I thought I’d share with you today a bit of a discussion that I had with some people on facebook about cutting out fabric for cloth nappies (or anything else for that matter). Is there a right or wrong way to do it? How can you get the most of your material when you are cutting out pattern pieces?
Which way to cut out
Most patterns will tell you which way around to pin your pattern pieces, before you begin cutting out fabric. Most of the fabrics that we sell are knitted fabrics, which means that they have more stretch than woven fabrics, but don’t tend fray as easily. Before you pin any pieces onto your fabric then you will want to check which way it stretches, again most patterns will tell you which way the stretch should run and you will find that a lot of fabrics will stretch both ways, but one will be more stretchy than the other. With cloth nappies, you usually cut the stretch out across the width of the nappy, rather than the length. This applies to all pieces, although you may find that you can fit more onto your fabric by changing it around, this isn’t usually a good idea.
Cutting out fabric – how to
When it comes to actually cutting out fabric, you’ve got a couple of choices. You can either use a good pair of dressmaking scissors (and I would recommend that you ONLY use these for fabric, although it’s tempting to grab them for other things, it will only blunt them quicker) or you can use a rotary cutter. If you use a rotary cutter you can have a hard cardboard or even perspex copy of your pattern that you cut around and you won’t need to use pins. If you are pinning your pattern to your fabric and you’re using one of our waterproof PUL fabrics, bare in mind that pins will cause holes which may lead to leaks. If you have to pin, pin in the seam edges where it won’t matter.
Getting the most out of your fabric
Once you’ve got your lovely fabric and your ready to make something out of it, you’ll want to make sure that you make the most out of it. When cutting out fabric, laying your fabric in the right position can make all the difference to the amount of use you get out of it, and the amount of waste you end up with. Experiment with your pattern pieces to find out which is the best way to lay them.
If you possibly can, try to use as large a piece of fabric as you can. This will depend on your pattern, but it might mean that you get more out of it. For example, this bad drawing shows how many nappies I might get out of my fabric:
However, if I had a piece double the size, I would get extra nappies out of it:
What are your top tip when it comes to cutting out fabric?
