How to Pin a Zipper on Fabric

Video Transcript

"Hi, I'm Candi Cane Canncel with Expert Village. So in this clip I'm going to show you how to press open your seam and pin your zipper in preparation to stitch this zipper. So we already put in our basting stitch and I went ahead and put my permanent stitch. Now you want to open up the seam so you just want to press it really flat so the seam lies open. I was thinking it was a really good idea when you are doing zippers or sewing in general to sew with an iron near you. Because it's just nice to be able to keep your seams nice and flat it's easier to work with. Once we have that, then we're ready to pin in our zipper. So the first thing you want to do is with the zipper head up, you want to put it against the long side of the fabric. You want to put it so that zipper tape just grazes the top because you are going to need about 1/2" to5/8" between the zipper head and the very top of it. If you were going to put the seam there, so just go ahead from the wrong side pin it in. Then what I do is just go ahead and put a in on the right side at the very top to lock the zipper tape in. This is a little tricky because the zipper head is so heavy. Now you want to take these out and put them onto the right side. We're actually going to be pinning on the right side. So you line up the zipper teeth the center of the zipper teeth with the center seam. You just line it up perfectly, turn it over to the other side and pin. You want to pin on both sides, do it again line it up, hold it down and go ahead and pin. Zippers are one area where you don't want to skimp on pins because the stronger you pin it there the less likely it is when you are sewing for you to get bumps and it kind of wiggles. It will be just a lot easier if you have it in there pretty secure and when you get to the very edge. What you want to do is make sure that you aren't going to hit this little zipper stop. So you want to put your finger there and what I do to remind myself is just actually pin right across the whole seam. That way I know when I get to that point that is my ending point so once you have your zipper pinned in the next step is going to be stitching it."