My former method of making ruffles was:
- Cut strip of fabric.
- Sew a basting stitch (longest stitch length) down the middle of the fabric.
- Pull the top string and hand gather, adjusting until ruffled as desired.
All in all it's a great way to get the job done, but it does require time and effort.
Somewhere in the dark recesses of my brain, I had a hazy memory that you could use your machine to make ruffles without a ruffling foot by adjusting the tension. I googled this, but couldn't really come up with hard cold facts on the first page of possibilities.
I did some experimenting. Woo hoo!!! It works! Here are the hard cold facts on how to machine gather ruffles without using a ruffling foot...
Cut strip of fabric to the width you want and twice the length you need.
Set your machine to the longest stitch length (in my case a 5).
Adjust your machine to the highest tension. (I set mine for an 8 or 9.)
Sew down the middle of your fabric and watch those gathers appear.
Ruffling just got easier!
