Techniques: Triangle Bound Buttonhole

First I want to thank everyone for their comments on my EOM collection so far, especially my jacket. I am in the process of touching up my bound buttonhole techniques and seeing that I did another walk though with this particular one, I decided to do a tutorial on it to share.

As like all button holes, you need to make sure that your button is proportioned in length and width with your button, that is, the buttonhole should not overwhelm your button and vise versa.

the reason for this, is that the triangle BH IS a DESIGN FEATURE and should not be covered up, on the other hand, if the button is too small, the hole will not be able to secure it, so it all makes sense right?

The Placement of your triangle BH needs to be marked out on your garment before you start working. These lines should be long, because the triangle BH requires a LARGE PATCH (think photo size 4x6) for the best application.

okay,, so its not a perfect shirt front but you get the point, lol.

1. You will need 3 pieces, your fashion fabric, your patch fabric, you may choose to do something fancy like use a different color or texture of similiar weight, that's on you and your interfacing, preferably lighter than your fashion fabric so it won't add bulk just stability.

2. Patch fabric goes on the RIGHT SIDE of the fashion fabric (flowered print) and interfacing goes on the WRONG SIDE.

3. I would recommend that you figure out the dimensions of your triangle before hand. Draw it on tracing paper and just transfer this onto your patch. I used a pen for my markings for this tutorial but of course you will use your chalks or other appropriate marking tools. As you can see, I just free hand mine and added a little extra on this test sample but on my actual garment, I will not take this chance. Stitch your triangle on the sewing machine.

4. Draw a Placement Line where you want the SLIT of the button hole to go.

5. Draw a line at the back leg and at the POINT of the buttonhole where the slit must stop.

6. Now this step is just a precaution to make sure your points and triangle is where you want it to be. Mark out points again and mark it once more with the chalk and ruler

7. Sew on these new lines using a 20 stitch per inch stitch length, when you get to each point, go 2 stitches ACROSS THE POINT. When you are done, PRESS the stitched triangle on the wrong side, and the right side to meld the stitches.

8. Sewing the triangle twice provides more support for the corners for turning and cutting. Take your scissors and cut into the triangle as shown before from corner to placement line. Cut through ALL LAYERS.

9. Now this part is very important. Next you have to Clip the Patch ONLY, not the fashion fabric, to 1/8" of the triangle corners. Place you hand under the patch to ensure than you are NOT cutting the fashion fabric.

10. Next, you need to mark or at least follow this diagram, your patch, so it looks like this

Side A (back leg) needs to be turned under FIRST. then B and C. The reason is because A needs to turned under so that NO FABRIC will be visible on the right side of your garment.

11. Once its on the wrong side, give it a hard press, to make sure that when you flip it, no fabric from the patch shows, you can use your clapper here also.

12. This is how it should look on the right side

13. For the other side, Make sure that the lips, which is the inner fabric of the triangle looks like this on the wrong side, because this will be the foundation that gives the shape of the bound buttonhole on the right side.

14. Then just turn sides B and C under just like you did with side A. It should look like this, the lips under the turn is what forms the shape. If your corners are not neat enough, fold the turn back and snip the corners little by little, be very careful, until it is just perfect or good enough, lol

15. Once all the fabric is turned under Bend back the back leg (side A) so you can see the original stitching of triangle. Holding the turned patch just like this, use your zipper foot to run another stitch along the previous stitch line, this will hold the buttonhole secure.

and done

as you can see, I am using my finger to emphasize the slit. Once you are done, you can add a top stitch for more definition and more stability.

You can also make this buttonhole, bigger, as a designer welt pocket

I hope this was helpful, I try to do my samples every once in a while and seeing that I'm going through all my buttonhole applications I figured I should do a couple of tutorials, so if you like this one let me know, I will post another one soon.

Have a great weekend.

Comments

[gold]

Thanks for the lesson!!Now I have to see if I can do it!!

[Robin]

Wow! What a great tutorial - it is super helpful! I also liked knowing that you can use this technique for welt pockets.

[sheila]

Thanks for the tutorial.

[Tany]

Great tutorial, well done! I've done these buttonholes before, on my red trench, and I love them!