Unfortunately, hand-sewing

[cimorene]

I've spent a couple of evenings fixing up my sewing kit, which felt much more urgent to do after all the hand-sewing I had to do last week, so I ordered a bunch of craft felt to make a needle book. My sewing kit is in this silver cigarette case inherited from my MIL which belonged to her father and his father (you can see the dates of presentation and their initials - AE 2.VII. 1911 and CE 11.VII. 1945 - engraved inside in the third picture).




This needlebook is actually only two cover 'pages', but with three layers of felt at the bottom and two in the rest. I can put more pages in later if I want to, but I don't need to carry very many needles around.

I mentioned in my last post that my most recent sewing project, the wool skirt, required a bunch of hand sewing that I hadn't anticipated. On the minus side, that took FOREVER. On the plus side, the hand sewing was something I could do sitting in bed, swaddled in a duvet and a shawl with a hotpack and watching videos.

And regardless of both, I foresee doing more of this in future, for wool skirts if nothing else; but the sewing kit stays in my knitting bag anyway, for darning, pinning, weaving in ends, and attaching fasteners to knitted projects.

I just watched a mind-blowing video on Youtube where she showed magnified close-ups of several needles to demonstrate that their quality has deteriorated drastically with time and most cheap and widely available needles are now terrible quality. Apparently the best quality needles used to be made in England, but even some of these brands have outsourced production to China. Some high-quality needles are still made in England, France, and Japan, apparently, according to the professional, who is an American.

I went through our sewing table, which was inherited along with most of its contents from Wax's granny, but it also contains her mom's stash which also contains the remnants of her mother's mother's stash because Wax's mom didn't throw anything away pretty much. We went through the stashes last year (?) and sorted everything neatly into compartments in the table, but we didn't throw away any old needles. I found a bunch of extremely elderly envelopes of English needles in the original packaging from two brands. I have examined these and the widely-available Prym needles sold all over Finland now, which are made in Czechia, with the 10x loupe that I keep for fountain pen nib doctoring, and the antique Milward and Sons needles (apparently these were made in Redding) are visibly sharper. There's a packet of the Milward needles in size 10 sharp, which was what the professional recommended for hand sewing, and a packet with no size label but they're clearly a wee bit thicker so maybe they're 11s. The Prym needles are noticeably larger as well though, so the fact that they're less sharp may be on purpose. They seem to be smooth and evenly formed like the English needles, not unfiled and rough around the tip and the eye like the cheap needles in the video. I don't seem to have any Pryms in 10 sharp to compare right now - they seem to be more recently purchased and they're mostly tapestry needles and darning needles, which are not supposed to be as sharp as sharps.

Then she swerved and shocked me with closeups and strength tests on cotton and silk threads. I already prefer natural fiber threads, having been raised by my mother (who sewed way more than I do) with a strong dislike of polyester thread. And I knew that regular cotton thread is weaker, which is why my mom always kept around coat thread and the stronger stuff too. But watching her snap the thinner cotton threads and looking at the closeup showing how much smoother and more even the higher-gauge thread was in the cotton was a bit shocking. I didn't know there was anything harder to do in buying thread than finding the cotton in the first place, which is already quite a bit of work (and completely impossible in some shops!). I've also bought silk thread specifically to sew buttons before because I knew it was stronger, but now I learn the Güterman silk thread I've bought and which is literally the only silk thread I've ever seen for sale is extremely inferior silk thread. Sure enough, in the closeups, the thread is visibly rough and uneven and she showed it is weaker than her preferred silk threads too.

I'm off to research this, because I don't know if I can even find high quality silk and cotton thread to order from within the EU. I'm definitely not ordering them from another continent (there are some limits). Apparently the historical costumers and historical reproduction hand seamstresses use linen thread which they manually run through a block of beeswax to coat it, as this is the most historically accurate, and while I'm now quite curious about linen thread I'm fairly certain that manually running the thread through a block of beeswax is not something I'm ever going to be interested in doing. Apparently modern linen thread has to be waxed in this way because the modern linen is processed more harshly. The reason linen is so expensive is that its production can't be fully mechanized; I understand that it still relies on hand labor very similar to the methods that prepared it for spinning a few hundred years ago. I suppose there must have been some advancements nonetheless, and they must save time or labor while degrading the quality of the fiber (which is something that also happens to more processed wool). Sigh.

Comments

[viggorlijah]

The beeswax running is so fast and simple though! I have of course misplaced my block of beeswax but it really is not a time impediment. I have read that some Japanese brands are much better like to only use Olympus supplies for sashiko if possible and the French hand milled needles are supposed to be better but oof the price.

[cimorene]

I've spent so long trying to find beeswax packaged for sewing (so in a little cake I guess) from a sewing store in the EU and eventually had to give up. I'll have to use beeswax that's sold for some other purpose. Or order some on Etsy. But it's annoying having that be the ONE sewing notion that I can't get from the same shop as all the others.

[anatsuno]

I have never yet bought beeswax as marketed for sewing purposes; I bought single bits of nicely molded beeswax from artisanal candle makers stands at crafts fair though (in the summer, might you, except for the ones I bought at Strasbourg's Xmas market). I'm not saying it'd be easy to find any time or any place, of course, but that might be an option for you? They work just fine for my sewing, so far.

[cimorene]

I did think of that! But I didn't henge a convenient candle maker or supplier of supplies for candles to buy from and I don't know how to reach them, although I know there are some working in the area. Luckily, I found some that... apparently it's meant for sewing, but it's a whole 100 g which is quite the sizeable lump. I would rather have one of those cute little ones that look like they're from little candy molds: much more convenient.

[cimorene]

Yeah after I made this post I decided I wanted the wax and looked feverishly in a bunch of countries all over the EU and nearly gave up, but one last search found it at a random store that isn't even a sewing store. So I am going to try.

[pensnest]

I am never going to be at a level where this kind of information makes a material difference to my sewing, but it is very interesting anyway. Thank you.

[cimorene]

Well, I have to admit it probably won't make that much difference to me usually. But now that I've done this one wool skirt I've seen threads snap and needles snag because of the material being thicker! Of course you don't need thick material to snap a thinner cotton thread; you just have to pull hard, but that is something you can usually avoid unless it catches on something, or knots itself up. I've definitely had my threads get snarled and knotted before when sewing buttons and patches and mending small tears, and waxing the thread would have reduced or prevented that, I gather? I'm interested to test it, even though I have been a very infrequent hand sewer most of the time, like... largely from curiosity, even if it might help those small tasks a little.

[phosfate]

I just bought a sewing kit that has the absolute worst thread in the world, so I need to find a way to hack it to hold real spools, or take the thread I already have and put it on the stupid little spools it comes with.

Beeswax is great. Totally cuts down on tangling, and makes the thread stronger. Here you can get it in a little clear round plastic case with notches to run the thread through. You turn the wax as it wears down.

My absolute favorite sewing wax is bear's nose wax. After you make your bear and embroider its nose, you run the little block of hard wax (it comes it neutral, black, or brown) over the embroidery until it's completely filled in, then polish it. You get a hard wax nose that will last for years and years. Sadly it's useless for weird colored noses.

[cimorene]

Not that I didn't trust you, but I have been burned by a childhood where my dad would make up all kinds of stuff with a straight face for fun, so I googled this and apparently people are also trying to color their own wax, or using regular pure beeswax for colored noses. I love wandering into little corners of the internet like these messageboards and seeing a whole new world open up for an intense, in-depth hobby interest that you never suspected.

(I don't mean I didn't suspect teddy bear making. Just the wax noses.)

[phosfate]

I don't blame you a bit, it totally sounds made up. I came across a place that sold it online, and I thought, I have GOT to fucking try this!

It's a weird hard wax, sort of like Prismacolor Art Stix or sealing wax.

[cimorene]

I am fascinated. I love the idea of this. The mental image!

I wonder if you COULD use sealing wax.

[phosfate]

That is a good question.