TUTORIAL: Hemming with Horsehair Braid

On Monday I showed how I hemmed the sheer overlay of a wedding dress using a Calvin Klein hem.  Today I'll show the way I hemmed the heavier skirt underneath, using horsehair braid. 

I figured out this technique simply by reverse engineering the hem as it was done originally, before I altered the dress by cutting off several inches.  It's pretty basic. 

Horsehair braid is not (currently) made of horsehair: it's actually a flexible plastic braid, with considerable springiness to it.  You can pull it taut, and its plastic filaments will scrunch together like a Chinese finger trap, or push it against itself, and it'll give easily.  But let it go and it'll spring back to its middling state of tension.  The purpose of horsehair braid is to stiffen and stabilize the hem of a skirt without making it completely rigid.  The benefit of this stability is that the skirt will keep a smooth line at its bottom, and if there's a train, the train will be less apt to crumple up on itself if the wearer turns abruptly. 

(The problem of the train crumpling on itself has a different but similar solution in Japan: an uchikake, or long formal wedding kimono/overcoat, has padding stuffed into the end of the train, visible on the floor as a soft roll of satin, that wiggles enticingly when you walk and prevents the train from getting twisted.) 

TUTORIAL: HEMMING WITH HORSEHAIR BRAID

First, look how the skirt panels are flat-lined.  The top layer is a thin silk, and the bottom layer is a sturdy cotton.  The cotton underlining gives body to the silk, and makes the dress heavy and structured rather than light and drapey. 

For measurements, cut the skirt to a little more than a quarter-inch longer than you want it to be when hemmed.  (I use my pinky nail as a guide, since numbers confuse me.)  There will only be a little seam allowance turned up with the horsehair braid. 

I use a serger to hold the two layers together at the bottom of the skirt, but you could use a zig-zag stitch or even just a straight stitch on your regular machine to do the same thing.  All the raw edges will be concealed in the end, so there's no need to serge if you don't have a serger. 

Use a regular sewing machine to sew the horsehair braid on the right side of the skirt.  In this picture, you can see I lay the skirt right side up, and lay the horsehair braid on its bottom edge, with the braid completely on the fabric.  I sew just above the serged edge, so all the thread from serging is in the bottom seam allowance and won't show when I'm done. 

Be careful not to either scrunch or stretch the horsehair braid as you sew!  Let it rest in its middling state. 

Turn the horsehair braid to the inside of the skirt.  As you turn it, the seam allowance from the last step will be concealed in the roll and the stiffness of the braid will pull some of the fashion fabric to the inside.  That's why I suggested measuring a little more than a quarter-inch of hem allowance: serging/sewing the two layers together takes up about a quarter inch, and turning takes up another few eighths of an inch. 

The last step is hand-finishing, which I forgot to take a picture of.  It's pretty easy: first tug the braid snug into the bottom of the skirt (there should be no excess in the turned area) and pin it in place; then use your favorite hand stitch to catch a few threads of the cotton lining to the top of the horsehair braid.  I just did large whip-stitches, but a catch-stitch would probably be better.  Be careful not to catch the outside fabric: you want the hem to be invisible from the outside.  One of the benefits of the horsehair braid's stretchiness is that it stretches and scrunches to go around the curves of your dress, so in some places you'll want to mold it to your desired shape and make smaller stitches to ensure it stays that way. 

Here is the bottom of the hem as worn: the dress and its brush train are hemmed with horsehair braid; the sheer overlay has a Calvin Klein hem. 

WHAT IF THERE'S NO UNDERLINING?

In the first picture I showed how this skirt was made with an underlining, so there were two layers of fabric to be held together, and an inner layer to be hand-sewn in the last step.  But what if your skirt only has a single layer?  You can still hem it with horsehair braid.  Just measure as above (a little over a quarter inch of hem allowance), then skip the serging step and go straight to sewing the horsehair braid to the right side of the fabric.  Turn the braid to the inside of the skirt, snug it tight at the turn, and pin it in place.  Then you can finish by machine-sewing on top of the folded fabric and horsehair braid, right next to the first seam which is concealed in the turn.  This last seam will be visible on the front of the fabric as a narrow hem.  Or you can finish by hand if you're good at nearly-invisible stitches.