Isn’t it typical? A really warm day and I spent it indoors at New Threads tutoring a workshop on Zips. Not only was it warm outside, but for some of the time we had the steam iron switched on – just to add to the heat!

But it was worth it to be able to spend time with two delightful ladies eager to learn about zips and improve their confidence and skill when using one of the many ways to insert them.

Debbi and Sue were both very able students and we rattled through the variety of zips and different methods of insertion. We dealt with standard zips, decorative trim zips and invisible zips for dressmaking and bag-making. The sample zips were inserted as standard central closures, lapped and/or hand picked, exposed with decorative trim, letterbox with and without a pocket and of course the “dreaded” invisible zip!

Hand picked centre zip                                  Lapped zip

Invisible Zip                                             Letterbox & Pocket Zip

As a bonus at the end of the workshop I was also able to show Debbi how to apply a zip pull to a continuous zip so that she will now be able to buy lengths of zips for her bag-making which is much more cost effective. Sue has promised to re-visit all the samples prior to filing in her workbook for future reference.

I hope that each lady will have the opportunity to practice and refine the different methods of insertion for zips so that they will “zip” onwards and upwards in their stitch craft.