Pleats on Clothing
I made this cotton chemisette with inserts of embroidered cotton. For the collar I added two pleated lengths of 1/3″ standard knife pleats. Something like this might take forever if you had to mark, pin, press and sew them. But with a pleater board it was fairly easy. One trick that made it easier was starch. Trying to use a pleater board with fabric that has no bias stability is a nightmare.The fabric doesn’t stay in the slots between the pleats. Also as the fabric being pleated was double thick with a folded edge on the outside and two raw edges on the inside sewing the raw edges together at about 1/4″ in really helps keep everything in line as you pleat. Below is the Chemisette from the front on the left, Shown with a bonnet in the center and from the back on the right. Model: Laurie Tavan.
Pleats on Day Caps
There are two different Day Caps in the picture below the one with the pink bow with just one row of pleats and the one in the center with 3. Both of the pleats are made with silk organza strips cut on the bias and pressed in half sewn on the cut edge as with the cotton one above. The reason the silk organza pleats are cut on bias is that if you fold silk organza on the straight of grain it makes a terrible morie pattern but not so much of on the bias. The difference in time with the middle cap with three rows of pleats would be much longer without being able to do the pleats on a pleater. Even though the pleats are 1″ pleats there are ~60 in total.
