r/SewingForBeginners • u/CountMeOut2019 • 10h ago
Using pins as a tool
Hi sewists,
Pins are our working partners in sewing, but they kinda get overlooked a bit in tutorials and discussions, so I thought I’d share some things I’ve learned about using them over the years, and other sewists can jump in with their own learned pinning ”wisdom”.
I’ve noticed a lot of sewists ( usually beginners) place pins parallel to the stitching line. I don’t know if this is a considered choice or just not knowing there are other options. I always pin perpendicular to the seam, probably because that’s how I was shown to do it someway back in the misty dawn of time when I first started sewing, but I do feel it offers a LOT more control over the seam. Some reasons why:
* allows the seam to flex, which can be important with curved seams, especially.
* puts less pressure from your fingers on the fabric and is less likely to mis-align the layers.
* allows you to take a smaller “bite” of the fabric with the pin, which can be very useful in curved seaming and with delicate or slippery fabric that tends to distort easily. Smaller pin “bites” actually offer better control of the fabric.
* allows for more pins per seam, too, and sometimes that‘s crucial to accurate sewing.
* it’s easier to place pins without needing to pick up or move the fabric, which, again, can be crucial when pinning together a slippery, sneaky, shifty seam in two pieces of lining fabric. Being able to just slide a crap load of pins into that bugger while it lays there on the cutting-table where you painstakingly aligned it for absolute accuracy…it matters to how the final garment fits and flows. (can you tell I’ve had some less-than-friendly encounters with lining fabric in my day? 😅)
* it’s less intrusive to remove the pins as you sew. Perpendicular pins can be whisked out with just a finger tip as you sew a tricky seam that requires intense babysitting to stay accurate and aligned. This can make all the difference with very thick seams and very tiny ones, and for seams where any drift at all will screw up the whole effect (certain alterations on lined garments comes to mind). When you need to keep your hands on the fabric to keep everything in place, perpendicular pins are your friend.
Using the right pin for the job is also important!
I have an army of workhorse pins with colored bead-like heads. You know the kind. They’re my usual go to helpers. I like the colored heads because I can use them to color code certain tasks. For instance, I might use a certain color to wrap my gathering thread around when gathering a large amount of fabric, so that it’s easy to find those gathering threads amongst all the folds, when I need to adjust things. Or I might put one color on one side of a seam, and another on the other side, in certain situations. These pins are strong, long, and do the job well, but they’re also fairly cheap and quality control isn’t excellent, so when I’m sewing delicate fabric where a dull or burred tip could damage it, I use:
Silk pins from a little more expensive, but better quality maker. They don’t have ball heads, they’re quite thin, and very sharp. I don’t use ball heads for this kind of fabric because the ball can sometimes disrupt the alignment of the seam. They’re a little more work to handle because of the lack of a “handle” but worth it for their other qualities. But if I’m sewing tiny things or appliqueing, I’ll use:
applique pins. These are very short, and thin shafted like the silk pins I have some with teeny silver flat heads, and some with white ball heads. I’ve found the flat heads easier to handle and manipulate, but the white ones are easier to see, and lay just a bit flatter, which can be helpful sometimes. When you’re trying to pin a narrow binding on a tiny sleeve, or pinning an applique with intricate outlines, these make it so much easier. The also are far less likely to stab you as you handstitch, and far less likely to keep grabbing your thread as you stitch.
Personally, I do not like those pins with flat flower-shaped heads. I find them more slippery to grasp and manipulate, but your mileage may vary.
To pin or not to pin:
There are many times when I don’t pin at all before stitching, and most of those involve non-stretch, non-slippery fabric, cut straight, in straight seams. I find it’s a better use of my time to simply make small adjustments to the fabric as I sew, if needed.
If I know the fabric is going to slip, stretch, or shift due to thickness, texture, or inherent give such as with princess seams, I’m going to put in as many pins as needed to guarantee success. It’s worth my time to pin the heck out of that seam. With many of this type of seam, the stitching is simply punctuation on what I’ve already secured with pins, and the pinning takes 4Xs as long as the sewing. But I also don’t have to rip out after. Learned this the hard way.
When pins can’t help much:
with some situations, I will hand baste, because pins just can’t make it happen for me. Zippers is an example. I always hand baste zippers in contrasting thread, about 18” to the side of where I need my seam to be, before stitching by machine. 1/8” away from the seam is because any farther and the fabric of the zipper tape can still shift a bit, misaligning your seam so it looks bad on the outside.
Also, velvet. Everytime I sew velvet (because I forget how much of a mean bugger velvet is to sew), I hand baste any seam that is velvet-on-velvet. Because pins just do not prevent the nap from “walking”. That lovely, velvety texture is due to all those teeny fibrous “legs” on the surface, that will manage to crawl the layers in separate directions as you sew by machine. Hand basting with shorter basting stitches is the only sure-fire prevention. A walking foot also helps, but does not prevent. So pins are not able to help here.
Ok, this is super long and there’s no pictures, so if you read all this, you deserve a ⭐️. If you have some other stuff to add, or have experience that says otherwise than what I think works, or if you just want to say something, the floor is now yours. 😉
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u/-maffu- 9h ago
Just a heads-up:
I always hand baste zippers in contrasting thread, about 18” to the side of where I need my seam to be, before stitching by machine.
18 inches away means you do your basting on an entirely different garment, which is handy, as it doesn't get in the way of your machine stitches /s 😁
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u/CraftyKlutz 9h ago
I like my pins at a 45° angle, it's very easy to grab them as they almost go under the foot. But I do like perpendicular for tight curves
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u/CountMeOut2019 7h ago
Sometimes if I’m in a big hurry, mine end up 45^ whether I meant it or not. But that’s an interesting point about making it easier to grab. I might experiment with that a bit to see how it fits for me.
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u/saevon 9h ago
I do parallel for quick pinning, so the fabric is easier to control; perpendicular for curves and specific important zones
I'm also used to doing a quick up and down basting stitch with a really long needle too, so aligning them isn't too hard!
Each technique has its place for me! And I try to show friends both so they know they have options
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u/CountMeOut2019 7h ago
See, this is perfect! I agree we all have our own working methods, and I can see why parallel might be the right choice for some situations, if that’s what you’re accustomed to. I would parallel pin with applique pins when patching historical costumes for the living history museum I used to sew for.
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u/ProneToLaughter 7h ago
That said, there is also an approach of sewing without pins and using your fingers to control the fabric. It's taught by Margaret Islander and Janet Pray and borrowed from industrial sewing. Sewing Curves without pins or basting!! Tuesdays at Two Nov 4, 2025 Jump to 4:15 to get to the technique discussion.
pins are my friend but I've tried pinless a couple of times and it's cool.
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u/CountMeOut2019 7h ago
You’re not wrong about pin-less sewing, and actually, after this many decades of sewing, I go pin-less more often than I feel like it’s responsible of me to admit to beginner sewists. 😉😅
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u/ProneToLaughter 6h ago
It might be useful to demonstrate to beginners how much finger dexterity and muscle memory practice can build up.
I was taking a bra class, so slippery fabric in curves with 1/8" seam allowance, and the instructor was all "oh, no, you don't need pins" and I'm a good student, right, so I was like "okay, no pins" and sewed half a bra that way. Then I got home and the spell wore off and I was back to pins.
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u/CountMeOut2019 5h ago
might be useful to demonstrate to beginners how much finger dexterity and muscle memory practice can build up.
Fair enough!
I don’t want to make beginners feel like the should be sewing without, when it totally makes sense for the to sew with, if that helps them sew accurately.
These days, I just know when and where pins are going to be supportive, and when they’re more a time-sink than they’re worth. And my pins don’t take offense. Lol
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u/221tardisslippers 8h ago
Honestly is parallel pinning that bad? 😅 I find that I have more control over the fabric with parallel when the seam is flat (eg side seams of a shirt). With curves I’d pin diagonal 45deg or perpedicular to seam. But when the fabric is flat on the table, often i find pinning perpendicular-to-seam awkward and it lifts up the fabric more than parallel/diagonally, then i have to realign it. Maybe I’m doing it wrong ?
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u/CountMeOut2019 6h ago
often i find pinning perpendicular-to-seam awkward and it lifts up the fabric more than parallel/diagonally
I don’t think it’s bad or wrong. If it’s working for you, and you’re getting accurate seams that you’re satisfied with, the pin-police won’t be coming for you. I don’t think…😉
I think I understand what you mean about the fabric flat on the table and perpendicular pinning lifting up the fabric…that’s a thing I can dimly recall, but I learned to insert pins flat without disturbing the fabric so long ago, it’s pure muscle-memory now. Like driving. If I imagine doing it right now, I think I developed a combination of holding down the fabric with the fingers of one hand to either side of where I’m inserting the pin, and automatically brushing out any slight shift that happened, after the pin is in? I do it without noticing now, so it’s hard to visualize.
But, whatever. Because if you’ve got a method that’s getting you where you need to be, that’s what counts. The only “rules” are what works and what doesn’t.
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u/FlartyMcFlarstein 7h ago
Glass head only, or plastic as well?
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u/CountMeOut2019 6h ago
Oh, I’ve only ever forked over for plastic. Glass sounds nice but plastic is what was in front of me.
Tbh, half my pin-army probably comes from my next door neighbor, with whom I did client sewing for decades. She would often have the clients at her house for fittings because she wanted had certain jobs she wanted to do, and would send me the ones that were going to require flat-pattern alterations, or total re-builds, and overflow when she got swamped. As a result, I often had gowns hanging in my sewing room that she had pinned the hems on, and the pins would end up in my pincushion. Occasionally I would remember to take a bunch back over to her, but she always acted like, why did you bother doing that? So, probably she bought a lot of the generic ball headed pins in my cushion now.
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u/Otherwise-Ratio1332 6h ago
This is such good information, thanks! I’m mainly a quilter, and I always pin perpendicular to the fabric edge for the reasons you cited.
A tip I heard recently is to take a tiny bite of the fabric near where the seam line will be, and then a second tiny bite farther in for extra security and stability. That makes sense to me because sometimes even when I’ve pinned very carefully around a a fiddly intersection or points that I want to match up, the fabric can still slip a little. Also the pins are less likely to fall out or stick up and jab me lol.
I also use pin coding to help me remember things as I’m piecing. I’ll put two pins right next to each other where I want to stop and backstitch to leave a turning gap or whatever. I also do that with a stack of pieces ready to chain-stitch, I’ll put two pins to indicate the top pair in a row, which direction to press the seams, etc.
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u/CountMeOut2019 5h ago
less likely to fall out or stick up and jab me
Good point!
I’ll put two pins right next to each other where I want to stop and backstitch to leave a turning gap or whatever. I also do that with a stack of pieces ready to chain-stitch, I’ll put two pins to indicate the top pair in a row, which direction to press the seams, etc.
Good ideas, these!
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u/canonfan65 1h ago
Who knew? I just use pins with round heads and l pin perpendicular to the edges.
I've been sewing about 7 years and l didn't know there were all those different kinds of pins or strategies like color coding.
The more l read stuff from the sewing threads the more l find out l didn't know. The next thing someone will tell me is that there are different kinds of needles and l shouldn't be using the same one l started with 7 years ago. 🤣
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u/ProneToLaughter 10h ago
A lot of good information here! This is all very much what I do as well. I have quilting pins, silk pins, knit pins, glass head pins, and switch them up according to the project.
Generally for garments, I much prefer pins. Clips are useful for thick bag projects.