How To Sew A Flat Felled Seam
In this video I will show you how to sew a flat felled seam, this is a great seam to sew on thicker fabrics like denim, canvas and twill.
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SewHayleyJane
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0:00 - 0:34
If you are sewing with a heavier weight fabric like a denim or a canvas or a twill and you're wondering what seam finish to use especially on the long straight seams such as the side seams of trousers or the inside seam, the sleeve seams of a jacket or a denim shirt, something like that a flat-felled seam is a really great option it encloses the raw edges of the fabric and gives a really beautiful finish as well.
0:34 - 0:51
So I have two pieces of denim here sewn together along the seam and I am going to trim down one of the seam allowances I've sewn this with a centimeter and a half seam allowance so I'm gonna trim down just one to about half a centimeter.
0:59 - 1:33
So we now have one short seam allowance and one long seam allowance we're gonna press both of those over to the shorter side so we're gonna press them over you can press them from the inside and the outside of your fabric as well. So what we want to do now is basically we're gonna wrap this longer seam allowance over and underneath the shorter seam allowance which will essentially wrap up all those seam allowances so we're gonna tuck them all up nicely.
1:33 - 2:04
So open it up so that you can see the shorter edge and you're gonna fold over the longer seam allowance like so and then we are going to make sure if you've got any straggly threads there you can cut those away so we're gonna tuck it under making sure all those threads are tucked under and then press it again and you're basically just gonna go all the way along your seam tucking and pressing.
2:16 - 3:15
Next, we are going to top stitch along this folded edge you can do that just with your regular presser foot or if you have an edge stitch foot you can use that as well to get a nice straight finish I'm gonna show you how to do that. So here is my edge stitch foot it looks a little bit like this they might look a little bit different depending on your sewing machine but what all edge stitch feet have in common is this ridge underneath that is going to be your guide you're going to press your edge of fabric that you wanna stitch along up against this ridge here so I'm gonna pop that into my machine and then what I need to do is move the needle position all the way over to the left your machine might have a button that you can just press and it will move it all the way over to the left on my machine I need to use my stitch width setting in order to move it all the way down to zero and that moves that needle all the way over.
3:16 - 3:45
So now we're gonna put the fabric under the machine positioning it so that the edge that you want to sew along to close up that seam is facing in towards the machine and that is the edge that we are going to butt right up against your edge stitch foot so that's gonna be your guide now you're not gonna use the edge of the presser foot or the lines on your machine you're gonna use this guide here and we're just gonna sew all the way down.
3:52 - 4:37
And there's your flat-felled seam. Now the beauty of a flat-felled seam is that you can sew it on either the inside or the outside of the garment either way it will still contain all those raw edges so as I've sewn it on the inside of the garment you can see we have two exposed lines of stitching this is the seam allowance stitching here and then this is the top stitching if we flip it over to the right side we have just a single visible line of top stitching now you can use fabric that matches your thread so that that line of stitching there is hidden in amongst your fabric or you can use a contrasting thread to give it a little pop of color.
4:38 - 5:00
Now if you wanted to sew it from the right side of your fabric so that you have these two lines of stitching on this side of your fabric you could also use top stitching thread for if you're, say if you're sewing jeans and you want to go for that classic look of top stitching you could sew a line of top stitching thread along there.
If you are sewing with a heavier weight fabric like a denim or a canvas or a twill and you're wondering what seam finish to use especially on the long straight seams such as the side seams of trousers or the inside seam, the sleeve seams of a jacket or a denim shirt, something like that a flat-felled seam is a really great option it encloses the raw edges of the fabric and gives a really beautiful finish as well.
0:34 - 0:51
So I have two pieces of denim here sewn together along the seam and I am going to trim down one of the seam allowances I've sewn this with a centimeter and a half seam allowance so I'm gonna trim down just one to about half a centimeter.
0:59 - 1:33
So we now have one short seam allowance and one long seam allowance we're gonna press both of those over to the shorter side so we're gonna press them over you can press them from the inside and the outside of your fabric as well. So what we want to do now is basically we're gonna wrap this longer seam allowance over and underneath the shorter seam allowance which will essentially wrap up all those seam allowances so we're gonna tuck them all up nicely.
1:33 - 2:04
So open it up so that you can see the shorter edge and you're gonna fold over the longer seam allowance like so and then we are going to make sure if you've got any straggly threads there you can cut those away so we're gonna tuck it under making sure all those threads are tucked under and then press it again and you're basically just gonna go all the way along your seam tucking and pressing.
2:16 - 3:15
Next, we are going to top stitch along this folded edge you can do that just with your regular presser foot or if you have an edge stitch foot you can use that as well to get a nice straight finish I'm gonna show you how to do that. So here is my edge stitch foot it looks a little bit like this they might look a little bit different depending on your sewing machine but what all edge stitch feet have in common is this ridge underneath that is going to be your guide you're going to press your edge of fabric that you wanna stitch along up against this ridge here so I'm gonna pop that into my machine and then what I need to do is move the needle position all the way over to the left your machine might have a button that you can just press and it will move it all the way over to the left on my machine I need to use my stitch width setting in order to move it all the way down to zero and that moves that needle all the way over.
3:16 - 3:45
So now we're gonna put the fabric under the machine positioning it so that the edge that you want to sew along to close up that seam is facing in towards the machine and that is the edge that we are going to butt right up against your edge stitch foot so that's gonna be your guide now you're not gonna use the edge of the presser foot or the lines on your machine you're gonna use this guide here and we're just gonna sew all the way down.
3:52 - 4:37
And there's your flat-felled seam. Now the beauty of a flat-felled seam is that you can sew it on either the inside or the outside of the garment either way it will still contain all those raw edges so as I've sewn it on the inside of the garment you can see we have two exposed lines of stitching this is the seam allowance stitching here and then this is the top stitching if we flip it over to the right side we have just a single visible line of top stitching now you can use fabric that matches your thread so that that line of stitching there is hidden in amongst your fabric or you can use a contrasting thread to give it a little pop of color.
4:38 - 5:00
Now if you wanted to sew it from the right side of your fabric so that you have these two lines of stitching on this side of your fabric you could also use top stitching thread for if you're, say if you're sewing jeans and you want to go for that classic look of top stitching you could sew a line of top stitching thread along there.