How to Hem Jeans

In this day and age, knowing How to Hem Jeans is an invaluable skill. What with sky-high prices and kids to clothe, it can cost a lot to buy everyone a perfectly fitted pair of trousers. BERNINA offers this excellent video tutorial on hemming jeans. Not only can you apply this concept to an already existing pair of jeans, you can also use it on future, original projects. Learn the basics that will make your dollar stretch longer and your sewing skills expand.

1. To prepare your fabric or your jeans for hemming, you’ll first cut off the hem and then you will go to the iron, fold up one inch, and press. Once you have one inch pressed all the way around your hem you will open it back up and fold it down to the crease. Fold it again, and press. This will leave you with a very nice half inch hem for your jeans.
 

2. Pressing is very important when you’re preparing your fabric for hemming. You may want to use a clothes a pin after your finished pressing to hold that in place as you prepare your machine for sewing.
 

3. To prepare your sewing machine to sew in a hem for your jeans the first thing you will want to do is choose a heavier weight thread. You can use jean stitch thread in the color that matches the stitching on your jeans.
 

4. You can also use a jean or a denim needle and use a 100 or a 110. The presser foot that here on the BERNINA machine is the pressure foot #8. This foot is specially designed to sew over thicker, heavier fabrics with your heavier thread. You can see that there is a center hole for the needle. Having just a single hole opening helps to stabilize that needle as it goes down through the presser foot and into the bobbin area. Therefore, there is little play with that needle and less of a chance of breaking that needle.
 

5. The bottom of this foot is designed to work with a heavier weight thread and it helps to glide over that thread and heavier stitching as you are hemming. For the stitch to be just a single opening you want to lengthen your stitch to the stitch length that was at the bottom of your jeans. Proceed to hem your jeans.