The Pfaff Icon

Part of the fun of working at a sewing store is supposed to be the opportunity to try out the newest sewing machines.  Unfortunately, there is usually little time, since customers need to be taken care of first and foremost.  But – we do manage to “play” from time to time.

A few months ago, Joyce took on selling Pfaff machines.  Boxes of machines arrived, and we dutifully unpacked them all and set them up.  They looked lovely sitting on the table.  Joyce went off to the Pfaff convention to learn all the ins and outs of the new machines.  Back home, we dutifully oohed and aah-ed at the lovely machines, but didn’t get much further than winding bobbins and stitching a few tiny samples.   Now, I can’t extol the virtues of any machine, no matter how lovely, unless I’ve had a go at it, so the next order of business was just finding time to stitch out something.

We need to show off the beautiful decorative stitches on the Pfaff Icon (the latest and greatest in their line-up), and instead of simply stitching out rows and rows on a square of fabric, I thought a useful project was in order.  I borrowed Rhonda’s idea of an organizer and stitched out a random selection of decorative stitches.  We now have a caddy and sampler in one to keep the squares of fabric and other bits that we need on hand to demonstrate the machines. 

ribbon stitch is the one running down the centre

My favourite, I think, are the “ribbon stitches”.  Wouldn’t that look gorgeous around the neckline of a tunic?  (Hint, hint - Sarah.)  You can probably see that I goofed in my calculations (my acrylic stand was of slightly different dimensions than the one Rhonda used), and instead of turning under a hem, I ended up stitching on a little ribbon “skirt”.  No problem – just another opportunity for more decorative stitches.

Then I absolutely had to try out some embroidery.  Since I have a real problem of random embroideries that serve no purpose, my eye was caught by a little case for scissors in the selection of embroideries.  (Something useful!)

front

I thought it was one of those “in the hoop” projects, and so, a very easy make.  I must have goofed somewhere.  (I am definitely no expert at machine embroidery.)  The embroidery turned out lovely – but the “project” part had me stumped and I ended up slip-stitching the sides by hand.  It all worked out, and we do have a sample of embroidery.

back

Couldn’t leave it there.  The Icon has some new and interesting stitches, called “floating” stitches.  These intrigued me.  You stitch the seam together using one of these stitches, and when you open up the seam, there’s decorative stitching showing on the right side the whole length of your seam.  I tried out various samples, but the six-gore skirt that I had planned was to be of Ultrasuede, and I didn’t want to use a stitch that would make too, too many holes, so my selection was limited to the simplest of this group.

inside

outside

So for now, my skirt is living at the store, masquerading as a sample.  If I keep this up, I’ll have more clothes at the store than at home!  (Well, highly unlikely.)

closest to the actual colour of the Ultrasuede

If only I had this machine at home ….  (I would probably never leave the sewing room!)