Marking Tools

[b15erk]

I've been making my first coat, and it's made me realise how inadequate my marking tools are.

I have air erasable pens, heat erasible pens, chalk, ordinary pencils and pens, tracing sheets etc, but I'm finding that marking this loose weave lumpy fabric is hit and miss. 

What are the most effective tools for tailoring? I'm in unknown territory here...

Jessie

[Elnnina]

Well Jessie you ask a very valid question, it all depends what is now available today in terms of gadgets.  I was introduced to Wax chalk back when I learnt tailoring, came in the same shape as the triangular ordinary chalk but the advantage of the wax chalk was that the mark stayed put until an iron went near it.  This was a white wax - do not know if there was ever a coloured wax chalk though.   We also used ordinary tailors chalk but that does brush off very easily.   We also learnt how to do Tailoring Tacking  - these were long even  stitches, but do not go round any corners, instead cut the cotton thread at the pint of a corner and leave long ends.  Back in those days there were not so many different types of sewing thread, good old Sylko 40 and occasionally Sylko 50.  The spools of thread on a cardboard tube were not so easy to get hold of and tended to be a rougher thread and this is what was used for this type of tacking as being slightly rougher it held in the fabric better.  Today I use my old Sylko threads - and I have a lot - for tacking and also for marking out embroidery fabric for hand embroidery as I like to replicate lines  crisscrossing over my fabric or canvas that match up to my chart - then it is so easy to follow.

However over the years I have acquired many gadgets and one is something called a Hera Marker by Clover - a nifty little gadget that is in plastic and has a honed shape at one end and you draw this along the fabric quite firmly and this just leaves an indentation on the fabric which should last until you press this out.

I also have had since my teenage years a handy little gadget called Measuring Gauge and this is plastic and was originally marketed by Milward and is small enough to hold in your hand and has what I call small fingers each a different measurement from 1/8" up to 2" and on those old Milward ones they had the metric measurements on the reverse.   I had managed to find a metal one of these in a Patchwork and Quilting shop and all was well until it fell on the floor and I rolled my chair over it.  Trying to find another metal one was not easy and eventually I found them at  Pelenna Patchwork down in Port Talbot only these are only in imperial measurements - I would be lost without mine.  In fact as I still believe in tacking I am using this little gauge all the time and it does not take long to tack and use this - takes a lot of guess work out.

Two other gadgets I find really useful are a superfine Chaco Liner by Clover - this is a bit like a lipstick that contains chalk and has the finest serrated metal wheel in the top and thus leaves a very fine line of chalk - you can get refill bottles of chalk and this comes in colours as well as the usual white.  The other gadget is by Prym and is a Parallel Tracing Wheel - this again contains chalk and you have a choice of measurements to set the extra wheel on - this I found in a sewing shop and came on a card - not exactly cheap but I thought it was worth it.

[b15erk]

@Elnnina , thank you!  I'm intending to make a list of those gadgets I think may be useful, and pick out the ones I think will suit me best.  I quite fancy the chalk markers, my eyes otoh are too poor to see a crease mark.

Interesting to know about waxed chalk, I thought there was just one sort.

The heat sensitive markers I have show the marks beautifully, unfortunately, when the iron goes near the marks, they disappear, so for tailoring not much use.

I will have to brush up on my tailor tacks I think, as this seems to be a useful technique.

Jessie

[Missie]

Tailor-tacking every time, ideally in silk thread as it pulls out far more easily, but it won't disappear with heat nor be dislodged easily.

[Nevis5]

Me too, @Missie , tailor's tacks for me!  I have a drawerful of pencils, chalks, pens etc but I go back to my good old TT every time. 

[Elnnina]

There are tailors tacks which we probably learnt how to do these at senior school to mark the darts essentially then there is tailoring tacking which is very different this is a line of long tacking just one stitch at a time and used in marking seams and easily pulls out in one long line of thread - whereas the tailors tacks are small individual tacks sewn on top of one another with a loop in the middle sewn through two layers of fabric and then pulled apart and cut - yes you can still use these to mark but if you are doing a long line i.e. a seam line it takes much longer however try both methods and see how you get on.

[Nevis5]

Yes, I remember being confused between the two, @Elnnina  !  My sewing teacher used to call the long lines 'thread tracing' instead which helped me distinguish between them.  Either way, it's a great way of tracing seam lines etc. x

[Ohsewsimple]

Tailors tacks and thread tracing for me too.  No risk of marking fabric. 

[Sewingsue]

There are tailors tacks which we probably learnt how to do these at senior school to mark the darts essentially then there is tailoring tacking which is very different this is a line of long tacking just one stitch at a time and used in marking seams and easily pulls out in one long line of thread - whereas the tailors tacks are small individual tacks sewn on top of one another with a loop in the middle sewn through two layers of fabric and then pulled apart and cut - yes you can still use these to mark but if you are doing a long line i.e. a seam line it takes much longer however try both methods and see how you get on.

Thank you, that is what I call tailor tacks too. I use them for marking darts and other 'dots' on a pattern.

[Tamnymore]

Yes I use tailor tacks extensively not just for the dots but also for notches as I overlock all the pattern pieces so you can't really do notches. I do use Frixion pens when I have a suitable fabric. Never really taken to tailor's chalk.

I'd always assumed that once you ironed the fabric the Frixion pen marks went for good. However someone I know told me a friend of hers put her quilt in her hold luggage on a plane and it was so cold all the marks reappeared! I wonder if anyone here has experienced that.

[Ploshkin]

@Tamnymore I did use a red frixion pen on a dark purple fabric and it left a permanent lightish mark when ironed.  Fortunately, it was on the base of a knitting bag that I had only made to practice FMQ.  Following that experience I have never used a frixion pen on the right side of any fabric unless it is going to be cut off or hidden.

[Acorn]

I have used these chalk wheels with a lot of success.  There is a little wheel at the apex of the triangle, and the chalk comes through as powder, so it doesn't drag on the fabric in the same way as solid chalk.

[Ohsewsimple]

I’ve got a couple of different chalk wheels and like them for some things. 

[wrenkins]

I use one of these. I bought it for P&Q but have also used it for dressmaking. It vanishes with a little bit of spit water. Bigger marks I dab with damp tissue. 

[maliw]

Tailor tacks every time especially for thick fabrics, I made a coat and a jacket last year for DD and that was the only form of marking I used. I do have other markers - tailors chalk, chalk pencils, a hera marker, I've even been known to use an ordinary 'biro' or pencil depending on what I'm using it on/for.