Stitchin' in My Kitchen

Welcome to the final (for now) edition of Up Close with Fabrics - Knits, Again.  I think this will be the last one for a while, at least until I diversify my stash a bit.  I know I haven't done any silk...but beyond that I'm a bit out of ideas.  But this will resume periodically when and if I discover some new textiles or if I get any requests. Today I have four knits that are pretty different to the eye and hand, but turn out to be pretty similar in structure. First up I have a light-medium weight polyester ITY jersey from Cali Fabrics: (L) Nylon lycra print; (C) Polka dot ITY 31x 109x 1440x Polyester fibers are fairly smooth, as we've seen before, compared to natural cotton or wool fibers. Next up is a nylon lycra, a swimwear or activewear type of material also from Cali Fabrics: 37x 95x It has the same general knit as the ITY, a 'braided' kind of pattern. 384x 872x Moving on to a scuba knit, which Mood Fabrics calls a n...

 I'm sure most/all of you know the fundamental difference between wovens and knits, mainly that knits are made from a continuous thread - like, when you knit by hand - giving them stretch. And wovens are created with a criss-cross pattern of fibers that are woven together, so they only have mechanical stretch on the bias.  Basically are the fibers crossed (wovens) or looped (knits).  After having seen the wide variety of wovens commonly seen in garment sewing, I have a selection of knits for this week.  First off, a cotton jersey - I believe this is 100% cotton jersey (no lycra/spandex) that I bought from Mood. Cotton jersey, olive swatch, far right 32x This fabric has a medium amount of stretch - no spandex, so it's not super stretchy.  But you can see how the fibers are knit to allow for some stretch (compared to a cotton woven). 110x 1900x The irregularity of natural fibers are visible at high magnification. Next up is a bandage knit...

This week's edition of Sewing Science we are Up Close with Wovens, Part II!  I snipped a bunch of tiny samples from my swatch collection to see how some of these fabrics compare to one another. Today we have denim, jacquard, and rayon. Denim: This is a heavier weight, non-stretch denim from Cali Fabrics. 31x. These fibers have a distinctive weave compared to a cotton canvas (see Wovens Part I). 74x 259x 1040x. I love the irregularity of natural fibers. Stretch Denim:  This is a medium-weight stretch denim from Cali Fabrics. Stretch Denim, far left  75x 167x 1200x There is no difference in the weave between the two, just the presence/absence of lycra. Jacquard: This one was really cool. You can obviously see that this is going to be interesting, but I didn't realize how many different weaves were involved until I put it in the microscope. Green and black jacquard, far left 25x  26x There are at le...