How to Sew & Cut Fabric to Make Bias Strips
- 1). Iron your 1/2-yard fabric rectangle to rid the piece of any creases or bumps. Smooth the fabric right side up on your work surface.
- 2). Cut the fabric on a 45-degree angled diagonal from the lower left hand corner of the fabric to the top edge, creating a right triangle with the section that is removed. One way to complete this step is to fold the top left corner of the fabric down to align with the bottom edge and cut along the fold.
- 3). Lay the cut right triangle on top of the right end of the fabric piece with right sides together, lining up the right angle to the top right angle of the fabric. Pin the far right short edge of the fabric to the fabric triangle.
- 4). Sew the triangle to the remaining fabric, removing the pins as you sew. The fabric should now be a parallelogram opposed to the original rectangle. Press the seam edges open on the reverse side of the fabric. Lay the fabric onto your work surface, right side down.
- 5). Find the necessary width of the strips to be cut from the material to make the bias strip. Multiply the width of the desired bias strip times four and subtract 1/8 inch for your total to create a double-fold bias strip, meaning that the fabric edges are folded into the outer fold thus avoiding visible fraying and fabric edges. For example, when making a 1-inch-wide double-folded bias strip, multiply 1/2 times four to equal 2 inches and subtract 1/8 inch, thus leaving a necessary strip width of 1 7/8 inches wide.
- 6). Use your ruler to measure and cut the strip widths calculated in Step 5. Using the previous example, measure the strips 1 7/8 inches wide beginning at the diagonal. Mark the width on the fabric from top edge to bottom edge across the entire piece of fabric using a marking pencil or invisible ink marker made for fabric.
- 7). Turn the fabric over again with the right side up and fold the lower long edge up to the middle of the fabric parallelogram and the top long edge down to meet it. Match up the lines, a bit off center, of the first section of the bottom edge to the second section of the top edge. This fold creates a spiral-like tube with the lining up of the measured width.
- 8). Pin the right sides of the long edges of the fabric together using that same off-center lining up of the widths. Sew along the long edge. The fabric will begin to twist up.
- 9). Untwist and flatten out one side of the fabric tube and you will see a small angled flap extending from the bottom. Begin to cut the lines, starting with the small fabric flap. The cuts are spiraled through the entire tube of fabric to the opposite end.
- 10
Iron the seams open on the reverse side of the extra-long fabric strip. Iron the strip in half width-wise, unfold the crease and fold each long edge of the long strip in toward the crease, and iron the folded sections to make two additional creases in the strip, lengthwise. Refold the center crease with the edges still folded inside and iron the entire strip together to create the bias tape you need for your project.