Smoooooooth Waistbands

At your request, here's the tutorial on how to make the waistband of the pants in the last post.

This is not a tutorial for the pants: I'm assuming you have a pair of pants that merely needs a waistband. A suggestion for maximizing the smoothness of this waistband: use as small a waistline on your pants as is possible. Remember that the waistline needs only be as big as your hips to be pulled up over them. If you entertain excess ease in your waistline, it'll all show up bunched under this waistband. 


I recently saw a similar tutorial on someone's blog that inspired me to try waistbands like these. I made one adaptation to that tutorial: in Steps 1 and 2, I sewed both the elastic and fabric loops closed before assembling the waistband. I did this because I like to hide all my seam allowances if I can. Sadly, I cannot remember the blog - I only remember that I left a gushing comment that included the words "yoga pants". If you're reading this, thank you! And would you also please raise your hand and shout, "Me! Me" and leave a comment so we can all go visit and give you credit?
*** update: found it, thanks to KJ@letsgoflyakite - here it is on The Mother Huddle!***


Let's get started:
You will need wide elastic and some stretchy fabric for the waistband. I used some knit remnants. You can also use ribbing, interlock, jersey - anything like that. Note that the pants themselves are a little stretchy, being made of sweatshirt fleece. I have not tried this with wovens - it seems incongruent somehow.


Step 1
Get wide elastic - mine was 1.5" wide - and measure and cut the length you need. Overlap the ends and sew into a loop.

Like so:

Step 2
Lay the loop flat on the waistband fabric (folded double along the left edge as shown) and cut to size. This is going to encase the elastic band, so it has to be as long as the waistband, and twice its height plus seam allowance. My waistband loop was 22" long and 1.5" wide, so the waistband fabric piece, including 1/2" seam allowances, was 23" long and 4" high. Remember to lay out the fabric so that the waistband stretches sideways (from hip to hip) rather than from top to bottom.


Sew the short ends of the waistband fabric (right sides together) together to make a tube.

Step 3

Fold the tube in half lengthwise, with the right sides facing out, and slip the elastic tube inside. You now have a casing for the elastic that hides it completely, and has the bottom edge open.

Step 4

Flip the waistband upside down so the unfinished edge is on top. Notice it is a little smaller than the waistline of the pants. You might want to make quarter-circumference marks along the waistband for alignment with the pants later.

Step 5

Slip the upside-down waistband into the top of the pants. Line up the seamline of the waistband with the back center seam of the pants and pin in place.  Line up the quarter marks of the waistband with the other seams of the pants and pin those spots in place too. Ignore how my seam allowances are all of different widths - it's just the way I sew. 

Step 6
Start sewing, stretching the waistband to match the waistline of the pants as you go. Stretch in both directions - behind and in front of the presser foot. Sew as close to the edge of the elastic as you can, but not on it.

Here's a picture to show the bulge of the elastic to the left of the stitching line - the stitching line hugs it pretty closely.

When done, it should look like this:

Step 7
Serge/finish the seam allowance of that seam you just sewed and keep it folded down (not turned up) as in the picture.

Step 8
On the right side, top-stitch on the pants, close to the seam, making sure the seam allowance is still tucked underneath so that you are sewing through it to keep it folded down.  

Finished waistband - in denim blue

and rose

just to show you that it works even in pink!

Two variations:

1. For sweatpants with adjustable waists, use draw cord elastic (the kind that has a channel in the middle with a drawstring) and make buttonholes (or use eyelets) in the center front of the waistband.
2. For yoga pants, make a wide/high and snug waistband of some shape-control fabric like lycra or polyester knit and omit the elastic.