Friday, August 19, 2011

Jeans Fit Class at ASG Los Angeles

Dear Readers,

I unexpectedly had the best experience.  I was lucky enough to get into Jennifer Stern Hazeman's Jeans Fit class at the American Sewing Guild (ASG) conference here in Los Angeles and even ate breakfast with her (unexpectedly, she's taller than I imagined)!  Fun with celebrity sewists - what a day!

 Here is the link to her BLOG!  We received, among a professional workbook the following jeans pattern (left).  She has a khaki pattern that I already have (right).


Jennifer is delightful!  I did get a perfectly fit pair of jeans seriously thick muslin  - see below:
 The class was large - and we were provided Bernina Aurora 440s and 430s to sew our muslins with (what a luxury!).   I am going to tweak them a bit more once I use actual jeans material (I need to ease in the knee notches so they match and work on some of the back wrinkles - this material has no stretch).

Seriously, Jennifer is probably the best sewing instructor I've run across. I must say she has excellent training skills she employs that are professional and exceed the standards for adult learning.  Great job JS!

And she can really draft and fit patterns.  The class had about 18-20 people (probably the max you can fit in a hands-on class) , and everyone had excellent results - and everyone had distinctly different figures.  She was very fair and spent time with those learners that had difficulty understanding the pattern-making/fitting techniques.

All that said, I didn't need much personalized instruction as I was the only person in the class that had an almost perfect fit out of the box.  I merely made changes for boot cut and a deeper slope in the back crotch line (a mere preference for me!) - I had quite the opposite experience in making my bodice sloper.

I would encourage all to attend the conference - I am thrilled at the variety of the workshops at the conference (bra-making!), and of the sewing level of the sewists attending.  It gives me something to aspire to!

I'm working on alterations, my bodice sloper blouse and now, jeans!  Fun!


6 comments:

Eugenia said...

Oooh I am so envious! I did Jennifer Stern's online jeans making class with Pattern Review, which was excellent, but it must have been wonderful to actually have her there in person to give you individual help. Lucky you! I'm looking forward to seeing your finished pair of jeans.

Dr. Fun (AKA Sister) said...

Awesome! 8 hours and look what you have! I worked 3 days (granted it was just a few hours at a time) and only ended up with a partial muslin and pockets sewn. Plus that was 3 times the price. You rock!

Pam said...

Thanks E! Maybe you can convince J. to come to London! I remember your jeans! Yes, what made the class so effective is that she had the ready made muslins made up - so you could try different sizes - then she suggested alterations - then you made your own and then she suggested more alterations and on and on. It made it quick to get to the end result. Plus she drafted the original pattern so she did know a lot of details. S - the ASG conference is in Houston next year - not too far away from you!
We'll see how the jeans sew up - my execution skills seemingly need to improve!

Ann's Fashion Studio said...

How nice to have the opportunity to take her class.
I made jeans with her pattern and I was very pleased with mine also.

Sewingadicta said...

OMG! How lucky are you !!!!! The setting is spectacular and pants as well, so fast! I am really envious .... lol.

Pam said...

I know - 8 hours - that's my kind of fitting:)