Saturday, March 3, 2012

Sewing Buttons and Buttonholes - A Tutorial


Here's the tutorial on sewing buttons and buttonholes with sewing machine. 

My new tunic needs 5 buttons and 5 buttonholes, so I decided to use the sewing machine for this job to save me some time.  If you have not machine sew your buttons or buttonholes, here some simple steps to guide you on. 

First you need some sewing supplies that comes along with your sewing machine when you first purchase it.  

For the Button: 
Darting plate
Button sewing foot
Darning plate on left and button sewing foot on right

For buttonholes
Buttonhole foot

How to sew a buttonholes
1. You need to make the buttonholes first before you sew the button. So, get your button out and measure the size in diameter.  Mine was 1.5cm.


2. Mark out the buttonholes on the placket.  The buttonholes should be slightly bigger than the button diameter.  I've used 1.8cm here.


3. Attach the buttonhole foot on your sewing machine and mark out the starting point. See picture below on the position of the starting point of the needle with the pressor foot. 


4. Position your needle to the right of the buttonhole marking.  The marking that you've draw should be right in the middle of the window.


    a. Select the stitch option 1 for the buttonhole option and stitch length of less than 1. (this is the 4 step buttonhole option on my Singer sewing machine so find out what's yours and you will be fine)


    b. Start sewing from the right top of the buttonhole mark and stop when you reach the end.


    c. Select the stitch option 2 and sew a sew a few stitch.


    d. Then, switch the dial to stitch option 3 that will see your needle moving up back to the top again.  


    e. When your needle reach the top left hand side of the window, select stitch option 2 again and sew a few stitch again and you are done!


5. Place 2 pins at the start and the end of the buttonholes that you have just sewn.  Using the seam ripper, cut out the fabric in the middle of the 2 sewn lines.  Now do the same for the rest of the buttonholes.


How to sew Buttons
1. Place the placket with the buttonholes over to the other placket and mark out the opening using a water soluble pen.  This will be the position of your buttons. 


2. Attach the darting plate and button sewing foot in. Place the button onto the markings on the placket that you have just made.  


3. Your needle position should be the right side on the stitch dial and try to align the holes on the button to the needle. 


4. Once you have it, change the stitch length to between 1 and 0 and sew a few stitches on the buttonhole to secure the thread in the button.


4. Then, select the zig-zag stitch option that will allows your needle to fit just nicely into the 2nd hole on the left.  You can adjust the zig zag stitch till you get the right fit. Start sewing a few zig zag stitch to secure the button to the placket.  



5. Cut away the thread and you are done! If you have 4 holes on your button like mine, you just have to do the above steps twice.



That's it. Simple right? 


My tunic is now complete, with buttons!


So go...get out the supplies and start sewing!


No comments: