THRIFTY STITCHER
Not sure which thread to use when? Claire- Louise Hardie gives us her expert guide to which sewing thread to use when!
ABOUT CLAIRE-LOUISE
Claire-Louise is an author, pattern designer, teacher and costumier. We recomm end her online course www.learntosewwithapro.com/ ultimate-beginners
Claire-Louise’s book, The Great British Sewing Bee: Fashion With
Fabric, accompanied the third series of the show and is priced at £20 from www.quadrille.co.uk
Join Claire-Louise’s monthly sewing club and learn how to take your sewing to the next level with expert tips, tricks and techniques to try. Visit www.thethriftystitcher.co.uk to find out more
Fun F act
Silk is the strongest natural fibre
Choosing the right thread for your project is an important decision
Whatever it is you like to sew, from crafting to quilting or dressmaking, there is one common denominator – thread! It’s such a part of your process that I bet you sometimes take the humble thread for granted. Before I take a good look at which thread is best for specific sewing, let’s look back at the origin of thread.
Man has been fashioning clothing long before the invention of the thread we now know. Originally this might have been crudely fashioned thin strips of animal skin. Later, wool fibres were used as ‘thread’ after being crudely spun by hand. Plant fibres like linen or flax would also have been handspun. Early Egyptian culture, for example, produced very fine versions of these types of threads. In China, fibres from the cocoon of the silkworm were again handspun into lustrous thread that was used in fine embroidery.