Design Assitant: Part 3

 The Final Days

The last two days of the internship were the most stressful and seemed to blur into one. All of the work needed to be submitted by the Wednesday before the show, a lot of sewing took place in this time.
As I said before, if I had free time I went to the knit room to help out there. In the morning I went to help Sarinya Rattanasusai, she is a knit student, her work was very colourful and dynamic. I had to knit samples which was later sewn together onto a large cape, I only had time for two.  I hadn't knitted in a while and it was nice to, especially as I have chosen that specialism for the rest of my course.

It's unravelling!!! (sorry)

Then I went back to help Karen. I spent the first part of the afternoon cutting out lining material for the garments, and then the remaining time sewing. Her collections feature very transparent fabrics, in order for them to look neat, different seams and hems must be used. I spent most of the afternoon sewing pin hems. A pin hem is a tiny little hem usually used for lightweight fabrics, they're seen a lot on scarves. To do a pin hem you have to turn the hem in 1cm and sew right at the edge, then cut the fabric away right near the sewing line, after you've done this you have to turn it over again and sew. As well as pin hems I had to do french seams for the inside of the overlay, this gives a really good finish. You have to sew the fabric wrong sides together, cut the seam allowance to 0.5cm, turn it over the right way and sew over it so that it is concealed. 

The overlay had to have a zip which goes through the centre back of the garment, however I also had to make a french seam for the remainder. This was incredibly tricky as the zip is facing one way and I had to sew the French seam the opposite way. I spent a very long time doing this, and I did it pretty well until I realized it was on the wrong side of the dress! 

It was a mad rush to finish all the garments, we didn't have time to put lining in one of the tops so I had to sew a rolled hem, this was tricky as the material used is so thick, also as it is in panels the thicknesses in material change through the whole thing. 

The day of the hand in, Karen sent me to Wilkinsons to get garment bags, hangers, and a toothbrush to brush out the mohair making it soft.

All of the garments made for the show had to be steamed and put into garment bags, on hangers with all of the accessories. A picture is taken of how it should all look like together and placed at the front of the bag. Then put onto the rails in the order they will be taken, and left to the tutors to mark. 

By four o-clock it was over, everone went home to sleep and prepeare for the show the next day.