Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: A Buckle Accent To Trim Blouse, Hat, or Pumps

In the quest for "newer, smarter, easier", Ruth Wyeth Spears provides a clever tip for creating a
cute buckle accent made from folded grosgrain ribbon. With her usual excellent illustrations, Ruth make these accessories very easy to make indeed!

Enjoy!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: Preventing Saggy Hemlines

In this tip from 1920s, Ruth Wyeth Spears provides smart and practical advice when hemming garments that are sewn together on the bias.  Due to their stretchiness, bias-cut garments are at risk of sagging after being sewn. To prevent this, Ruth has a nifty tip for pre-stretching the seams before hemming. If you don't have a darning ball or egg with a handle, substitute with whatever you have on hand that would weigh approximately 2 ounces (what my wooden darning egg with a handle weighs). For example, a serving spoon or a couple of teaspoons from your kitchen would weigh about the same.

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: Smart Treatments for Pleats

In this tip from the 1920s for home sewists, Ruth Wyeth Spears provides some tips for adding smart details to box pleats. As usual, she provides wonderful illustrations that leave no doubt as to how to implement the tips.

 I especially like the second tip on creating extended points of the box pleats. Do you have a favorite? Would you ever use these tips?

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: A Curly Chrysanthemum Corsage for Thanksgiving

It's not too late! Here is a marvelous tip from Ruth Wyeth Spears and the 1920s for a curly "mum" that you can wear on Thanksgiving Day. All it requires is some picot-edged ribbon, which you may already have in your stash. It's a snap to make! Enjoy this tip as you prepare to celebrate with family and friends. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving, from my home to yours. I am very thankful for all my readers!

And if you don't have time to make one today, have a bunch of ribbon on hand at Thanksgiving, and invite all those interested to make one to wear. Sounds like fun!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: Sew a Lovely Negligee

You have almost no cutting and only a few seams to sew with this pattern for a graceful negligee from the 1920s , courtesy of Ruth Wyeth Spears. Ruth recommends that you use a soft fabric for this dressing gown. The negligee would make a great and quick gift. If it is intended as a gift, Ruth recommends that you try to harmonize with the colors in the wearer's bedroom. Delightful!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: Make a Yoke and Add a Dress To It!

In this tip from Ruth Wyeth Spears, she tells her 1920s home sewists that dresses as sketched here "are new in the Parisian mode". And who wouldn't want the latest dress styles from Paris? This tip illustrates just how easy it is to sew a very fashionable 1920s frock. Happy sewing!

Let me know if you sew a dress using this tip!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: A Fresh Taffeta Flower for Your Shoulder

Here is another lovely corsage from Ruth Wyeth Spears and the 1920s. This one features fringed petals of taffeta. As Ruth says, "Flowers like this are so easy to make that you can easily have a fresh one whenever you want it."

Create several, one for every outfit, for every season!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: A Smart Little Hat of Silk and Straw

Need a new hat? Want to try something that requires some serious millinery supplies? Then use this tip from Ruth Wyeth Spears and the 1920s to create your own "smart little hat" of silk and straw.

This pattern requires the following material:

• 1/2 yard of tailor's canvas or willow (a millinery fabric, also called esparterie)
• 1/2 yard of silk fabric
• 2-1/2 yards of millinery straw braid
• millinery wire
• buckram for the flowers, as well as ribbon or silk scraps

I do believe that the extra effort required by this pattern will result in a very stylish cloche!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: A Chrysanthemum Corsage

Here is the perfect small project for autumn. With her typically simple illustrations and instructions, Ruth Wyeth Spears steps you and her home sewists in the 1920s through the creation of a lovely chrysanthemum corsage from scraps of silk. Are you ready to craft this lovely accent that you can wear on a coat, jacket, or dress?

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: Elastic Shoulder Straps Make a Quick Gift

Here is an intriguing tip from Ruth Wyeth Spears for her 1920s home sewists. Detachable shoulder straps of ribbon and elastic is a gift you might not think of! Designed for use with undergarments (such as a camisole or slip), the shoulder straps are attached with tiny safety pins. Ruth suggests tiny rosettes of ribbon if you want to make them fancier.

This idea is very simple, and certainly useful for 1920s undergarments. Rather than making the shoulder straps detachable, I think it would be great to use them in place of regular straps in slips, camisoles, and such.

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s - Art Deco Applique

Ruth Wyeth Spears describes this Art Deco applique as "futuristic" - it must have seemed a striking design at the time! Use this tip to create a colorful, silky, appliqued handkerchief. Perfect for bridesmaid gifts, don't you think? Relatively small effort, with an authentic result! Just remember to use vivid contrasting colors, as Ruth suggests.

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s - Lace-Trimmed Frocks for Evening Wear

While the title indicates this topic is directed at a bride, when you read this very interesting tip from Ruth Wyeth Spears for her 1920s audience, it seems directed at anyone with an interest in the right frock for evening wear. And according to Ruth, the right type of frock depends on your age and body type. If you have a youthful, slim figure, the dress on the right is perfect. Otherwise, choose the dress on the left. ;) Read on for enlightenment!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s - Draping the Bride's Veil

If you are planning a Downtown Abbey-style wedding, you'll want to read this tip for draping the bride's veil from Ruth Wyeth Spears and the 1920s. It doesn't get more authentic!

Reminds you of the veil that each bride wore in the weddings of Lady Mary and Lady Edith, doesn't it? I love Downton Abbey!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s - A Frock Trimmed with Self-Fabric Plaits

While this tip from Ruth Wyeth Spears and the 1920s describes a plaited (pleated) trimming for a "young girl's frock", I think this excellent tip would also apply to a frock for any age!

In her usual marvelous style, Ruth guides her home sewists with clear illustrations and precise steps. And note her tip for the novel feature of flipping the hem to the outside and trimming it in place with the plaiting (pleating). So clever and so simple - I love it!

Ruth recommends a crisp fabric as most effective, and says the sketch is of "changeable pink taffeta". I can picture this frock in pink taffeta - can you?

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s - A Smart Parisian Frock with Cascading Drape

I was watching Downton Abbey last night (oh my gosh - don't you just love the costumes for Edith and Mary?!) It makes me want to sew up a whole wardrobe of 1920s frocks. It is hard to believe there is only one episode left. :( At least we still have Miss Fisher of Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries to get our Flapper Era fix.

To help you with your Downton Abbey or Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries frock envy, just turn to Ruth Wyeth Spears and her wonderful tips from the 1920s. In this tip for the home sewist, she covers the latest frock style from Paris with her usual simplicity. This frock, with a  unique neckline with offset jabot collar, and artful cascading drape below the waist, is designed for print fabric. Inspired?

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s - A Pair of Beaded Shoe Buckles

Here we are in the last season of Downton Abbey and I am been very remiss in posting more of Ruth Wyeth Spear's wonderful tips from the 1920s for the home sewist! To remedy the situation, here is a wonderful post for making a pair of beaded shoe accents, which Ruth states that you can make "quite easily and very economically"! Do you have "some cut steel beads, a scrap of buckram, a half yard of fine hat wire, and a bit of black satin"? Then make a pair for yourself to wear with your vintage 1920s dresses. And then make another pair as a gift! :)

Marvelous!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: A Ribbon Rosette for Your Evening Frock

With the holidays approaching and all the festivities that this season entails, another tip from Ruth Wyeth Spears for her 1920s sewists on the subject of evening frocks seems appropriate! This tip is for creating a large ribbon rosette with streamers to accent your 1920s party frock. Key to her tip is two-toned or double-sided ribbon (a different color on each side, not two colors on each side). You create knotted loops and sew them in tiers to a circle of buckram - easy-peasy!

I love Ruth's tips. Enjoy!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: Dress Up Your Frocks with Lace Medallions

It's "blond on blond" in this inspiring tip from Ruth Wyeth Spears and the 1920s. The tip is perfect for making a special holiday frock. The insertion of medallions of filet lace adds an elegant touch. The thin bands that trim the front bodice and dropped waistline are of filet lace as well. All the trimmings are placed on the fabric itself, rather than being see-through. Don't forget to add the satin ribbon bow & streamers of "deep strawberry tone"!

Dreamy fashion for the 1920s home sewist!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: Smart Neck Finish for a School Frock

I rather like the finishing touch that Ruth Wyeth Spears describes in this tip for her 1920s home sewists. Look how the bands incorporate the facings, which become part of the revers collar. And then those cunning little snaps on an underlay to close it all. This would be fun to try!

Another helpful tip for adding smart style to your sewing projects!

Home Sewing Tips from the 1920s: A Ruffled Summer Frock with Picoted Edges

While Ruth Wyeth Spears feels that this style is for the "sub-deb" (that is, sub-debutante, so pre-teen girl), I think this very feminine summer frock would be lovely fashion for almost any age. Aside from sewing this frock from soft georgette, Ruth describes a technique for creating a picoted edge - very clever, our Ruth!

To learn more about hemstitching (which in the 1920s was evidently something the home sewists paid for, rather than created themselves) that you can create yourself, check out this very informative Youtube video from Professor Pincushion.