Building structure and support into a garment can be confusing and a recent query brought this to light. The question — What’s the difference between interfacing, lining, interlining and underlining?

The answer: All of these terms refer to construction details that are usually hidden from view when you’re wearing a garment, but they serve an important function in maintaining the shape and comfort of your creation.

Interfacing is a support fabric used in areas that need more stability than just the fabric weight. For example, you’ll find interfacing in collars, cuffs, waistbands, closures (like buttonholes), and sometimes hems. In tailored garments, you may find interfacing under entire garment sections, and more than one type used within a single garment.

Lining is used to help hide the inner construction details of a garment, and also to help it slide off and on over other clothing with ease. Lining fabrics are usually slippery and silky, though other types may be used for effect. Lining is constructed separately from the garment and attached at facing or hem areas by hand or machine.

Interlining is a fabric added to a garment when more warmth is needed, like in a winter coat. It may be a heavy fabric with batting added, or a lighter weight one like flannel or fleece. Interlining can be constructed separately from the actual garment (it’s sometimes removable), or used as an underlining.

Underlining is a fabric added to fashion fabric for more body and/or opacity. It’s a separate layer attached to the corresponding garment fabric section wrong side, and then treated as one during construction. Pattern markings are often transferred to the underlining to avoid show-through on the garment fabric.

So, next time you’re in a fabric store, check out these offerings and add them to your projects where they’re needed. Follow the pattern directions for their use.

Many of us like to wear sweatshirts–they’re comfy and cozy for winter days at home. It’s easy to convert a sweatshirt to a cardigan and use it as a basic canvas for embellishing. Just follow these easy steps:

1. Find the center front of the shirt by matching the “side seams”. Many sweatshirts are knitted in a circle so they don’t really have side seams, but approximate based on the underarm sleeve placement. Mark the center front along the enter length of the shirt.
2. Before cutting on the line, reinforce on each side it with stitching 1/8″ away from the marking.
3. Cut between the sewn lines to open up the sweatshirt.
4. Embellish it as desired, then bind the front edges to finish. If you’re making a button and buttonhole closure, add a narrow fabric facing or grosgrain ribbon behind the opening to prevent stretching.
5. If you want to trim the ribbing off the neck or lower edge, follow a similar process of stitching first to prevent stretching, then cutting next to the stitching. Bind edges to finish.