Great British Sewing Bee Live ticket winners!

Thank you so much to everybody who entered my giveaway to win tickets to The Great British Sewing Bee Live, I loved reading about everybody's first makes! The five winners who each win a pair of tickets to attend the show on either Thursday 21st or Friday 22nd September 2017 are:

Pendle Stitches

Maria Makes

nanacathydotcom

Sharon Pickles

Frankie Baldwin

Congratulations ladies! Please email me your address details and I can arrange for the tickets to be sent out to you.

If you weren't one of the lucky winners, don't forget you can still claim £1.50 off advance adult ticket prices by quoting my discount code HMJ.

Looking forward to seeing some of you there! x

The Great British Sewing Bee Live giveaway

If you're a fan of The Great British Sewing Bee then you'll no doubt be aware that The Great British Sewing Bee Live will be taking place from 21st to 24th September 2017 at Excel London. I loved the GBSB when it was on TV and am really looking forward to seeing how the concept translates to a live show format.

From the information I've had so far, it looks like there will be LOTS going on to attract dressmakers and sewing lovers of all abilities, including:

• The GBSB Live Super Theatre featuring Patrick Grant and Esme Young and hosted by comedian, author, Grumpy Old Woman and red lipstick fan Jenny Eclair
• Workshops and demonstrations by GBSB contestants and top sewing tutors
• Dressmaking drop-in clinics
• A make-at-home fashion catwalk
• The Fashion and Textile Museum's Liberty in Fashion exhibition, specially curated for the event
• 200+ dressmaking and sewing suppliers

If this sounds like a description of your perfect day, then you're in luck as I have five pairs of tickets to give away to UK readers. Please note that the tickets are for either Thursday 21st or Friday 22nd September only so you must be able to attend the show on those dates. 

To enter leave a comment on this post telling me what was the first thing you ever sewed. The closing date is midnight on Friday 4th August 2017 and winners will be chosen at random and announced on my blog.

If you're not one of the lucky winners then don't despair, I also have a discount code - HMJ - which gives readers £1.50 off advance adult tickets bought here.  Come along, it will be a laugh!

Fashion with Fabric book review

Just as the Great British Sewing Bee seems to have evolved as a TV series (more challenging tasks, contestants working with a variety of different fabrics and techniques etc), so too does the accompanying book. I reviewed the book for the first series here and was mostly positive about it, my main criticism being the lack of patterns included. I was recently asked to review the book for the current series - Fashion with Fabric - and wow, what a difference a couple of years makes!

The focus this time is on the fabrics used, which makes for a surprisingly interesting read. The book is split into four main chapters based on the most widely used and popular fabrics: cotton, wool and other animal fabrics, stretch fabrics and luxury fabrics. The reader is encouraged to use the book as a starting off point, then experiment with their own ideas, which I think is a great approach to take. Lots of projects also have 'hack' suggestions, some of which are improvements on the original pattern in my opinion! Each chapter also contains advice and tips on working with these different fabrics, which I found really useful.

Unlike other pattern books (and I include the first GBSB book here), there is a comprehensive section of the book dedicated to adjusting patterns for an accurate fit. As well as standard bust, waist and hip measurements, the reader is told to take a high bust measurement to determine whether a full or small bust adjustment is required. It then shows you how to do one. This is such an important fitting step for a lot of women, yet it's only ever skirted around in a lot of books. There's also advice on moving darts, broad or narrow back adjustments and a page of useful tips on fitting trousers and fiddling about with crotch depths and lengths. The author - Claire-Louise Hardie - has years of experience as a theatrical and costume designer and runs her own sewing school. She's also the sewing producer for the show and this working knowledge absolutely shines through in the book.

There are 30 projects in the book, including a few from the series to date (Capri trousers, Walkaway dress, men's kilt and curtain skirt), and a couple of men's and children's patterns. For those who want to get their teeth into more challenging projects, there's a corset dress (with bustier hack), a leather jacket and the afore mentioned kilt. The patterns come in a separate pack, which in my case anyway, will actually encourage me to use them. Patterns that live in the back of books tend to get easily forgotten in my world, but if they're in a separate pack, they can live with my patterns! The patterns are full sized but need tracing off as there are several on each sheet. This isn't the headache it sounds as they're all clearly marked and colour coded - nothing like a Burda magazine!  The women's patterns come in seven different sizes ranging from size 8 (32 ½" bust, 25 ½"waist, 36" hip) to size 20 (45 ½" bust, 38 ½" waist, 49 ½" hip)

Of the patterns themselves, there are several that I'll probably try out at some point...

… the sleeveless shell top ...

… the silk woven tee ...

… and the sleeveless collared blouse.

I also like the look of the Capri trousers, despite the hideous example the poor model has to wear in the book…

There are some patterns that I can admire from afar but will probably never try: the men's kilt is one - although I'm tempted to make it for the sole reason of getting Jon to model it! The drapey knit dress is another as it's so far removed from my personal style. I can admire it on others who CAN rock that style though, I'm thinking specifically of Karen's version from Did you Make That? Simply stunning.

I've been keeping one final pattern up my sleeve  - the lace pencil skirt - as it's one I've already made!

I kept coming back to it in the book and in the end just decided to give it a try with some leftover fabric from my lace top. For the underskirt I used a sea-green lining fabric previously used to line the sleeves of my boiled wool coat, so all in all, a good stash busting exercise! The skirt is a simple, elegant shape with no front darts, an invisible zip and a facing. I only ever intended it to be a practice run to test out the pattern, but I think the finished version is totally wearable. I also made it before this week's episode of the GBSB and let me tell you, I could NEVER have finished it in 3 hours or however long they were given. Hats off to the semi finalists!

Using the finished measurements as a guide, I made a size 10 with no adjustments, and the fit is spot on. The two skirt layers are made up separately, but attached around the zip as a single layer. They're then treated as two separate fabrics below the zip. It's a brilliant technique which I'll definitely use again. I also used hairline seams for the first time, where the seam is stitched, narrowly zigzagged and then trimmed. A hairline seam is a good choice for sheer fabrics and it worked well for my lace overskirt, creating a very light finish.

I'm amazed by the number of excellent tips and techniques I've picked up from reading this book - I learnt two new ones just from making a simple skirt! I'll keep you updated with anything else I make from it, but so far, it's shaping up to be one of my favourite sewing books to date.

'Fashion for Fabric' was given to me free of charge for review by Quadrille Publishing. All views my own.

Social media dinosaur inches forward

When it comes to social media I'm well aware that I'm about five years behind everybody else - all the hip young gunslingers have moved onto something else by the time I catch up. But indulge me please, it would make me happy!  When I got together with some fellow stitchers last week to watch the first episode of The Great British Sewing Bee, I was the only one not Tweeting throughout the show. The others mercilessly bullied gently encouraged me to set up a Twitter account, which I promptly did, and I'm now delighted to have joined the 21st century. My Twitter name is @Janehandmade and you can follow me here.

But wait, that's not all, I've also set up a Facebook page for my blog!!! So if Facebook's your thing, you can find all my blog posts plus any other sewing snippets that take my fancy by liking me here. You'll also find beautiful new Facebook and Twitter buttons in the right hand column of my blog.

Right, that's it for now, join me for an update in five years time, who knows, I'll probably have an Instagram account by then!  x

The Great British Sewing Bee needs YOU!

We all loved The Great British Sewing Bee when it was on TV last year right? Well the company who produce the series - Love Productions - are on the hunt for talented, sewing enthusiasts to take part in their third series (series two will be broadcast on BBC2 later this year). If you're a UK-based man or woman and you're a dab hand with a sewing machine, then this could be your chance to shine. Best of all, you'll get unfettered access to Patrick Grant….

To find out more, please email sewing@loveproductions.co.uk. Applications will close at midnight on Sunday16th March 2014.  Pleeeeeease apply, I'd love to see a sewing blogger on there! x

Great British Sewing Bee blog tour

To celebrate the arrival of the Great British Sewing Bee on BBC2, the wonderful folk at Crafty Magazine have organised a week long blog tour to help prolong the party. Every day, a different blogger will review the accompanying book and there are some great giveaways too. The blog tour started on Monday on the Crafty website and will finish on 14th April - there's a full list of who'll be reviewing the book each day at the end of this post. Today it's my turn....

Just in case you haven't noticed, The Great British Sewing Bee is a BBC TV series entirely devoted to sewing. AT LAST!! We get to see contestants making clothes, choosing fabric, using patterns, struggling with zips and trying to get the fit right - basically everything we sewing types do all day every day, if we're lucky. Even better than that, Tilly is one of the contestants!!!!!

AND we get to feast our eyes on bearded Savile Row hottie Patrick Grant every week. What's not to like?!

One of the aims of the programme is to encourage people to either discover or re-discover the joy of sewing your own clothes. The beautifully stylish accompanying book will certainly help you achieve both these goals. All the sections you'd expect to find in a sewing book are included: tools of the trade, different types of stitches, choosing fabric etc. Plus a really well explained and photographed Basic Sewing Skills section, which tells you all you need to know about seams and seam finishes, gathering, zips, bias binding and buttonholes.

If you're new to sewing, then reading through these pages first would be incredibly useful as they cover most techniques you're likely to find on a home sewing pattern or on one of the projects in the book. And if you've never used a pattern before, don't worry, there's a separate section on how to navigate your way around one. There were two really helpful bits that stood out for me in the book. First was a troubleshooting section on common sewing machine problems - not always included in sewing books and very handy if your machine is skipping stitches and you haven't a clue why. Second was an 'order of work' page: a template of good practice encouraging you to think about your work in a chronological order. Sounds obvious, but it's actually a really sensible way of working and an incredibly useful discipline to use for your sewing.

The remainder of the book is given over to a whopping 28 projects and they really have tried to cater for all tastes and abilities. There are 11 non-clothing items including aprons, cushions and bags, plus a range of window treatments. If you like the look of the two projects featured on the telly so far (the laundry bag and the tie cushion) then they're in the book too - with detailed instructions, not the laughably brief ones that were given on the TV.

The rest of the projects are all clothing items, ranging from PJ bottoms, a waistcoat and a bow tie for the gents, to a prom dress, a circle skirt and even a tailored hacking jacket for more experienced stitchers. I suppose the idea is that you can sew your way through the book, trying out more challenging projects as you gain confidence. If you wanted to take your dressmaking a step further i.e. perfect your fit, then you may have to widen your net to other resources as there are only a couple of paragraphs on adjusting patterns to get a better fit.

My only gripe is that there's just the one paper pattern included with the book - for the basic tunic.

All the other projects have to be either scaled up or printed out as a download and taped together. Now, I have no knowledge whatsoever of the costs involved in producing patterns to accompany a book, but I would have preferred to have seen fewer projects and more paper patterns. The time and effort required to print out and tape together just one pattern is enough to put me right off I'm afraid. But if you have a tougher constitution than me (and that's not difficult), then go for it! Two of the projects are based on commercial patterns (Simplicity 2886 and New Look 6035) and one is an early incarnation of an independent pattern - Tilly's Mathilde blouse. For all three of these garments, the instructions are pretty brief and I suspect you'd have an easier time making them if you actually bought the patterns instead. Having said that, there are some lovely classic patterns in the book that I can see being great starting points for adding your own personal touches: the tunic (see pic above), the pencil skirt and the basic dress.

I wish they included a pattern for a longer version of that top, isn't it lovely?

Basic dress

I do think it's nigh on impossible for one single book to cover every single sewing angle and taste, but The Great British Sewing Bee has had a bloody good try. Overall, it's a wonderful book and is a fabulous companion to the TV series.

Finally, confession time... I know that some of the reviewers on this blog tour are offering their copy of the book as a giveaway prize. I'm really sorry folks but I'm going to hold onto mine a little while longer (hangs head in shame). Some of the non clothing patterns are useful, I can see myself referring to that zip section on a regular basis and I'm seriously tempted to give the prom dress a go. Oh yes, and I haven't spent nearly enough time sighing over Patrick's picture..... x

Tomorrow, head over to Did you Make That? where Karen will be posting her review and, rumour has it, hosting the giveaway of giveaways! And don't forget to check out the rest of the bloggers taking part in the blog tour. They are Teasemade on 9th April, Peas & Needles on 10th April, My Happy Sewing Place on 13th April and House of Pinheiro on 14th April.

A copy of The Great British Sewing Bee book was given to me free of charge for review. All views my own.