#i just want linen no bullshit synthetic blend

[smolsleepyfox]

I thought the sewing process on a historic shirt was the hard part but no

Getting linen fabric apparently is

[vinceaddams]

Top 5 WORST fabrics

1. that fuckign. synthetic knit that some of the sport coats at work are made of. I don't know what it's called but I hate it. It's polyester with barely any stretch and is. so. DENSE. Worst thing to alter. Damn near impossible to get a pin or a hand sewing needle through, and sometimes it makes the machine skip stitches. A lot of the sport coats are half lined, and if you bring me one of those ones with the side seams pinned to take in, I will just take in the centre back seam instead because I DO NOT want to hand sew the lining back down to both entire side seams on that horrible impenetrable bullshit fabric. Sometimes it has a woven looking pattern printed on it, as if to mock me.

Some of the shirts at work are made of a slightly softer version of the same stuff, and I once tried to mend a small hole in one of them using a zigzag stitch and it shredded the fabric and ruined the shirt. They had to go find the customer an identical replacement shirt, because the stupid fabric couldn't hold up to a few tightly spaced zig zags. Bullshit, bullshit garbage fabric. I hate it, I hate it I hate it I hate it. Everyone should stop manufacturing it immediately. Stop making it and destroy the formulas so nobody can ever make it again. It's not even a particularly bad texture to touch, relatively speaking, it's just a nightmare to sew.

2. Faux fur. To be fair, there is some decently nice faux fur out there, but most of it is just such an icky plastic-y texture and it sheds so much. So so much, and then you're worried about breathing in floating fuzzies of plastic. And it can also be really hard to get a pin or needle through the base fabric, depending on what kind it is. I remember I had some scraps of white faux fur that I used for craft projects as a small child, and it was like that, and there was some kind of finishing (presumably to help glue the hairs in place) that made the back of the fabric all crusty. It's the kind of thing that's awful to touch if your hand is even the slightest bit sweaty. I dislike polyester fleece for the same reason. No fleece sheets or pyjamas for me, ick!

3. Really loosely woven boucle. Who would invent a fabric that frays so gotdamn much? Look at this. (image source) Awful. Falls apart if you sneeze at it. Unpleasant texture, and not even nice to look at. (Yes I chose an ugly picture on purpose, but it's not a look I like even if it is in nice colours.)

Where's your structural integrity?? You can have weird lumpy fabric and still weave it decently tight! Especially if it's wool and you felt it a little bit. I shortened a skirt for a co-worker and it was made of similar stuff, and I was worried I'd damage it because it was so loose and shifty. What happens if you walk by a tree or something and snag a thread? Whole thread comes out and deforms a big patch of fabric? Well that's what you get for making all your threads just acquaintances instead of best friends. (I hate poly chiffon for similar reasons.)

4. Poly/cotton blends, because they feel like a betrayal. You could have been 100% cotton but you aren't :( Could have been a nice comfy shirt or nightgown that could eventually be used for firestarters once it's too worn out, but no, can't use blends for kindling because the polyester part melts into nasty little black plastic blobs. Not like 100% cotton or linen, which burns nicely and leaves basically no ash. And I hate pilling, horrible hell texture, and synthetics tend to pill way more.

5. Anything with glitter on it, because it's contagious. Small sequins are also bad (see blog post linked in poly chiffon line) but at least they're sewn on and only come off where you cut them. I think we as a species have moved past the need to glue glitter onto fabric, because it does not stay glued. We have foil print, and metallic ink, and beading and rhinestones and metallic thread and all kinds of other ways to do the sparklyshiny. No more sticking glitter on things that might go in the wash.

Generally speaking I dislike synthetics and Bad textures, though everyone's opinion of bad textures is different. I'm also not fond of stretch knit, but it has its uses.