How to Sew a Narrow Hem

Ding dong! Here I am, back to the blogging and sewing tutorials world to bring you my latest labor of sewing love in this “How to sew a narrow hem” tutorial.

With Easter and series 3 of The Great British Sewing Bee both over I have been both busy and bursting with inspiration and ideas to share with you guys, but alas short on time to put it all down here…I know…I have been a naughty girl, keeping all my sewing knowledge and tips to myself for the past few months, but I promise to be bringing you more of these regularly from now on..I hope I am forgiven!

Learning how to sew a narrow hem is a lovely technique to apply to curves such circle skirts’ hems, necklines and armholes and it works very well both on woven (non stretchy) and stretchy fabrics.

In this tutorial I am working on a curved woven fabric hem, and although narrow hems are particularly good on curved edges, they can nevertheless be constructed on straight hems with equal success.

STEP 1. Sew a 1cm (3/8″) seam all along the edge of fabric to be hemmed.

STEP 2. Take your fabric to the ironing board and folding the hem about 1mm above the stitchline steam press all along its length.

STEP 3. Take your fabric back to the sewing machine and sew another seam about 5mm (just over 1/8″) above the first seam.

STEP 4. Using some small pointy scissors such as embroidery scissors trim all aroud the seam allowance about 2mm (1/16″) above the second seam.

STEP 5. Fold the hem up about 1- 2mms above the second stitching line and steam press.

STEP 6. Take your fabric back to the machine and sew a seam about 5mm (just above 1/8″) from the folded edge of the hem.

STEP 7. Give your hem a good press et voila’. You’re done! Here is how to sew a narrow hem and what this looks like on the right and wrong sides of your garment. Impressed? 🙂