A DRESSMAKING CLUB.

Hawera Star, Volume XLV, 14 November 1925, Page 19

A DRESSMAKING CLUB.

A dressmaking club is a new idea in London. Miss M. C. Kingsford. who originated it, says that the idea had been simmering in her thoughts for about live years. She has done dressmaking all her life, and teaches at girls’ schools and takes private pupils.

“Such a Jot of women who nowadays live in clubs and at hotels' and boarding-houses where they have only one room,” she said, “used to tell me that they did not have a place where they could work.”

So Miss Kingsford rented a large office_ in a main shopping thoroughfare in Kensington and equipped it as a workroom with sewing machines, dress stands, andi a cutting out table. On the walls are hung quaint fashion prints showing bygone styles.

The club members are allowed the use 'of the room between 2 and 6 o’clock any afternoon in the week. They can get advice on paper patterns to suit their particular figures, and buy these patterns and be. helped with their cutting out. They pay an annual subscription, and every time they make use of the club room a small fee for running expenses.

“One girl, who is the eldest of a large family, told me, ‘I am going to get father to let me join the club so that I. can run around here- and work in peace without, interruptions,’ ” said Miss Kingsford. “And a- mother who has several girls who go. out a good deal comes in to make up frocks for them. Many women are really good needlewomen, but have not enough confidence to make a dress, so they are encouraged: before joining the club to take a lesson or two. ’ ’ As members, they can always appeal for advice or take a special lesson to show them the right wav to finish a neck so that it will set properly, or to make covered buttonholes, or any other detail.

“The sleeves are the test of a garment,” said: Miss. Kingsford, “and long sleeves are in fashion again. Sleeves and armholes are very difficult, and when they don’t look right it is liard to say whab is wrong with them. Beginners are apt to cut the armhole too big, forgetting that, turnings have--to come oft. People come in with two oi - three dresses and two or three pairs of sleeves to put* in. One of mv members who is- a very good worker and does exquisite clothes always consults- me. about the sleeves. Another comes when there is a change in. the fashions to know how to cub out the new .things. ” Manv practical professional ways unthe amateur are picked up at the club, such as the need for constantly taking: measurements. How to use chalk in marking a pattern is also learned, and the value of a “And here is one thing that I a - wavs use,” and Miss Kingsford held an * a thin roller padded with, flannel. “It is most useful when pressing sleeves and the seams, in skirts where yon do not want the- edge of a turning: to make a mark.”