Creating a Silk Lining for Your Hand Knit or Crocheted Shawl

Finishing techniques can take your hand knit or crocheted item from practical to spectacular. This is one method I use for lining a finished knit or crocheted project with silk.

Materials:

• Finished project, washed &/or blocked to final size

• Large paper (plain wrapping paper, recycled packaging paper, brown grocery bags cut open, etc.)  You may need to tape sheets together.

• Pencil

• Pins, weights and, if applicable, a blocking board for stretching garments with negative ease.

• Sewing thread

• Silk (select a weight and finish with good drape and hand, matching the drape of your knit or crocheted item, a heavier silk is better when pairing with a heavy knitted item), washed and steam pressed

• Interfacing (optional, depending on your project)

Method:

Lay the project on top of your paper, pinning or adding weights (cans of soup work well) to ensure it does not move. If your project fabric has a lot of stretch, you will need to stretch it out on the paper and weigh it down to stay in place.

1. Trace around the project.
2. Remove your project and cut outside the outline you have made by about 1/2". This will be your seam allowance. 
3. Lay your pattern on the silk and carefully pin or weigh it down, then cut out the silk.
4. Cut out the interfacing, if using, and trim away 1/2" for your rolled hem.
5. Create a rolled hem around the silk. See my video tutorial below.
6. Pin the silk to your project, stretching as needed to accommodate negative ease.
7. Carefully sew the lining to the inside of your project, picking up only a part of the yarn strand with your sewing needle. This will prevent the lining thread from appearing on the right side of your project.

Check out my YouTube videos with some tips: