I have been working with some wonderful sewing porducts of late. Today I am sharing my hack of the #sudley blouse using #prymshirredtape

It is a stretchy tape with lines of shirring elastic within a very fine mesh. It means you can add shirring details without the jeopardy of winding your bobbins at different tensions and running out mid detail.

I used the tape to add sleeve details to the otherwise quite basic Sudley blouse. I like the bodice draft on Megan Nielssen patterns and it is a lot of fun to add your own details to a pattern. I have two short sleeved ones already with peter pan collars but adding a mix to the long sleeve was so easy with the tape. I did trace off the sleeve piece and slash and spread some volume into the sleeve to have plenty of fabric in the shirring. In order to absorb the added volume in the sleeve head, I added a gathering detail to mirror the rest of the sleeve aesthetic.

Some people call it faux shirring but in all honesty it is just shirring in a different way. I sewed every other row on the tape but you can get super fine micro shirring if you sew between every line. The tape is soft enough to wear against your skin therefore suitable for waist details, wrists or trouser ankles. If you have any dresses that are too big this product is a great thing to have in your stash for altering either size or a style you have fell out of love with.

Because the elastic is high stretch, the recovery is much firmer for thicker fabrics. I tested on other fabrics and it easily shirred up 300gsm crepe and ponte roma.

Interesting isn't it?