Unit 14 · Fabric, Fibers and Patterns

Pull a cotton T-shirt out of the dryer and it is warm, soft and a little wrinkled. Pull a polyester shirt out and it is smooth. The difference starts inside the fiber. A fiber is the smallest hair-like unit that fabric is made from. Cotton grows as a fluff around the seeds of the cotton plant, and each fiber is a hollow tube of cellulose, the material plant walls are built from. That tube soaks up water like a tiny straw, which is why cotton feels cool in summer and why a cotton towel dries you off.

Cotton is strong, gets a little stronger when wet, and stands up to hot water and repeated washing. It takes dye well, which is why so much printed fabric is cotton. Its weaknesses are the other side of the same coin. Because it holds water it dries slowly, and because the fibers do not spring back, it wrinkles and can shrink in a hot dryer. Cotton is the fiber in T-shirts, jeans, sheets, towels and most underwear.

Linen comes from the stem of the flax plant. Workers soak the stems to loosen the fibers, then comb them out into long, stiff strands. Linen is also cellulose, so it absorbs and breathes like cotton, but the fibers are longer and stiffer. Linen is one of the strongest natural fibers and feels crisp and cool. It also wrinkles more than any other common fabric. A linen shirt looks creased ten minutes after you iron it, and people who wear linen learn to accept that.

A common mistake is to treat cotton like it cannot shrink. A new pair of 100% cotton pants washed in hot water and dried on high can lose an inch in length the first time. If the label says cold wash and low heat, that is why. Another mistake is buying a cotton shirt to run in on a hot day. It will soak up sweat, hold it against your skin, and get heavy. For that job a fiber that does not absorb is the better choice, which the next lessons explain.

Put your hand inside a wool sweater on a cold morning and it feels warm before you have even worn it. Wool is the fleece of sheep, sheared off once a year and spun into yarn. Each wool fiber is a protein fiber, like your own hair, and it grows with a natural wave called crimp. When wool is spun, those crimped fibers trap millions of tiny pockets of air. Trapped air is what keeps you warm, so wool insulates even when it is a little damp.

Wool has two more useful habits. The crimp acts like a spring, so wool springs back from folds and does not wrinkle much. And the surface of each fiber is covered in tiny overlapping scales, like shingles on a roof. Those scales are also its weak point. Hot water plus rubbing makes the scales lock together, the fibers pull tight, and the sweater felts into something two sizes smaller. That is why wool labels say hand wash cold or dry clean, and lay flat to dry.

Silk is spun by the silkworm caterpillar as it builds its cocoon. The cocoon is one continuous thread up to a few thousand feet long, unwound by workers in warm water. Silk is a protein fiber like wool, but smooth instead of scaly, which gives it a soft shine and a cool, slippery feel. For its weight it is very strong. It is also easily damaged: sunlight fades it, sweat and deodorant stain it, and a hot iron scorches it.

The common mistake with both fibers is washing them like cotton. A wool sweater thrown in a hot wash and a hot dryer will come out felted and small, and nothing will stretch it back. A silk blouse in the same load will lose its shine and may shrink or bleed dye. Read the tag, wash in cold water by hand or on a gentle cycle, and lay wool flat to dry so its own wet weight does not stretch it out of shape.

The gym shirt that dried in two hours was polyester. Polyester is a manufactured fiber, which means it does not grow on a plant or an animal; it is made in a factory. Chemists start with petroleum, build long chain molecules from it, melt the plastic, and force it through a metal plate with tiny holes called a spinneret. Each hole makes one continuous fiber, like a strand of very fine fishing line. Because the fiber is solid plastic, water cannot get inside it. It dries fast, does not shrink, and springs back from wrinkles.

Those habits make polyester the most used fiber in the world. It goes into athletic wear, fleece jackets, school uniforms, curtains and the thread in most sewing kits. Its weaknesses come from the same plastic nature. It does not absorb sweat, so on a hot day a polyester shirt can feel clammy unless it is knit with channels that move moisture. It holds onto body odor more than cotton. And it melts: an iron on the cotton setting will glaze or put a hole in polyester in seconds. Always iron it on low or not at all.

Nylon was the first fully manufactured fiber, made in the 1930s, and it is even stronger than polyester. It stretches a little and snaps back, resists scrapes, and dries fast. That is why nylon is in backpacks, tents, windbreakers, swimsuits, stockings and seat belts. Like polyester it melts with heat and does not breathe. It also weakens in strong sunlight over years, so an old nylon tent can tear where a new one would not.

A common mistake is thinking a fast-drying shirt is always cooler. On a humid day, a polyester shirt without moisture-wicking channels can feel hotter than cotton because sweat sits between skin and fabric. Another is putting polyester fleece in a hot dryer; it does not shrink, but it pills, meaning small balls of fiber form on the surface. Low heat, or a line, keeps it looking new longer.

Not every manufactured fiber starts as oil. Rayon starts as wood pulp or cotton scraps, which are cellulose, the same material as cotton. The pulp is dissolved in chemicals into a thick liquid, then pushed through a spinneret into a bath that hardens it back into fiber. The result is a plant-based fiber that a factory shaped. Rayon is soft, absorbent, cool and drapes in smooth folds like silk, at a fraction of the cost. You will see it on the tags of dresses, blouses and linings, sometimes under the name viscose.

Rayon’s weakness is water. It absorbs like cotton, but unlike cotton it gets much weaker when wet. A rayon dress agitated in a washing machine can stretch, twist, shrink or tear at the seams while it is soaked, and a hot dryer can shrink it further. Many rayon labels say dry clean only or hand wash cold and lay flat, and those instructions are not a suggestion. Treat wet rayon gently, support its weight, and let it dry before you pull on it.

Spandex is the fiber that makes clothes stretch. It is a manufactured fiber built from long chain molecules that can extend to several times their length and snap back. On its own it is never used; it is blended in small amounts, often 2 to 10 percent, with cotton, polyester or nylon. Dev’s jeans with 1% spandex bend at the knee more easily than stiff denim. Leggings, swimsuits and athletic wear carry more. You may see it called elastane or by a brand name.

The common mistake with spandex is heat. High dryer heat and hot irons damage the stretchy molecules, and over time the fabric bags out and stops recovering. Chlorine from pools does the same to a swimsuit, which is why rinsing a suit in cool water after swimming makes it last. Wash stretch garments cool and dry them low or hang them, and they will keep their snap for years.

Look inside the collar or side seam of almost any garment sold in the United States and you will find a small tag. Federal law, the Textile Fiber Products Identification Act, requires it to list each fiber content by percentage in order from most to least, the country where the garment was made, and the name or registered number of the company responsible. A separate federal rule requires care instructions on the same tag or a nearby one. Those few lines are the most honest thing about the garment.

Read the percentages as a recipe. "100% cotton" will breathe, absorb, wrinkle and possibly shrink. "60% cotton, 40% polyester" will breathe less but wrinkle less and dry faster, and it will hold up in a hot dryer better than pure cotton. "95% rayon, 5% spandex" will drape and stretch and needs gentle washing. "100% wool" needs cold water and flat drying. Once you know the fibers, every tag predicts the future of the garment.

A blend takes the strengths of two fibers and softens the weaknesses of each. Cotton-polyester sheets breathe almost like cotton and come out of the dryer nearly smooth. Wool-nylon socks feel warm like wool and wear at the heel like nylon. But a blend also takes both fibers’ care rules. A 50/50 shirt should be ironed on the polyester setting, not the cotton one, because the polyester half will still melt.

The mistake shoppers make is judging by feel on the rack. A soft, smooth shirt might be rayon that will fall apart in the wash, or polyester that will feel clammy in July. A stiff cotton shirt will soften with washing. Take ten seconds and turn the tag out. If a tag is missing entirely on a new garment, that is a sign about the seller too.

Pull the hem of a T-shirt sideways and it stretches; pull the hem of a dress shirt and it does not. Both are cotton, so the fiber is not the reason. The difference is how the yarn became fabric. First, fibers are twisted together into yarn, a continuous strand strong enough to work with. Then yarn becomes cloth in one of two main ways: woven or knit. The construction changes how the fabric stretches, frays, wrinkles and hangs more than most people realize.

Woven fabric is made on a loom. Long yarns run the length of the cloth; a second yarn passes over and under them, back and forth, across the width. The yarns cross at right angles like a tiny grid. Because the yarns are straight and locked, a woven barely stretches along its length or width, holds a crisp shape, and can be pressed into sharp creases. Cut a woven and the edge frays as loose yarns slip out. Jeans, dress shirts, sheets, jackets and most pants are woven.

Knit fabric is made of one or more yarns looped through each other row by row, the way a hand-knitted scarf is, only with far finer loops. Each loop can open and close, so knits stretch in every direction and spring back. That is why a T-shirt pulls over your head without buttons and why leggings fit. Knits do not wrinkle much, drape softly, and do not fray, though a cut edge can curl and a broken loop can run into a ladder. T-shirts, sweatshirts, socks, underwear and sweaters are knits.

The common mistake is sewing or fitting a knit like a woven. A knit needs a stitch that stretches with it, such as a zigzag, or the seam pops the first time you pull the shirt on. A woven pattern needs extra room, called ease, because the fabric will not give. And a heavy knit sweater hung on a hanger will stretch under its own weight at the shoulders, so knits are folded and wovens are hung.

Lay a bandana, a pair of jeans and a shiny ribbon side by side. All three are woven, but they look nothing alike. The reason is the weave, the pattern in which the crosswise yarn passes over and under the lengthwise yarns. Three patterns cover most of what you wear. Learn them and you can name a fabric from across the room.

In a plain weave the crosswise yarn goes over one, under one, over one, under one, and the next row shifts by one. It is the simplest and most common weave. The surface looks the same on both sides, it is strong for its weight, and it wrinkles readily. Bandanas, muslin, broadcloth shirts, quilting cotton, chiffon and most bedsheets are plain weaves.

In a twill weave the yarn goes over two or three and under one, and each row shifts by one, so the crossing points step across the fabric in a diagonal line. Look closely at jeans and you will see those diagonal ridges. Twill packs yarns tighter, so it is heavier, tougher, resists dirt and wrinkles less than plain weave. Denim, chinos, gabardine and most work pants are twills.

In a satin weave one yarn floats over four or more yarns before dipping under one. Those long floats lie flat and reflect light, which gives satin its shine and its slippery feel. The floats also snag easily and wear faster, which is why satin is for dresses, linings and ribbons, not for work pants. The common mistake is calling satin a fiber. It is a weave; satin can be silk, polyester or cotton, and the tag tells you which.

Ms. Reyes gives the class a job: pick a fabric for a soccer jersey, a winter coat lining and a pair of work pants for a summer landscaping job. Nobody can answer with a fiber alone. You have to weigh four properties, the ways a fabric behaves: breathability, stretch, warmth and durability. Each is set by fiber, yarn and construction together, and no fabric wins on all four.

Breathability is how easily air and moisture pass through. Loosely woven or knit plant fibers breathe best; tightly woven manufactured fibers breathe least, unless they are knit with wicking channels. Stretch comes mostly from construction and spandex: a knit stretches, a woven does not, and a few percent of spandex makes either one give. Warmth comes from trapped air, so fuzzy, crimped or thick fabrics such as wool, fleece and flannel are warm even when they are light.

Durability is resistance to wear, tearing and repeated washing. Nylon, polyester and tight twills such as denim are the toughest. Satin, loose knits, rayon and silk wear fastest. So the soccer jersey wants breathability and stretch: a polyester knit with wicking. The coat lining wants warmth and low friction: fleece or a smooth quilted lining. The work pants want durability and some breathability: cotton twill, maybe with 2% spandex for bending.

The common mistake is choosing on one property and forgetting the others. A heavy wool coat is warm and tough, but it soaks up rain and takes a day to dry. A thin polyester shirt is quick-drying and durable, but on a still, humid day it can feel like a plastic bag. When you shop or sew, say out loud what the garment has to do, list the two properties that matter most, and pick the fabric that serves those.

A sweater tag shows a tub of water with one dot, a triangle with an X through it, a square with three lines inside, an iron with one dot, and a circle. No words. Those five symbols are the standard care symbols used on U.S. clothing since the late 1990s, and once you know them you can read the tag on anything. Each symbol is one step of laundry, and the marks inside it say how.

The washtub means washing. Dots inside it give the water temperature: one dot cold, two dots warm, three dots hot. A hand in the tub means hand wash. An X over the tub means do not wash; dry clean instead. The triangle means bleach: plain means any bleach is safe, diagonal lines inside mean only non-chlorine bleach, an X means no bleach. Chlorine bleach on a triangle-with-X garment can strip color or eat holes in the fiber.

The square means drying. A circle inside the square means tumble dry, with dots for heat: one dot low, two medium, three high, and an X for no tumble drying. Lines inside the square without a circle mean air drying: a curved line at the top means hang to dry, one horizontal line means lay flat. The iron symbol takes the same dots, one for low, two for medium, three for high, and an X means do not iron. A circle alone means dry clean; a circle with an X means do not dry clean.

So the sweater tag reads: wash cold, no bleach, lay flat to dry, iron on low, dry clean is fine. The common mistake is skipping the tag and washing everything one way. That is how wool felts, rayon tears, polyester glazes and a bright red shirt turns a load of whites pink. Read the five symbols the first time you own a garment. After that you will remember.

When a tag is missing, a textile lab can name the fiber with a burn test: a technician holds a tiny snip of fabric in tweezers over a metal tray and touches it to a flame. This lesson describes what they see. It is not a lesson to try at home or in class. Loose fabric catches instantly, melting plastic drips and sticks to skin, and the fumes from some fibers are toxic. You will identify fibers by tag, feel and water drop instead.

The lab watches three things: how the sample acts near the flame, how it burns, and what is left. Cotton, linen and rayon, the cellulose fibers, catch fast, burn with a yellow flame, keep burning after the flame is removed, smell like burning paper, and leave a soft, light gray ash that crumbles. Wool and silk, the protein fibers, catch slowly, sputter, tend to go out on their own when the flame is pulled away, smell like burning hair, and leave a crisp black bead that crushes to powder.

Polyester and nylon behave like the plastics they are. They shrink and curl away from the flame before touching it, melt as they burn, drip, smell chemical or sweet, and leave a hard round bead that does not crush. Spandex melts into a sticky black bead. Blends show a mix: a cotton-polyester sample smells of paper and leaves a hard bead with ash around it. These are the standard lab results and the reason a chemist can read a fabric no tag describes.

The lesson for you is the hazard, not the test. Fabrics burn in the kitchen the same way they burn under tweezers. A loose cotton sleeve over a gas burner catches and keeps burning. A polyester fleece near a flame melts onto skin, which is a far worse burn than a scorch. Wool is the slowest to catch and tends to put itself out, which is why firefighters and welders wear it. Keep sleeves rolled and fabric away from flames, and choose fibers with fire in mind.

A five-dollar T-shirt is on a rack in a mall on the far edge of Chicago. It is cheaper than a sandwich. That price is possible because of fast fashion: designing, making and shipping new styles in weeks, in huge numbers, from the lowest-cost fabric and labor, so a shirt can be worn a few times and replaced. The price on the tag does not include everything the shirt cost.

Some of that cost is water and energy. Growing cotton takes large amounts of water; making polyester takes petroleum and energy, and washing polyester sheds tiny plastic fibers into water systems. Some of the cost is people. Most cheap clothing is sewn in factories far away, and garment workers in some of those factories work long hours for low pay in unsafe buildings. Some of the cost lands at the end. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimated that in 2018 Americans sent about 11 million tons of textiles to landfills.

None of this means new clothes are wrong. It means the choices you already learned in this chapter have weight. A durable fabric, cotton twill instead of a loose knit, lasts more washes. A garment you can mend stays out of the trash. A tag you read keeps a sweater from felting after one wash. Secondhand clothing, from thrift stores and swaps, gives a garment a second life at a fraction of the cost. And a cold wash and a line dry use less energy than hot and high.

The common mistake is to think the answer is a better brand. The most effective change is fewer, better, longer. Buy what you will wear thirty times. Learn what the fibers do so the garment matches the job. Wash it as the label says. Fix it when it tears. A closet built that way costs less over a year than a closet of five-dollar shirts, and it puts far less in the ground.

A pattern is a set of paper shapes that you cut from fabric and sew together to make a garment, and the envelope it comes in is the instruction sheet for shopping. The front shows the pattern number, the finished garment in a drawing or photo, and the views, which are the different versions the pattern can make: view A with short sleeves, view B with long sleeves, view C with a collar. The front also lists the sizes included. Most modern patterns hold several sizes on one tissue.

Turn the envelope over. The back has a small drawing of each view from the back, with seams and darts shown as lines. Then comes a chart of body measurements for each size: bust or chest, waist, hip, and back waist length. That is the chart you use to pick a size, and it is where the next lesson starts. Below it is the yardage chart: how much fabric to buy, listed by view, by size, and by the width of the fabric on the bolt, usually 45 inches or 60 inches.

Next is the notions list, everything besides fabric that the garment needs: thread, a zipper of a certain length, buttons of a certain size and number, elastic, hooks, bias tape, interfacing. Then the suggested fabrics, which name the weights and types the design was drawn for, and often a warning such as not suitable for plaids or stripes. Some patterns mark their yardage with nap or without nap; nap means the fabric has a direction, such as corduroy or velvet, and takes more yardage because all pieces must point the same way.

The common mistakes all come from reading the front and skipping the back. A student buys 1½ yards of 45-inch fabric when the chart called for 2⅛, and the last piece will not fit. Another buys the notions list except the interfacing, and the collar will not hold its shape. A third picks a stiff canvas for a pattern suggested for soft challis, and the drape in the picture never appears. Read the whole envelope in the store, with the fabric width in mind.

Jada wears a size 8 in jeans and cut a size 12 pattern, and the top fit. That is normal. Pattern companies use their own size charts, and the numbers do not match ready-to-wear clothing. The only way to pick a size is with a tape measure. Measure over the underwear or thin clothes you will wear under the garment, stand naturally, and have someone else hold the tape when you can. Keep the tape snug but not tight, and level all the way around.

Four measurements decide most patterns. Bust or chest: around the fullest part of the chest, with the tape straight across the back. Waist: around the natural waist, which is the narrowest part of the torso; if it is hard to find, tie a string around the middle and bend side to side, and the string settles at the waist. Hip: around the fullest part of the hips and seat, usually 7 to 9 inches below the waist. Back waist length: from the bump at the base of the neck straight down the spine to the waist string.

Write the numbers down and compare them to the envelope chart. For a top or dress, match the bust first. For pants or a skirt, match the hip first. If your numbers fall between sizes, or one measurement is in one size and another in the next, choose by the measurement that matters most for that garment and plan to adjust the rest, which the fitting lessons cover. Multi-size patterns make this easy: you can cut a size 12 at the bust and blend to a 14 at the hip.

The common mistakes are measuring over a thick sweater, pulling the tape tight to get a smaller number, and letting it droop in the back. Each one gives a size that will not fit. Another is cutting your store size out of habit; the pattern chart is the only chart that counts. Measure twice, and measure again if it has been more than a few months. Bodies change, and the tissue does not.

Unroll a bolt of woven cotton and look at the two long edges. They are tightly finished and will not fray. That edge is the selvage, made where the crosswise yarn turns around on the loom. The selvage is your compass for the whole layout. Everything about how a garment hangs depends on lining the pattern up with the yarns in the fabric, and the selvage shows you where the yarns run.

The yarns that run parallel to the selvage, the length of the bolt, are the lengthwise grain. They were held under tension on the loom, so they are the strongest and stretch the least. Garments are cut with the lengthwise grain running up and down the body so the fabric hangs straight and does not sag or twist. The yarns that run across, from selvage to selvage, are the crosswise grain. They have a little more give, which is why a shirt gives slightly when you breathe in.

Before you lay out, the grain has to be straight. Fabric is often pulled crooked on the bolt. To check it, snip into the selvage near the cut end and tear across, or pull one crosswise thread and cut along the line it leaves. Then fold the fabric selvage to selvage. If the torn edges line up and the fold lies flat, the grain is straight. If they do not, pull the fabric gently on the diagonal, from the short corners, until they do. Wash and dry the fabric first, the way you will wash the garment, so it shrinks now and not later.

The common mistake is skipping the grain check because the fabric looks fine. A pattern piece cut a few degrees off grain makes a pant leg that twists around the shin or a skirt seam that spirals after one wash. Another is skipping preshrinking: a 100% cotton top cut from unwashed fabric can come out of its first wash a full size smaller. Ten minutes of washing and straightening at the start saves a garment.

Take a square of woven cotton and pull it straight across; it barely moves. Now pull it corner to corner. It stretches, sags in the middle and springs back. That diagonal is the bias. The true bias is exactly 45 degrees to the lengthwise grain, and because the crossing yarns can shift like a folding gate in that direction, it stretches more than any other line on a woven. Every woven has it, whether or not you want it.

Designers use the bias on purpose. A skirt cut on the bias hangs in soft, clinging folds instead of standing away from the body. Bias tape, the folded strips used to bind necklines and armholes, is cut on the bias so it can curve around an edge without puckering. To cut it, fold a corner of the fabric so the crosswise cut edge lies along the selvage; the fold is the true bias. Cut strips of the width you need parallel to that fold and join the ends to make a long piece.

Sewing on the bias needs care. A bias seam stretches while you stitch it, so you support the fabric with both hands and never pull it through the machine. A bias-cut garment is hung for a day before hemming so it can drop, and then the hem is marked level on the body. Skip that, and the hem will grow uneven on its own after the garment is worn.

The common mistake is accidental bias. If a pattern piece is laid a little off grain, one edge of it sits partly on the bias and stretches while the other does not, and the seam ripples. Curved edges such as necklines are partly bias by nature, which is why they stretch out if you handle them roughly before they are sewn. Staystitch a curved edge, a line of stitching just inside the seam allowance, right after cutting, and it will keep its shape.

Unfold a pattern tissue and every piece is marked with the same handful of pattern symbols. They are the same on nearly every commercial pattern, so learn them once. The cutting line is the heavy outer line, often several lines for several sizes; cut on your size. Inside it, many patterns print the stitching line 5/8 inch in, the standard seam allowance. On multi-size patterns the stitching line is often left off and you rely on the machine’s 5/8-inch guide instead.

The long straight arrow with heads at both ends is the grainline. It must lie parallel to the selvage. To place it, pin one arrowhead, then measure from each end of the arrow to the selvage; when both distances are equal, the piece is on grain, and you pin the second end. A bracket with arrows bent toward one edge marked place on fold means that edge lies exactly on the fabric fold, and the piece is cut once to make a whole symmetrical front or back. Do not cut along the fold.

Notches are the small triangles on the cutting line. A single notch on the front matches a single notch on the back; double notches match double. They tell you which edges join and where. Cut them outward, beyond the cutting line, so you do not weaken the seam allowance. Small circles or dots mark points inside the piece: where a dart ends, where a pocket sits, where to stop stitching at a corner. Darts show as long triangles or diamonds to be folded and sewn to shape the fabric. A double line across the piece says lengthen or shorten here.

The common mistakes are cutting notches inward, which can cut into the seam, and cutting both layers along a place-on-fold edge, which turns one back piece into two halves with a seam you did not want. Another is ignoring the grainline because the piece looks straight. Every symbol is there because someone made the mistake before you. Read the whole piece before the shears touch it.

The guide sheet inside the envelope has a page of cutting layouts: small diagrams that show how to fold the fabric and where each piece goes for your view, size and fabric width. Find the right one and follow it. The layouts are worked out to fit the yardage on the envelope. Freelancing the layout is how you run out of fabric with one sleeve left to cut.

Start with the fabric preshrunk, pressed and folded as the diagram shows, most often lengthwise with selvages together and right sides in. Lay the fabric on a large flat surface, never hanging off the edge, where its weight would pull it off grain. Set out the pieces roughly as in the diagram, with fold pieces on the fold and the grainline arrows running along the selvage. Do not pin yet; just confirm everything fits.

Now pin, one piece at a time. Pin one end of the grainline arrow, measure from both arrowheads to the selvage, adjust until the numbers match, and pin the other end. Then smooth the tissue from the center out and pin the edges every 3 to 4 inches, pins at right angles to the cutting line and inside it. On a fold piece, pin the fold edge first so it cannot creep. Keep pins clear of the cutting line so the shears do not hit them.

The common mistakes are laying a directional print upside down on half the pieces, forgetting that a piece marked cut 2 needs both layers, and placing a piece on a single layer when the layout showed it on the fold. Check the number on each piece against the number of layers under it. Then step back and look at the whole layout once more before you pick up the shears; that pause is free, and fabric is not.

Bench shears, the long scissors with one bent handle, are the tool for cutting fabric and nothing else; paper dulls them. Rest the flat blade on the table and slide it along, so the fabric never lifts. Cut on the cutting line for your size with long, even strokes, and never close the blades all the way, because the tips leave a jagged step. Keep your free hand flat on the tissue near the cut to hold the layers together. Cut notches outward as you reach them. Never pick the fabric up to cut; the layers shift.

With every piece cut, the tissue is still pinned on, and this is the moment to mark: transfer the dots, dart lines, pocket placement and any other inside symbols to the wrong side of the fabric. Once the tissue comes off, there is no way to know where the dart went. Three tools do the job. A tracing wheel and dressmaker’s carbon paper: slip the carbon face-up under both layers, run the wheel along the dart lines, and it leaves a dotted line on the wrong side of each layer.

Tailor's chalk or a washable fabric marker for single dots: push a pin straight through the tissue and both layers at the dot, lift the tissue slightly, and chalk each layer where the pin comes through. For fabrics that chalk will not show on, use tailor’s tacks: a loose loop of doubled thread stitched through the dot and both layers, then snipped apart so a tuft stays in each layer. Test any marker on a scrap first; some carbon papers do not wash out of light fabric.

The common mistakes are closing the shears at the end of each cut, which leaves a saw-tooth edge, marking on the right side where it may show, and unpinning before marking. That last one is the painful one. Students lay a beautiful cut front on the table, pull the tissue, and realize the dart ends are somewhere in the middle of a blank piece of cloth. Mark first, then unpin, then move on.

Jada’s bust measures 35 inches, and the finished top measures 38 around. Three inches of difference is not a mistake. It is ease, the room between the body and the garment. Take it away and you get a shirt you cannot lift your arms in, or a pair of pants you cannot sit down in. Fabric does not stretch the way skin does, so a woven garment has to be built with space for breathing, bending, reaching and sitting.

There are two kinds. Wearing ease is the minimum for movement. A fitted woven top needs roughly 2 to 3 inches at the bust, 1 inch at the waist and 2 to 3 inches at the hip; a knit with stretch can get by with less or even with negative ease, smaller than the body, because the fabric gives. Design ease is what the designer adds on top of that for style: a boxy shirt might have 8 inches, a swing coat 12. Design ease is why two size-12 patterns from the same company can fit so differently.

Many patterns print the finished garment measurements on the tissue at the bust, waist and hip, or list them on the envelope. Compare those numbers to your body numbers and you know the ease before you cut. If a top’s finished bust is 47 inches and yours is 35, it will be very loose, which may be the look, or may not. When patterns do not print them, measure the tissue from seam line to seam line, skipping darts and seam allowances, and add the pieces up.

The common mistakes go both ways. One student sees the finished measurement is bigger than her body and sizes down, then cannot raise her arms. Another wants a fitted look, chooses a pattern with 10 inches of design ease and is disappointed. Neither read the numbers. Ease is a decision the designer made and printed; your job is to find it and agree or adjust.

Jada’s back waist length measures 15½ inches; the envelope chart for her size says 16½. If she sews the pattern as printed, the waist seam of a dress will sit an inch below her waist. The fix happens on paper, before cutting. Every bodice, sleeve and pant piece carries a double line labeled lengthen or shorten here. That is the safe place to change length, because it sits where the piece is straight, away from curves and shaping.

To shorten by 1 inch: draw a line across the piece at the printed line, then measure ½ inch above it and draw a second line. Fold the tissue so the two lines meet, forming a tuck of ½ inch that removes a full inch. Tape it flat. Then true the edges: lay a ruler along the cutting line above and below the tuck and redraw it so there is no step. To lengthen by 1 inch: cut the tissue apart on the printed line, slide a strip of paper under it, spread the halves exactly 1 inch apart, keep the grainline arrow lined up, tape, and true the edges.

The change has to travel. If you shorten the front bodice 1 inch, shorten the back bodice 1 inch on its line, and any facing or lining that runs the same length. If you lengthen a pant front, lengthen the pant back. Otherwise the side seams will not match at the notches, and you will find out at the machine. Write the change on each piece so you remember it when you sew the same pattern again.

The common mistake is changing length at the hem. Chopping 2 inches off the bottom of a pant leg with a tapered shape makes the hem wider than the designer drew and moves the knee to the wrong place. Another is folding a tuck the full amount instead of half, which doubles the change. Draw the lines, measure twice, and fold once.

Even with careful measuring, a pattern is drawn for an average body, and no one is average everywhere. Before cutting the navy cotton, Jada sews a muslin: a test version of the main pieces in cheap unbleached cotton, with long machine stitches and no facings, hems or zipper. It takes an hour. It shows every place where the pattern and her body disagree, in fabric she does not mind marking up or throwing away.

Try it on over the same underclothes as the final garment, and have someone help. Look for the standard problems. Pulling lines pointing to a spot mean the garment is too tight there; loose folds mean too much fabric. A neckline that gapes, a shoulder seam that sits behind or in front of the shoulder, a waist seam above or below the waist, a sleeve that binds when you reach forward. Pin out extra fabric where it folds, and clip a too-tight seam open and measure the gap. Mark all of it on the muslin with a marker.

Then move each change to the tissue. A pinned-out fold of ½ inch on the muslin means removing ½ inch from that seam line on paper, blended smoothly into the neighboring lines. A gap that needed 1 inch means adding ½ inch to each of the two pieces that meet there. Make the change on every piece the seam touches, true the lines, and write the date and the change on the tissue. If the changes were large, sew a second muslin. Only then cut the real fabric.

The common mistakes are skipping the muslin because the fabric was cheap, fitting it alone in a mirror, which distorts how you stand, and fixing the muslin with pins but never carrying the fixes to the paper, so the next garment has the same problem. A muslin costs an hour and a dollar of fabric. A finished garment that does not fit costs all of the fabric and all of the time.