Saturday, February 6, 2010

Sew Creative Club: Linda Lee and Project Sewing Workshop

This post is sort of a continuation of the last one. In addition to sponsoring the class on Monday, Ann Silva's also had Linda Lee at the monthly Sew Creative Club meeting on Tuesday. So of course, I also went to that!

For Sew Creative, Linda showed many garments from her pattern collection, but she also spoke about Project Sewing Workshop, her other endeavor in conjunction with Bernina. She introduced Project Sewing Workshop last year at the ASG Conference. Since then, she's done a lot of development work on the program. The kits are still the main part, but there's more.
  • There's an Artist Series of patterns specifically designed for PSW: the first one features quilt artist Yvonne Porcella. This series will feature a new fiber/quilt artist twice a year. There will be special embellishment kits as well as fabric kits associated with each pattern so you can create the look. Linda said the embellishment kits will feature buttons and other embellishments that you can't find anywhere else.
  • There's a whole swatching service that sewing stores can participate in, without having to stock thousands of additional yards of fabric. I really liked the viscose knits that were available. She will have standard fabrics that will be available only through participating stores, as well as special ones that will be available at the stores and online. Of course it would be great to have a quality local independent fabric shop, but face it, that's not going to happen. This is another option that's quasi local.
  • The kits: PSW plans to offer kits featuring patterns from other fabric companies, so there will be additional options. The fabrics and patterns will change several times during the year.
  • Accessories: buttons have been added to the PSW line, as well as fasteners. I bought some buckles that will be used on the Soho Coat I've had in the planning stage forever.

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