It is not often that the Stitchers group have day trips, but one Sunday in March a few of us headed off to the Sewing For Pleasure exhibition at the NEC in Birmingham. The opportunity to look and touch a large range of fabrics from so many vendors has us all excited. Despite that we were quite restrained in our purchases, in that we did not buy out half the exhibition.
We spent time browsing all the stands and even managed to explore the Creative Craft and Fashion & Embroidery halls, which our tickets also allowed us access to.
One of the key things that we all were looking forward to and took the opportunity for was the ability to attend a workshop. The one we opted for was a pattern making class where we learnt about sizing in dressmaking and were introduced to some of the key techniques in altering a pattern blocks to fit our own body. Techniques that anyone who has used commercial patterns wish that they had in their skills arsenal. We even purchased the accompanying book by the tutor which gives us the base blocks and reference, allowing us to show the rest of the group what we learnt.
Emile Wolstenholme
