A Darting tutorial

This is a post that will have appeal to the sewing geeks among you. If you don't care about garment construction, don't bother reading the rest of this post. 

 Yesterday one of my sewing buddies wanted to know how I figured out where to place the darts in  my daughter's birthday dress.

I had learned  a cool method from  this book

Which you can download from Amazon for not very much money, or buy on Google play for even less money.

I am using paper for this tutorial because I am not making a dress today.

This is your basic A line dress shape. It already has a crease down the center because you have probably cut your dress out on a fold. You will need that crease later.

Fold the dress where you want the starting point of your waist dart. Press that fold well. 

Do the same for the ending point of that dart.

Then fold the dress on that center line. Waist darts are often put in line with the top shoulder point. In this paper sample the darts are placed a bit closer to the center of the dress. Fold the dress where you want to place the dart. Press hard so the press line shows up on all layers of the fabric

Use the lines you pressed into the dress to form the waist darts.

I was also asked about how I do neckline darts.  Often when I cut a sheath dress like this out of a woven fabric, the fabric at the upper chest tends to sit away from my body. Neckline darts are an easy fix.

This is how I add the darts.

I cut a nip into the fabric with the dress folded along the center line.

Sew the dart shut starting about a presser-foot away from  the fold and then angling your stitching line down to nothing.

Depending on your build you might need more than one set of neckline darts.  You can get clever with the placement of the dart if you are working with a striped fabric. You can also play with where in the neckline your dart goes.

That's it a no fuss way to get some nice shaping in a dress.