Smocking is an embroidery technique used to gather fabric so that it can stretch. Before elastic, smocking was commonly used in cuffs, bodices, and necklines in garments where buttons were undesirable. Smocking developed in England and has been practised since the Middle Ages and is unusual among embroidery methods in that it was often worn by laborers. Other major embroidery styles are purely decorative and represented status symbols. Smocking was practical for garments to be both form fitting and flexible, hence its name derives from smock — a farmer's work shirt.Smocking was used most extensively in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Materials Required:
Smocking pattern (optional)
Fabric pen or pencil.
Ruler
Fabric
Needle
Gathering thread
Embroidery floss
scissors
Process:
Prepare your fabric and transfer your chosen design onto the reverse of the fabric. Thread your needle with a strong thread, ensuring it is long enough to complete one row of the design and that it matches your fabric; make a knot at the end of the thread.
Each stitch picks up only a couple of threads, which hardly show from the front. Make the first stitch at the start point , making two tiny stitches to fasten.
Take the needle diagonally to the next point and pull up.
Knot the thread by going back through the stitch.
Make the next stitch, which is an unpulled stitch. Pick up threads at the required point then knot the stitch as in step 4, so that this stitch does not pull when you pull up the following stitch. Continue following the diagram to the end of the row. Return to the top to start the second row, using a new piece of thread.
I tried smocking for the first time. There are many different techniques in this.. Since it was my first time, it was a little diffcult for me but I love the outcome! We can use smocking in our clothes, necklines, cuffs, etc..
If you haven't tried smocking, you show! Time for you to enhance your attires..Do share yoyr vibe and comment!
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