Facings 101 ( Why facings really are fun & easy for everyone!)

This blog is based on a class I've taught for a few years within the Society for Creative Anachronism ( SCA), which is a historical reenactment group with a very broad time range. (which is why I love it...I want to make ALL the pretty historical clothes!)

The original class, and this blog, are geared for the individual who is just getting started making period clothes, but hopefully it will also be of use to anyone who desires a neat and easy way to finish his or her neck lines. Or simply needs a reminder on the how-to's of facings.


Things to keep in mind:
  These instructions are for neckline facings only. I am not including a garment pattern at this time, although keep checking back. I hope to continue adding to this blog and sharing helpful things I've learned along the way.

For some basic tunic patterns and how-to's please check out the links at the bottom of the page.

 Also, these instructions deal specifically with how to make a decorative facing. A decorative facing is a facing that is on the outside of the garment, usually in a contrasting color or fabric, intended to add to the overall look of the garment, as well as be a practical way to finish the neck hole.

These same instructions can also apply to making hidden facings. A hidden facing is a facing that is on the inside of the garment, intended only to finish the neck edge and not to be noticeable.

To make a hidden facing:
Under "Attaching the facing to the garment", on the first step,  instead of pinning the right side of the facing to the wrong side of the garment, you would pin the right side of your facing to the right side of your garment.

That's all you have to change. Other than that all the same directions apply.

Choosing your facing

Facings can be made out of almost any fabric that strikes your fancy. Chinese silks, rich brocades, plaids...they are all possibilities!

However, for the sake of ease and especially while your still getting the hang of facings, I highly recommend sticking to fairly sturdy, non-slippery fabrics with very little stretch to them. Mid-weight cottons and lightweight wools are wonderfully easy fabrics to work with that also produce very neat, clean looking results. Heavy flannel is another great choice, both for ease of use and looks.

The amount of fabric needed for your facing depends on the type of neckline you want to make and how much of the facing fabric you want to display. It is possible to make a facing out of a scrap of fabric just a few inches bigger in diameter than the neck hole pattern, if the neck hole has no slit.

You can use all sorts of scraps for facing. My personal favorite is the triangular sections of fabric left over between the sleeves and the body when you cut out a basic t-tunic.

When your first getting started, I recommend using a piece of fabric about 17in x 22in. You'll also make your life easier if you keep your facing fabric on the straight of the grain.

Preparing your facing

The first step after selecting your fabric is to mark the neck hole placement.

I like to do this by first folding the fabric in half lengthwise, using my trusty iron to press the crease, and then, keeping the fabric folded, making a second fold, this time width wise.

This second fold line will mark where the shoulder line is on the garment, and allows you to place the neck hole so it will sit properly on the shoulders. ( more on this later). You can pretty much put this fold wherever you like on the facing fabric, keeping in mind you want it to be biased towards the top half of your facing. I find about 3-5 inches down from the top edge works best.

So make the second fold and again press the crease.

Now we can unfold our facing! It should look something like:

Figure 1
Here's the facing fabric, with the center lines and shoulder lines marked. ( for clarity I used marker, in reality the lines are pressed in.)

Do not iron out the fold lines! These lines are what you will use to both place the neck hole on the facing, as well as ensure the correct placement of the facing on the garment itself.

For the sake of clarity I have marked all the fold lines on all the examples in the pictures. This is not something you need to do on the actual fabric, as the pressed in folds should be much easier to see in person than the are in a picture.

Marking the neck hole and slit on the facing

Place your facing, with center and shoulder lines marked, flat on your work surface wrong side up.

You can use my Basic Adult Neck Hole Pattren, which you can find at this link:   http://www.mediafire.com/view/?kvclshd5osr0alc
and again at the bottom of this post, along with sizing instructions.

Or, you can draft your own. I have posted some instructions on how to draft a neck hole pattern in the very next blog post, aptly titled " How To Draft A Custom Neck Hole Pattern"

Of course, if you already have a pattern, you can just use that!  

Now that you have a neck hole pattern, you need to place that pattern on facing, matching center and shoulder lines.

Figure 2
Facing fabric with the neck hole pattern laid out and ready to be marked.

Trace around neck hole and remove pattern. I highly recommend chalk to mark with, but markers, fabric pens and thread marks work too.

Do Not Cut Out The Neck Hole Yet!

Now we mark the slit.

Measure down the center front line and mark the desired length of the slit. I like to use a small arrow shape at the end of the slit line just as a visual reminder that I will need to turn the corner here when sewing.

Figure 3
Slit marked along center line. Yellow arrow is pointing out the little arrow-like mark I use to mark the end of the slit.

If using the pattern I've included, I find that about 5.5 inches looks good and works well for most garments and people. You can make it longer if you like, however I do find that any shorter looks kind of  "off" with this particular neck hole.

Do Not Cut Out The Neck Hole Or Slit Yet!

Note:
Now that you have the neck hole and slit marked, this can be a great point to add any fancy work, like embroidery, to your facing.

I prefer adding any embroidery before I've cut out the actual final shape of my facing. This way I have more fabric to work with and attach my embroidery hoops to, and if the fabric stretches or becomes a little misshapen while working the embroidery on it, I can just take it into account when I do cut out out the final shape of the facing.

Just remember to leave yourself room for seam allowance on the outside edge, about a 1/2 inch, and I personally feel it looks best if you set your embroidery about an 1/2 inch away from the neck hole.

Shaping the facing

Now that all the important bits have been marked we get to the fun part, the overall shape of your facing!

This is where you can be as creative as you like...or not. If you wish to have a simple square-ish facing, or you need this tunic in the next half hour and just want to be done, you can even skip this whole step and go straight to the next step. You totally have my permission!

OK, if your still reading, we are shaping our facing, which is quite simple.

Fold your facing (now with the neck hole and slit marked) in half along the center line.

Mark the shape you want your facing to be on the folded fabric.

Keeping fabric folded, cut out the shape.

Figure 4
Two examples of the facing fabric, the one on the left has been marked with the shape I want the facing to be, and the one on the right has been cut out. (please ignore the wrinkles on the bottom of the facing..they didn't look that bad when I was taking the pictures.)

Unfold.

By working with your fabric folded you ensure everything comes out symmetrical.

Do Not Cut Out The Neck Hole Or Slit Yet!
(I know, it's so tempting, and many of the Big Three pattern companies instructions would have had you cut it out @ step 1..but trust me, it's easier this way!)

The shape you cut can be anything you like and think will look spiffy on your garment. You can plan it out ahead of time, or just play around with a straight edge and some chalk and see what strikes your fancy.

A few things to keep in mind:

All the outside edges of the facing will get turned under, and straight lines with corners are generally far easier to turn under than curves. Something to consider if you are new to sewing, or going for quick and easy.

Remember to leave yourself seam allowance...I usually go for about 1/2 inch all the way around.

Don't get scissor happy! Make sure you leave enough fabric around the edge of your neckline so that once it is sewn, turned and the edges are turned under you still have enough facing showing that it looks good. I find a good rule of thumb for a neck hole with a slit is to have at least 2 inches left all the way around once everything is done.

That is 2 inches past the end of the slit, the sides of the neck hole and behind the neck hole.

It would actually be 2.5 inches when your cutting out the shape because of seam allowance.

This is the minimum that I personally feels looks good. By all means feel free to go bigger!

Preparing the garment

Before you attach the facing to your garment, you need to prepare the garment. The facing is attached after any center and/or shoulder seams have been sewn, but before side seams are done or side gores, sleeves, or trims have been added.

The goal here is to work with a flat piece of fabric that is as small and manageable as possible while attaching the facing. That way there is less to fuss with and less to wrangle through your sewing machine. ( if you are using a sewing machine. If you are sewing by hand, bless you for your historical authenticity and determination.)

If you are making a garment that has center and shoulder seams, you are ready to attach the facing! The seam lines will actually double as your center and shoulder lines. If your garment has only shoulder seams, or no seams at all, you will need to mark these lines in the same manner you marked them on the facing.

Fold the garment in half lengthwise; press crease line with iron.

Fold again in half, this time width wise; press crease and unfold.

Attaching the facing to the garment

With your garment lying flat, wrong side up, place the facing on it, also wrong side up, matching all center lines and should lines

Again: To have your facing end up on the right side of your garment, with the right side of the fabric showing, you want to have the right side of the facing against the wrong side of the garment

When all lines are matched up, pin the facing to the garment, starting at the center of the neck hole and then working evenly around the circumference of the neck hole. Also be sure to pin just past the end of the slit and about midway up the slit as well.

You may also want to pin the edges of the facing, just to keep them from flopping around while your sewing the neck hole.

Figure 5
My facing, pinned: ( I believe in more is ..more.)

Now stitch the facing onto your garment, beginning at the center back of the neck hole and following the neck hole around towards the slit.

Stop stitching just before you reach the slit, about a 1/4 to 1/8 of an inch away.

Sink the needle into the fabric, raise the presser foot and rotate the fabric around the needle so that you will now be sewing just to the outside of the slit line. Lower the presser foot and resume stitching, again, just outside the edge of the line marked on the fabric.

When you reach the end of the slit, again sink your needle into the fabric, raise the foot and turn your fabric to angle your stitches down to meet the center line. Lower foot and stitch.

At the center line again sink your needle and raise the foot. Now turn the fabric so that your stitching will mirror what you just did on the other side of the slit line. Lower foot and stitch.

Figure 6
It's not as clear as I'd like,  but if you look close you can see the stitching line in blue around the outside edge of the black line. 

Continue up the other side of the slit line, and then around the rest of the neck hole just as you did for the first side of the neck hole, just in reverse order.

Finish at center back.

Finishing the facing

You're almost there! :)

Now you can cut out the neck hole and slit...aren't you excited?

Carefully trim about a 1/2 inch inside the stitching around the neck hole.

Very carefully cut down between the stitching lines on either side of the slit, being sure not to cut into stitching. You may want to use a small pair of embroidery scissors for this.

Cut notches along curves to make turning easier and neater, again being careful not to cut into stitching.

Trim corners where the neck hole meets the slit at an angle.

Figure 7
Here is the neck hole, half trimmed before turning. It can seem like an easy to skip step when you're in a hurry, but those little notched on the curves make such a difference! 

This will make turning the corners out easier and help it look much neater. Once again, just be careful not to cut into the stitching line.

Now turn the facing through the neck hole to the right side of the garment.

Neatly press the edges of the neck hole and slit. This can take some finagling. Just take your time and work your way around the neckline, being careful of fingertips around the iron!

Now working your way around the outside edge of your facing carefully turn under about a 1/2 inch, press and pin facing edge to garment.

Figure 8
It's a little hard to see, but the right side is still the raw edge of the facing, and the left side is turned under, pressed and pinned, ready to stitch. 

Once again, you'll want to keep in mind where your center and shoulder lines are and match these up, ensuring everything comes out centers and even.

Stitch facing edge to garment, keeping as close to the edge of the facing as you can for a neat finish.

You're Done!

At this point you can top stitch around the neckline edge if you like. I usually don't, but this can be a good way to stabilize the neckline if your working with a particularly flimsy fabric, It could also be a decorative element.

This is also a great point to add and decorative trim or fancy work you want to add to the neck line or facing.

Now you have a lovely finished neckline and can continue on constructing the rest of your garment. Go You! :)

Here are some links for easy tunic patterns and tutorials that would work well with this type of facing.

http://www.virtue.to/articles/tunic_worksheet.html
This links to a tunic making worksheet that walks you through all the measurements you need to take and important things like wearing ease. I personally find tunics made from this worksheet a bit on the snug side, but that's a personal preference sort of thing. Be sure to check out the rest of Miss Cynthia Virtues site...inspiration galor!

http://www.thescholarsgarret.com/northernshores/tunic1.html
A truly quick and dirty tunic how-to. Not necessarily period, but it's not a bad place to start.

http://www.vogthandcrafts.com/sca/ktunic1.html
This is a new one I've recently come across, and I like it! (It's very similar to how I make my earlier period gowns and tunics.) It's how to make a simple gown, but the same instructions work for a tunic.

http://stursula.lochac.sca.org/articles-stories/how-to-make-a-t-tunic/
 Another newer one. Really good overall instructions and touches on period fabrics and some other useful information.

And finally, here is the link to my Basic Adult Neckline Pattern, if you don't feel up to drafting your own just yet, as well as a few other helful ideas.

http://www.mediafire.com/view/?kvclshd5osr0alc
Once you click the link and see the pattern, you can click the big green download button, and after downloading it you should be able to print it. You want it to be full page size and if you computer gives you the option you want to make sure "fit to frame" is check-marked.

http://www.mediafire.com/view/?yasm15pcdg3128g
Another style of neckline that can be nice for dresses called a Boat Neck Line. This One has no slit, but can be made using a facing in the same manner as described above.

http://www.mediafire.com/view/?mtz0g2724exx12g
Some ideas for facing shapes.