For this project, I wanted to go with a simple design. I didn’t want to include any pockets on the apron as it saved time in manufacturing and I don’t have a huge need for extra pockets (all my clothes have pockets already). My design consisted of a piece of fabric that was sized according to the dimensions below and three straps found in the OEDK. One strap was for my head to fit into and the other two tighten around my waist.

To start this design, I cut the above dimensions into a piece of butcher paper. There was no meter stick that I could find in the OEDK, so I used a large piece of aluminum with a straight edge. I initially started out with a longer measurement for the top measurement and I adjusted all of my lines as I went to find an aesthetically pleasing shape for my apron. After drawing, I cut the design out on paper with scissors, taped the design onto my yard of fabric, and then used the cutting wheel to make straight, long cuts along the paper.

After cutting, I started sewing. I folded an inch of fabric over the edge of the left side of my fabric to begin. I then sewed along this line. The focus during sewing was to put the stitch close to the end of the fabric that was overlapped as this leaves a tight edge without loose fabric. I did this for all the edges, pivoting by leaving the needle in the fabric and rotating. The hardest part of this process was trying to fold the edge on the side that bends inward. I wanted to leave a sharp corner at this junction while not leaving too much fabric in the corner. Another setback was that I had to change the thread on one of the sewing machines. I decided to use a different color for my my new line of stitching as I thought it would look good. After sewing a little bit with red thread, I decided to go back and finish the rest of the border with black. The front can be seen here:

After this step I was able to add the straps. To attach the straps, I used a simple box stitch as seen below:

This stitch provide a strong attachment and I liked how the white boxes looked against the red apron. Four of these box stitches were done to attach all straps. Then with the waist straps I folded them over so they wouldn’t fray significantly with use. This can be seen below:

Overall, I would estimate that this project took me around six hours to complete. The hardest part for me was the measurement and test fitting with the butcher paper. That took me a while to complete, but made the rest of the project easier. Sewing the apron edge took the longest time as I had issues with the sewing machines and there as a lot of fabric that needed to be sewn. In the future, I would like to work on my stitching when I changed direction. I also would like for the two angled sections of the apron to look cleaner with less stitching errors. Overall, the final product can be seen below and the project required a lot of precision in measurement and sewing.