Bias binding is, as you’ve probably guessed, cut on the bias. The ‘bias’ just means across the grain of the fabric either from left down to right or right down to left diagonally at a 45 degree angle. Being cut on the diagonal like this gives the binding special properties compared to a normal ribbon or a strip of fabric cut on the grain or across the grain. Bias binding has the ability to stretch or curve with the curved edge of the corset without wrinkling (to a certain degree anyway – if the curve is extreme there will be some wrinkling). Often on cheap corsets the top and bottom edge is bound with plain ribbon which puckers and creases, the more you work with bias binding the more you’ll notice this sort of thing on badly made garments.
You can buy corset skirts sets binding in virtually all sewing shops and online. It comes in all colours and is normally made of a shiny satin or cotton. So why make your own? Well when you have a patterned or luxurious fabric its often hard to find just the right colour or fabric binding and using one that just doesn’t quite look right can lessen the professional look of your corset and detract from all that hard work.
Don’t get me wrong, sho bought binding looks great against most fabrics and its often nice to have a contrasting fabric or colour binding to your main fabric. But for those occasions when you just can’t find the right match its reassuring to know how to make your own out of the fabric your sewing your corset from.
First you will need a good half meter of your chosen fabric, a 45 degree angle (you get one of these as a plastic triangle in a kids maths set or you could Google it and print off a paper one), a pair of fabric scissors and an iron for ironing in the folds.
