Customer Reviews

SewBasic: 34 Essential Skills for Sewing with Confidence

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I recently taught a small basic sewing class and used this book as a guideline and reference book for the class. My students knew nothing about sewing and in the end they did not want to become great dressmakers, they just wanted to use the sewing machine that had belonged to their Mom or Grandmother ( and had been sitting in a closet..) to do general household sewing and clothing repair. One man was starting a company and needed to learn how to sew in order to make prototypes of his products. Another was a mom who wanted to make simple clothes for her daughter. This book was helpful in that it demystfied basic sewing techniques, was reader friendly, and had enough pictures to explain the techniques without being TOO MUCH information thrown at the novice sewer all at once. My teaching time was basically a "hands on" session where I used the book as a guideline and where any question that they had about sewing could be answered. My students were the " just get to the point and skip the froo froo" type of folks. For them a book that did not assume any sewing knowledge and then gave them what was needed to get from absolutely no sewing skill to completed simple class sewing projects is a good teaching tool.

Good for beginners, especially distractable students. The pages are not too full of information and the type is larger instead of smaller which is good for children. It includes color, which appeals to kids, without going overboard. After a child/beginner has gained basics, then a more detailed book is definitely good to "graduate to."
This would not necessarily be a reference book. Once the skills are learned, a person might move it off their shelf.
I feel a 4th grade student would understand most of the info and need help with understanding some of the techniques.
I learned a few new techniques from it. (I teach sewing) I am recommending this book to my students, along with other real good reference type sewing books.
"Tailor tacks" is illustrated better than what I have seen so far. I found "Directional Sewing" to be very informational!
"Understitching" is also very well explained.

This book contains reprints of articles on sewing. Each article is only 2 or 3 pages long, and that includes one or more photos or illustrations, so the result is not too much detail. Use this text as a guidebook--if you cannot grasp a particular skill--by reading this book--look elsewhere for more info., more detail, more illustrations--you'll know what to look for. Further, each writer is telling you how they do it. Yes, there alternatives to their way--like using a ruler and a "French Curve" when tracing patterns; you can buy some "bias tape" or you can make your own--stuff like that can only be gotten by reading everything you can get your hands on! That's if you had no one to show you how to sew.

This book is is clearly laid out with nice photos. Each section is concise, and covers one topic. (ex: tools, pressing, grain in fabric, etc.) It's not going to get you going on a project, but for getting your feet wet I thought it was pretty nice for a beginner.

There was little in here. An example on feet is 'use your instruction manual and experiment!". Well if the machine came with an instruction I guess I would and somehow I did not buy this book to be told to use the manual. Instead I would recommend The Complete Guide to Machine Sewing (unfortunately Amazon has this has hard to get :-(, or Sewing 101.
The one thing that this book did teach me was about pattern copying and it is very thoroughly indexed. Still nothing is very in depth and you can get this level of information from practically any source (Readers Digest Guide to Sewing).

I found the book basic, and that is why I ordered it. It is a fine book for back-to-sewing people like me.

I was really impressed with this book! I have a couple of general sewing books, but this one has some info I haven't seen before. It also helped clarify some techniques that were a little confusing to me. To be fair, some things presented were as clear as mud, but I will chalk that up to my long, steep learning curve.

The book is organized into three parts: Before You Sew, Needle & Thread and Perfect Seams. I was trying to figure out how to review the 34 skills. I've decided I won't list them all because you can preview the table of contents. What I'll do is highlight the ones that made an impression on me.

-Grainline - simply explained; I get how to square the grain now. Really good pictures comparing the drape of the different grains
-Making Your Mark - completely unclear! I thought the explanation of tailor's tacks lacked greatly. I'll have to turn to You Tube to understand how to make these better.
-Pattern Layouts - useful info about using the crosswise fold

Part 3 of the book is Perfect Seams. Here is where it gets good.

-Sew A Perfect Seam from Beginning to End - this was an eye-opener for me! I can now start seams at the very edge of my fabric without the fabric jamming in the throat plate. I also learned how to secure the end of my machine stitching without backstitching.
-Understitching - these are the best-ever written instructions.
-Clipping & Notching - use the method from Threads Industry Insider Techniques DVD Vol. 2 By The Each
-Pressing 101 - for this to be a basic sewing book, this was really light. Get your pressing tutorial here.
-Ripping Out Stitches - who knew you should rip out the various types of stitches differently? Okay. maybe y'all knew, but I didn't.
-The zipper and pleats sections were written very clearly
-The sections on making bias strips and piping made my head spin, but I'm not above admitting reader fatigue.

In conclusion, this is a great book for beginners. I caught it on sale with free shipping, so it was a wonderful bargain. Even without a sale, it would make a great addition to the beginner's sewing library. More seasoned sewers probably know all of this stuff.

I am a complete beginner to sewing so this book was very helpful. Lots of pictures. Well written easy to understand.

I just think this book is a must-have for a beginning sewer. Very complete with excellent photos. Should be included in Home-Ec classes. Do they still have Home-Ec classes???

An excellent book for people learning to sew. With good illustrations and step by step instructions, it made a lot of things very clear to me.

Put simply - I found this book to be an essential guide in aiding me in doing things correctly. The ABCs of sewing.