Are you sick of all this fabric-geek-tech stuff yet, or are you enjoying the real nitty-gritty of how fabric is made?

I have a new post on the BurdaStyle blog this month covering manufactured fibers like polyester, nylon, spandex, and the new and exciting microfibers.

If this is all a bit too much technical detail for you, don’t despair. Next month I’ll come up a level and will use this fundamental information to start discussing how the fabrics made from these different types of fibers can be best used.

It’s always fun to get a peek into a designer’s process: Tula Pink, via True Up

How to convert a pattern into a downloadable pdf: BurdaStyle

I really need to get myself a subscriptions to Uppercase

Photos of the volcano in Iceland: Boston Globe and The Telegraph (be sure to click through the whole slide show on the second link)

Wear what you’ve made in May: the Me Made Challenge

One of these days Gertie and I will run into each other on a shopping trip to the Garment District: Gertie’s New Blog for Better Sewing (via Colette)

Where I’d like to spend an afternoon: Posie Gets Cozy

Enjoying the Collection a Day blog

Excellent advice on mixing prints: The New York Times

I remember shopping here: The Sartorialist

We are very pleased to announce the first Oliver + S fabric collection, City Weekend, produced by Moda. Here’s a preview for you.

City Weekend debuts next month at Quilt Market, where fabric store buyers place orders for the following season. We don’t want to discuss too much about the collection yet (since it’s not going to be available in stores for several months), but we are looking forward to sharing more details with you when we return from Quilt Market.

Suffice it to say that in addition to the printed cottons, City Weekend also includes interlock knit fabrics. So of course we’ve been busy designing some new Oliver + S patterns to highlight the knits. Stay tuned for more details!

French seams give the wrong side of a garment a clean, finished appearance. This is an especially useful finish for very lightweight or sheer fabrics where a zigzagged or serged seam allowance might be visible. But it can also help to stabilize a fabric, like linen, that is prone to fraying or to seam slippage. French seams are usually not appropriate for heavy fabrics because the multiple layers are too bulky.

French seams are easiest and most appropriate to use along straight edges. They aren’t generally appropriate for curved seams like an armhole, since curves will cause the fabric to pucker when finished. However, with a gentle curve like the side underarm portion of the Ice Cream Dress (shown below), I’ll show you a tip that will help you to stitch a French seam without puckering.

A French seam is made by stitching the seam twice—first stitching with the fabric’s wrong sides together, and then stitching a second time with the fabric folded over the seam allowances so the right sides are together. This second row of stitches encases the seam allowances inside the seam. You’ll find full instructions below. Note that these measurements are appropriate for a 1/2″ seam allowance. You’ll need to adjust the measurements if your pattern calls for seam allowances of a different size.

1. Pin the edges to be sewn, with wrong sides together, and stitch them with a 1/4″ seam, backstitching at the beginning and end of the seam to secure the stitches.

2. Press the seam allowances open and trim them to 1/8″.

Then fold the fabric over the seam allowances, so the right sides are facing and the seam allowances are sandwiched between the two layers. Press the fabric at the fold (the first seam) to flatten it and get a nice crease, and then pin the two layers together near the fold.

HINT: If you’re sewing a slightly curved seam, you can prepare the fabric by straightening and stretching the first seam at the curve as you press it. By stretching the seam slightly, it won’t pucker and tug when the seam is finished.

3. Stitch the pinned seam again, this time 1/4″ from the folded and pinned edge. This second seam neatly encases the seam allowances’ raw edges. Press the seam flat first, and then press them to one side.

Fairly simple to do, right?

We’re pleased to announce that the Spring, 2010, issue of Stitch features an exclusive, new Oliver + S pattern: the Ruffled Halter. The issue also features a profile piece on Oliver + S written by Anne Merrow, who spent a day in the studio with us while she was in New York last winter.

The Ruffled Halter pattern is very easy to make and includes some unique construction methods. The ruffles are all cut on bias, which gives them a nice drape. The bias also means the bottom edge of the ruffle can be left unfinished so it will soften and fray just a little bit over time without getting all messy. If you make the halter with a stripe or plaid, you can have all sorts of fun with it. We made this sample for the magazine in an orange gingham, but imagine all the interesting things you could do with alternating stripes!

Photo from Stitch magazine

Here are a two more examples, one made in a single fabric and the other made using a different fabric for each ruffle.

Single fabric version

Multiple fabric version (featuring S telling me about her school field trip to the zoo today, complete with gestures)

I’m quite proud of the construction we worked out for this pattern. It was a puzzle to find an elegant sewing method for the design, but the result is very easy to make and may surprise you at how it’s put together. For example, the top ruffle forms the casing for the tie while simultaneously finishing both the inside and outside of the halter beautifully. It’s a lot of fun to sew, and I hope you’ll try it.

In the United States, Stitch is available at many independent fabric stores and at Barnes & Noble, Borders, Jo-Ann, and Hancock Fabrics. Stitch is also available at select retailers in Australia and the United Kingdom. Single copies can be purchased from the publisher’s website.

What are you to do if you’re in New York (Fort Green Brooklyn, specifically) and you’re looking for some help and camaraderie while you sew our Swingset Tunic and Skirt pattern this spring? You register for the upcoming class at Lena Corwin’s studio.

The date is Saturday, May 22. The instructor is Cal Patch, author of the great book Design-It-Yourself Clothes. And the day’s agenda even includes a catered lunch.

Video interview with Valerie Steele, the director and curator of the Museum at FIT: Italian Vogue

Taking this advice to heart, especially when using a rotary cutter: Radiolab

Frank Lloyd Wright’s Falling Water, in Legos: Apartment Therapy

Keds, with unicorns: Heather Ross

Another in our occasional series of links to brilliant music videos describing the roots of the financial crisis (remember this gem?). The complicated Magnetar trade explained in 90 seconds of song: This American Life (Vimeo)

Take out lids: SwissMiss

How thread is made: AllPeopleQuilt.com

The most haunting, tear-jerking story you may ever read is this year’s Pulitzer Prize winner for feature writing. Gene Weingarten on parents who accidentally left their children in the car: The Washington Post (Update: this is a very important, but troubling and difficult, article to read that you may not be able to stop thinking about once you’ve completed it: hence the word “haunting” in the description. If you’re a very sensitive person you might want to read the comments on this post before following the link.)

We wanted to give you fair warning that the Puppet Show Tunic + Shorts and the Bubble Dress, both in size 2T-5, will only be available for a limited time.

If you’ve always wanted one of these patterns for your collection, now is the time to purchase. Once the small number we have left are sold, these styles will be out of print, and they won’t be available again. (Update: both patterns have now sold out.)

Each season we put together a trunk show of new and recent styles made up in current fabrics and tour the show to select shops that carry Oliver + S patterns.

This season’s trunk show features items from our Spring 2010 and Fall 2009 collections sewn from prints in Denyse Schmidt’s new Hope Valley collection, with the addition of a School Days raincoat made from a recent Amy Butler laminate.

We’ve finalized the first several stops on this season’s tour. Here’s where you can catch the show in coming months.

• April 6-19: Quilt Essential Fabrics, Abbotsford, BC
• April 22-May 3: Plum Project Studio, North Vancouver, BC
• May 11-25: Cloth and Bobbin, Narberth, PA
• May 28-June 13: Textile Fabric Store, Nashville, TN
• June 17-27: Spool, Philadelphia, PA

If you are a retailer and would like to host the show in July or August, please contact the studio to arrange details.

By the time we’ve finished developing each collection of sewing patterns, we always have a large stack of toiles (or muslins) to show for our efforts in addition to the nice finished samples we photograph and display.

Toiles are the rough drafts of a pattern. After a paper pattern is drafted, we make a toile to adjust the fit, revise design details, and work out the construction of the garment. It’s not uncommon to make three or four toiles before we’re really pleased with the results and are ready to start writing instructions and making finished samples.

We also test the fit of the full size range to be sure we’re happy with the grading. Most styles need to be tweaked a bit before they’re ready, and the simplest way to check the fit is to make a muslin.

I like to use muslin for toiles because we can draw or write directly onto the fabric, the fabric is inexpensive, and the print or appearance of the fabric doesn’t interfere with the design itself (although sometimes the muslin can make a garment look a bit stark–designs always look better when made in actual fabric).

Now that the spring collection is finished and shipped, I thought you might enjoy seeing a few of the toiles in all their wrinkled, messy glory.

Here are a large size and a small size Sketchbook Short, side by side:

Sometimes we need to test the fit or drape on just the collar:

or just the cuff:

Other times when we test the fit of a size, we merely indicate details so we can check placement during a fitting without taking the time to actually construct the details (again). For this size 10 Ice  Cream Dress we marked the placement and size of the pockets and seams so we didn’t need to take the time to sew them:

My favorite toiles are for patterns that have multiple views. We often save time and materials by including  several options in one muslin when we make up fit samples. The models always get a kick out of wearing one short sleeve and one long sleeve:

So there they are, before I unceremoniously dump them to clear out space for the next stack, which is already quite high. We’re hard at work on fall development!