Continuous Bias Tape Tutorial

Bias tape

Okay, I have to confess that this page isn’t a tutorial at all – at least not by me. It’s a place for me to link you to three other bias tape tutorials, all of which I have found invaluable.

The first one is from Whipstitch, and it shows you how to make continuous bias tape from a twisted loop of fabric. It’ll make your brain hurt the first time you do it, but trust the instructions (and be accurate in your measurements) and it’ll work like a dream! My only recommendation with this method is not to use a piece of fabric smaller than about 30cm deep, otherwise it’ll be needlessly fiddly to maneouvre the spiral seam through your sewing machine.

The second one is from The Dread Pirate Rogers, and it’s the basis of the Whipstitch tutorial above. It goes into a lot more mathematical detail, explaining how to work out how much fabric will turn into a given length of binding. Also comes in a handy pdf format. The illustrations are especially useful in this one, particularly for that moment when you come to make the twisted loop and need to make sure you’re not going very wrong indeed.

And then there’s Creative Little Daisy, who demonstrates a simple-but-effective way of making bias tape without one of those special little metal gadgets. It turns out that all you need is a pin!

You do need to keep in mind that whilst making your own bias tape is very simple, it’s also rather slow. You also need to be very accurate with your marking, cutting and ironing, otherwise you’ll just end up with a long wiggly mess. But each of these three tutorials will help you to make lovely bias tape from fabric to match your garments – and what could be nicer than that?

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