Understanding Fabric Anatomy
So now that we've cut our pattern pieces out, it's time to take a look at our layout, to see how we're going to put them on our fabric, to cut them out, to make the right size fabric pieces in order to do that, however, we're going to need to learn a little bit about fabric anatomy, so I have a handy chart right here, some fabric that has thes terms written right on it, so I can explain when fabric is woven, there are the long threads of the fabric that go from one end of the loom to the other end of the loom, and those air pulled really, really tightly on the loom. The cross grain threads are the threads that go back and forth to weave the fabric. So, first of all, when you're cutting out patterns that are going to be made into garments, you need to know that on this stage on this length of green there's, not a lot of stretch to this fabric, those threads have already been pulled really tightly on the loom. There is, however, a lot of stretch for a woven fabric on this direction, the ...
cross screen that's because those threads weren't pulled quite as tightly as they were going back and forth. So the length of grain is the long threads, and across grain are the threads that go back and forced to leave the fabric as the threads of wrap around and go in the other direction. They create what's called the salvage edge, right here, the woven edge to the fabric. And once the fabric is woven, it's folded in half, so the to salvage edges air together. That creates the fold edge down here, so the fabric is then wrapped up on a bolt and shipped to a fabric store. And when you purchase it, the fabric is unrolled, and they cut off just how much you need. That creates the cut edge, and you can see that the cut edge phrase so that's what all of these little fuzzies are but the selvage edger, the woven edge is going to be the smooth edge that doesn't fray. These are the terms that you need to know to lay your pattern out correctly on your fabric.
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