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Fly Zipper--A Real Fly Zipper
Thursday, May 26, 2005
On DH's Kwik Sew Pants, the pattern employs a mock fly zipper--just like most women's pants. I've been sewing this kind of zip forever, so the ones I make look pretty good. DH hasn't complained, or even noticed that the zips on his home sewn pants are any different than the ones on his RTW.
The only person who notices is me, and honestly, the only reason that I care is because of my topstitching. With the fly shield I use in place, you can't topstitch the "hook" portion without breaking your stitching. Or, I can't.
RTW top stitching exhibits no such break.
I've been looking at RTW pants trying to figure out how they do fly zips for quite some time, but never going so far as to rip a pair apart. I could tell that the fly shield and the zip were sewn together to the center front seam, allowing the fly shield to fold back from the top stitching completely. The shield is bar-tacked into place later.
Somehow I couldn't quite work it out, and nothing I have at home goes through the process in a way that makes any sense. If it mentions a real fly at all, it goes through such gyrations with flipping and folding that I'm completely cross-eyed before I get to the end of it.
I decided to do an all out search of the 'net to find some instructions I could understand. I followed every link--most were to the mock fly style that I can do with my eyes closed--until I found this one:
http://www.geocities.com/FashionAvenue/Catwalk/4867/sewtip1.html (scroll down about half way)
I printed it out and read through it a couple of times and Eureka!!! I've got it. Last night I successfully employed this method on my in-progress slim slacks. Now that I understand the concept, I've thought of a few improvements.
Someone said that Peggy Sagers has a fly method on her pants patterns that might be like this. I don't own any of her patterns, but when I've seen her on Sew Much More, she seems to know her stuff. It might be worth buying a pattern just to check out the fly.