sleeve shell.
Once your lining is stuck into the sleeve shell, sew it into place with 1/4″ seam allowance.
I realize that aligning the sleeves correctly paired to each other can be confusing so I tried a second way of doing it for the other side. Maybe this will be easier for you to see (below). Lay yours out to match, fold up the sleeve lining edge, stick it into the sleeve shell and presto.
Once I finished the above, I sat down in preparation to sew and found I had a bagging helper. His name is Right. He doesn’t play with the needle when it goes up and down anymore.
Now it’s time to tack the jacket. Lay out your sewn sleeve ends as shown below.
Now fold both layers as shown, turning it so the wigan is at the fold; your hem will fold here.
Below, you can see I’ve run a couple of stitches joining the shell and the lining together right on the seam allowance. I’m no more than 3″ up from the folded end.
Below is another view of the sewn tack.
Now you want to tack the seam allowance in the bottom of the shell armhole (at the side seam juncture) to the corresponding location on the lining armhole. You can see below that I’ve lain the sleeve lining and shell together to match them up correctly.
Find a good spot and run a couple of stitches to join the armholes of the shell and the lining together. That’s what I’ve done although the photo below is kind of a mess. This stuff isn’t easy to illustrate folks.
Now, you’re pretty much done at this point. Now it’s time to turn the jacket. Stick your hand into that open back lining and grab some of the back of the jacket and just start pulling it through.
Here you can see I’ve stopped midway to take a picture. It looks like a mess, doesn’t it?
Below, I’ve stopped again and this shot doesn’t look any better than above but no matter, continue pulling the thing through. Once you’re actually doing this, you’ll be surprised just how easy this part is. This is a lot easier than you thought, eh?
Below you can see the thing is pulled completely through. All that’s left is to press it, topstitch it and close the sleeve lining.
Hopefully, this tutorial has been useful to you. I figure if it’s useful, produces a better result and in less time, you’ll pass along a donation. I haven’t been getting any donations which leads me to believe nobody likes the tutorials -why do something nobody wants? I mean, you all wouldn’t continue to produce styles nobody wanted to buy either. I’m kind of depressed about it; I thought the tutorials were a good idea :(
Nobody paying for what they get? Maybe you should make the tutorials a pay-per-view. TANSTAAFL.
I love the tutorials! So many don’t have pictures and just assume I know what they are talking about.
Maybe put your Donate Now button in a couple more spots because after reading this, I had to search the page to find it. Honestly, when I look at a tutorial, I’ll go right to it and then run off to use what I’ve just learned. And while your Donate Now button looks great, it just kind of blends in :)
The donation button is in the upper right hand corner under the search box. Now that you’ve found it, maybe you’d care to leave one? :)
The donations thing doesn’t work well to subsidize the production of tutorials. People say they just love them but I lose money on them -which explains why I haven’t done one recently. All of the tutorials I put up in the future will just be for my friends. By friends, I mean anyone who has supported this site with a donation. I’ve kept track. I haven’t sent thank you notes to everyone like I should have but I have kept records. I wish people would include their addresses on the form when they send a donation because I’d really prefer to send a thank you card in the mail. Email thank yous don’t convey the appreciation I have for my donors.
This is a great tutorial. Would you consider giving a tutorial on inserting a shirt collar. I have yet to find a really good one with actual pictures. thanks so much.
Would you consider giving a tutorial on inserting a shirt collar. I have yet to find a really good one with actual pictures.
Gigi has a great collar tutorial on her site which is what I steer people to. Why duplicate work? Also, if you’re interested in shirt stuff, see the tutorials index in the left side bar and look at the entries under “Reverse engineering standard work”. This is all about cuffs, plackets and what not. Terrible title but good material.
Speaking of good material, Els (one of the incomparable sewing divas) has posted an entry to sewing invisible zippers that people are sure to find useful too. Those gals are something else. I meant to add them to my side bar long ago but then decided to hold off until they upgraded their site but that’s been delayed. I guess I’ll add them now and rebuild when it comes to that. Rebuilding this site just takes forever and I avoid it like the plague.
I learned this method in school. It is difficult to convey in pictures or even with explaining. Watching is best, but just doing it is better.
What I didn’t learn in school was tacking at the cuff and underarm before turning it. I always ended up digging back in there and tacking with a hand needle.
Also perhaps it’s just this style has topstitching, but I was also taught to edgestitch the facings.
I hope you’ve gotten some donations by now! I love the tutorials and really appreciate them, unfortunately I am currently jobless, so donating is not an option :( But thank you very much for having these up for people to see.
maybe a few unobtrusive adds would be a good idea? I know people aren’t fond of them, but its a way of making back money, and you certainly deserve it!
Maybe it’s just because I’m looking at this some time later and don’t have the prepared bundles, but I’m a bit confused by where you leave the opening that everything is pulled through at the end. You don’t mention leaving a portion unsewn when stitching around the neck, CF, and hem. In fact, you specifically say “sewn all the way around”. Are we to assume that you’ve left a seam in the lining open in order to pull everything through? At one point you say to reach through the “open back lining”, but then at the end you say to “close the sleeve lining”. So where is the opening left?
Good eye. That sentence should read “Stick your hand into that open back sleeve lining”.
Writing tutorials is a learning process and I am/was still learning when I wrote this. Part of learning is learning what people do or don’t know. Five years ago when I wrote this, it did not occur to me that people would not know to leave a portion of the sleeve seam open for turning. I know better about this issue specifically of course but am still tripped up by other things people don’t know that I take for granted.
I know I’m quite late on this, but I have a question that isn’t addressed (if it has been covered elsewhere, I appologize and would appreciate a pointer to the information if possible). As far as closing the lining, is this something done by hand, or is there a specific procedure or special machine/attachment that allows this final seam to be sewn? All the information I’ve found is directed to home sewers.
You would fold under the raw edges by hand and stitch them closed by machine.
My personal preference: I like to turn the seam out as much as I can, stitch it right sides together as far along as I can and close the remaining portion I can’t get to as above. It is a bit awkward to do it like this with respect to positioning the work piece but it really doesn’t matter if you don’t do it like this as long as you catch the raw edges to the inside when you top stitch it closed.
Thank you for this. Do you have/know of a tutorial for lining a dress with/without sleeves?