Hi I'm Meg. I'm the editor at Seamwork and I am here to do a little sewing experiment.
I want to answer the question what happens when you don't pre-wash your fabric before you sew
a piece of clothing? If you don't pre-wash your fabric, is your t-shirt going to shrink in the wash
and then you won't even be able to wear it or does it really make a difference?
Stay tuned as I do this little experiment with a couple garments
and a couple different kinds of fabric and I will let you know what I find out.
So first I want to explain how I'm going to conduct this experiment. I am going to use
two different kinds of fabric, one is woven one is knit, and I'm going to sew two different Seamwork
patterns the Orlando t-shirt and the Bo top. I'm going to sew one of each before I wash the
fabric or treat it in any way and I'm going to sew another one after I have washed the fabric
and at the end we're going to compare the two garments and see how much shrinkage there was, if
it affected the overall shape, or if I'd still be able to wear these garments even though I didn't
wash my fabric before I sewed them. So let's meet the fabrics I'm going to use for this experiment.
The first one is a jersey knit it's the one I'm going to use, that I did use for the Orlando top
and I got it from Blackbird Fabrics and according to the tag it is 57.5% cotton 37.5% modal
and 5% spandex and so this is a pretty typical t-shirt weight knit. It's got the model so it's
got some some extra drape but I thought it would be a good example of what would happen if you did
not pre-wash knit before you sewed up a t-shirt. So I've got my yardage here that I will wash for my
other sample then I have a little swatch here so that we can measure the difference as well.
For the next fabric uh it's a woven fabrics that I'm going to be using to sew the Bo top which I
have not made yet. I also got this at Blackbird Fabrics and it's a viscose linen noil um and
it's in the colorway of latte and according to the fabric tag it's 70% viscose and 30%
linen um I thought this would be a good example because anything with any kind of a rayon in it uh
can be kind of a disaster in the washing machine depending on the percentage and linen is also
can be prone to shrinkage so I thought that this would be a good fabric to experiment with um the
instructions say to machine wash warm and tumble dry low or hang to dry. I picked this one because
you could machine wash it. Sometimes with rayon I know that they don't want you to put it in the
washing machine but I wanted to get one where you could see kind of what the effect of that would be.
So those are the two fabrics that I'm going to be using for this little experiment. I am going to sew
up all of my samples and I will meet you back here to show you what shrank and what didn't and by how
much and if this even really matters. Welcome to my laundry room. So I thought I would give you a
couple tips while I do my laundry. First of all I'm going to throw the Bo top in that I already
sewed. Again this fabric was unwashed so it's going in to be washed for the first time already sewn.
Then I have my yardage here and I have serged the ends of it if you're not serging or finishing the
ends of your fabric before you pre-wash it you're going to end up with a tangled mess. So I have my
yardage with the edges serged. I'm going to wash that and as a little bonus for you I'm going
to wash a little scrap without serging and then one end is actually pinked using pinking shears
so as a little bonus we can compare the different finishing methods and see what works best
and then I also have my swatches which I'm going to put in a little lingerie bag so I don't lose
them. I'm just gonna pop it in here and wash the fabric as directed on the fabric tag. I'm gonna do
the same with the Orlando knit fabric and then I will meet you back in the sewing room to see
how it all went. All right I am back, I've finished sewing everything, I've finished washing everything,
and now it's time to see if the experiment worked and the experiment definitely worked. So what this
means is that you really should pre-wash your fabric. Let's take a look at why. So here is
the Bo top that I sewed with pre-washed fabric. So I washed this fabric according to the care
instructions, I cut out the size 8, and I sewed it, pressed it, it's all ready to go on the model.
Here this is the Bo top that I sewed before I pre-washed the fabric and I want to show you how
dramatically it shrank. This would be the number one reason why you want to pre-wash your fabric is
it can shrink, and it can shrink a lot. So let's take a look at what this one looks like and
it's the Bo crop top um as you can see it shrank significantly in length and it is now officially a
crop top. I actually really kind of like it and I'm still going to wear it but if this isn't what you
intended to make it might be what you end up with if you don't pre-wash your fabric. You can also see
here that the neckband kind of tore apart a little bit. This doesn't usually happen um after I wash my
project when I sew it but I think the reason that this happened is that the binding actually kind of
shrank and tugged and it pulled apart at the seams a little bit. So that was an unexpected surprise
and another cautionary tale for pre-washing your fabric because you never know what those
binding or hem bands might do when they shrink when they've already been sewn into the garment.
Okay so the Bo top shrank pretty dramatically and it was made out of a woven fabric
but what happens with knit fabrics? Are they a little bit more forgiving? Let's find out!
So this is the Orlando top sewn in a size 10 and this is fabric that I pre-washed. So I pre-washed
it according to the care instructions, sewed it up, washed it one more time, and here it is.
Now we're going to take a look at the Orlando top that I sewed without pre-washing the
fabric. So I just got the fabric, cut right into it, sewed it up, and then I washed it.
I just want to point out right away that there is already some distortion at the neckline. I think
because the neckband shrunk and it kind of created some puckering here along the neckline, so I have
a feeling there was some shrinking but let's see what it looks like when you're wearing it.
And surprise, surprise. This shirt also shrank. It isn't as noticeable as it is on the woven fabric
because knits really are forgiving, they'll stretch, you can see that the distortion at the neckline
stretches out and lays flat against your neck when you put the shirt on. When the shirt's not
on it's a little bit more obvious. Pay attention to how much it shrank in length because that's
kind of what you want to, what you want to pay the most attention to with garments, especially
woven garments. If you ever wash your pair of jeans you'll notice they may shrink in length more than
in width. So I have a few more examples of how different fabrics can shrink because again it's
a gamble if you don't pre-wash your fabric you don't know how much it's going to shrink. So I have
cut out some 5"x5" samples, I washed them and I'm going to measure them and see how much they shrink.
This is a denim sample, it actually did okay, it only shrank about an eighth of an inch, which isn't
too bad. That's not the case for every denim so again it's a gamble. This is a lightweight cotton
and this one shrank pretty significantly, it shrank half an inch. So it is now four and a half inches
wide instead of five. Same with the linen that I sewed the sample for Bo, it actually shrank
about three quarters of an inch, so big shrinkage there. The knit, like I said a little bit more
forgiving but measuring the swatch you can see that it definitely shrank at least a quarter of an
inch. So there you have it shrinking happens and you can prevent it by pre-washing your fabric
according to the manufacturer's instructions. I have one more bonus for you a little experiment
within an experiment. This is the swatch of fabric that I pre-washed and I wanted to show you what
happens when you finish the edges. So if I had serged the edges they'd be totally neat and
contained within the serging, but if you don't have a serger what can you do? Well something you can
try to do is get a pair of pinking shears and pink the edge. So I did that with this
edge here and as you can see um it's pretty nice, it's pretty neat, there's not that much fraying.
This is the side where I didn't do anything absolutely no finishing of that seam and look
at how messy it gets. This can turn into a huge tangled mess in your washing machine if you don't
finish your fabric before you pre-wash it. So word of caution, get a pair of pinking shears, do a quick
zigzag stitch, or serge the edges of your fabric before you toss it in the wash to avoid this
thready mess and that concludes my experiment. I had a lot of fun doing the Seamwork Lab
with you so if you have a request for any other experiments you'd like to do, leave a comment below
tell us what you want to know and we will do the experimenting so that you don't have to and don't
worry I'm still going to wear this Bo crop top, in fact I'm gonna wear all these samples because
they didn't shrink too much that I won't be able to wear them. That being said I recommend you
always, always, always pre-wash your fabrics. Happy sewing! I guess I'll continue talking about it. Hmm, no I won't.