Piping is a fun accent to seams and an easy way to trim garments. You’ll also see it in upholstery. It’s fairly easy to make, you just need a few specific tools and notions!
First you need your fabric. I’m using this polyester slub satin so it’s super easy to see the grain. For most purposes you need to cut the fabric on the true bias, which is the 45 degree angle.
I say for most purposes because heavy vinyls, like marine vinyls, don’t have any give on the bias so there’s no reason to cut at an angle. Instead they are cut on the straight grain and the seam allowance is snipped at any curves. You’ll see this in upholstery mostly.
You can use a ruler with the true bias marked (like this Olfa ruler) and line it up on the grain of the fabric to get the perfect true bias cut.
Or you can draw out 2″ on the straight and cross grains of your fabric, and use a straight edge to mark out the bias as shown above. Mark another line 1.5” away (unless you’re using really large cording, then you’ll need a wider strip) and cut the bias strip.
The reason to cut on the bias is that it will be the smoothest to work with. It can curve nicely around a neck or armscye, and it keeps a smooth shape around the cording.
You can use just about any fabric for piping. If you use a knit you can usually cut across the straight grain without incident. But with a woven fabric like this, the straight grain can’t take a curve without getting weird.
Now I’ll grab the cording. I like to use a specific cording from Wawak. The snow white micro cording is the best that I’ve used, and the 3/16” seems to be the right size for most jobs. You can also get larger cording up to 1” if you want to do something outrageous!
The last thing you need is the right presser foot for your machine. I sew on an industrial machine, so I like to use a zipper foot that I can get right up next to the cording. On a home machine you will probably use a cording or piping foot, but it will limit you on what size cording you can use.
To sew, you just fold the bias strip over the cording and nestle it right up next to the needle. Try to keep the fold even as you go. Because the fabric is on the bias, you can stretch it tightly around the piping. Try not to do that, just fold it over gently.
Above I have three examples of piping cut on different grains:
The top sample is on the straight grain. It’s pretty rigid and won’t curve at all.
The middle sample is cut on the bias, but only about 30 degrees, so not the true bias. It takes a slight curve, but it’s still not great.
And the lower sample is the true bias, cut at a 45 degree angle. See how tight of a curve you can get without any struggle? That’s why you can to use the true bias.
One thing I forgot to include in the video is how to join bias strips! If you’re doing a lot of piping, say along a hem, you’ll want to do it in one continuous piece.
So you would leave the pointed ends from cutting on the bias – those ends are on the straight grain, making joining them clean and easy. Place them together with the stitch line matched up at the edges. See how the points hang over? That’s good, you want the edges to match up where you sew them together (see the black line in the drawing above). Then press the seam open and trim away seam allowance if it’s too bulky. You’ll barely notice the seam once it’s made into piping, but try to hide them in inconspicuous areas anyway 🙂
