Speed-hemming lining

 At the risk of exposing you to probably the most boring photographs ever, I'm going to show my method for cutting and hemming a lot of lining at once.

I figure out all the cuts for all the drapery jobs I have coming up in the near future, then begin cutting, laying the bottom at the -6" line and cutting with 4" over the FL at the top.
Here you can see all the widths I've cut out- I think it was 20 altogether.




I lay the straightedge at "0" and press the hem up, then move it up to "3" and press again, creating a double 3" hem.  I put in 2 pins.









Then fold it up maybe 15" to get it out of the way.
Then I keep doing this with all the widths in the pile.










Fold 'em all back down again, and start pinning right sides together at the hem foldline, and take to the serger.  I do this for all the widths of a particular job, then take them all to the machine to hem with a topstitch.



If there are half widths, when I get to a panel to be split, I fold it in half lengthwise and finger press, then slice it with nice sharp scissors, then proceed with pinning and serging.




Even though the hem is already pressed in, you can still sew the hem without re-pressing: as you near the seam join, just "snap" it into place and keep sewing.
Later when the panels are being tabled I give the bottom hem another quick pressing to freshen up the bottom edge.




As all the lining widths from a single job are done, I either fold in quarters and lay on the other table, or lay over hangers and hang them til I'm ready for them.
Then I repeat the process for the interlining.




Now that all the linings and interlinings are prepped, I start with face fabrics, press up the hem and either take them home to hem them all while watching YANKEES baseball, or hem them one at a time as I table each panel.




I think I've just used up a lot of words on this subject, a lot more than I ever imagined possible.....