Bias-bound keyhole

Turns out I have a giant head. I started sewing up my Pendrell blouse and discovered once I sewed the shoulder seams for the center front and back, my head didn't fit through the opening. Now, I did try out Kenneth King's technique for staying the neckline, so there won't be much give in the neckline, but I don't think it's supposed to give. I think I just have a big head.

So what to do? Finishing the neckline with the bias facing helped a little, getting rid of the seam allowances from within the neckline, but it's still a struggle to get it on. The solution? A keyhole opening in the back.

The keyhole is basically just a slit at the center back of the neckline. I decided to use French bias bound keyhole like Claire Shaeffer describes in High Fashion Sewing Secrets. Here's the process:

1. Find the center back at the neckline (you can just fold and match the shoulder seams) and mark it with a pin. Decide how long you want the opening to be (I chose 2 1/2 inches, but seeing the end result I wish it'd been a bit longer) and mark the center back below that. Use a pin to mark both spots.

   

   Mark the center back.
2. Draw a line where you want the slit to be.



Mark the cutting line.

3. Make a bias strip to bind the keyhole with. I cut a bunch of extra 2" bias strips when I was cutting the fabric, so I used one of these. I'm leaving it extra long so I can use the ends as ties to close the keyhole. If you want to close the keyhole with a button, you can just cut it somewhat larger than twice the length of the opening.
4. Fold the strip in half and press.
5. I used the bias strips that I happened to have to determine how wide my binding would be. Stretch the strip and measure how wide it ends up being. 



Determine how much width you have to work with on your bias strip.

Mine is 3/4". You want your finished binding to be just under 1/3 as wide as the folded, stretch strip, so I'm making mine a scant 1/4".
6. Stay-stitch around the opening, just inside where the seam line will be. 



Sloppy sewing on my part, it should theoretically be a bit cleaner and more trapezoidal at the bottom than this. I stitched at 3/16" to accommodate my scant 1/4" finished width. At the bottom, end it with a bit of a rounded point to smooth the bottom of the keyhole.

7. Cut open along the mark, stopping just short of the stay-stitching at the bottom.



Snip!



8. Align the middle of the bias strip with the bottom of the opening to figure out where to start the strip. Match the raw edges of the strip with the raw edges of the opening, with the strip on the right side of the back, and stitch just outside the stay-stitching. 



View from the wrong side



View from the right side.





I found it easier not to pin the whole strip in place before I started, because the curve at the bottom is difficult. Start at the top and just keep the raw edges aligned as you sew, stretching the bias strip slightly. Keep it stretched and stitch slowly at the bottom. You'll get some extra folds at the raw edges, I'm not sure this can be avoided. If the folded edge curves up a bit, that's fine, it doesn't need to be able to lay flat here since it will be turned to the inside.
9. Fold the bias strip towards the back and then fold it once more, so it's wrapped around the raw edges.
10. Hand-baste to hold the strip folded around properly. I know hand-basting is a pain, but this is such a short distance to baste that it's really not so bad, and it's worth it. 
11. Stitch-in-the-ditch on the right side, catching the folded edge of the bias strip underneath. A zipper foot is helpful to line your needle up so you're right at the edge. This is why you hand-basted - it will ensure that the folded edge gets caught in your stitching when you can't see it. Remember how you made your binding width a bit less than 1/3 the width of the stretched strip? You have one piece caught inside (with the raw edges), one piece is the binding on the right side of the blouse, and one piece is the binding on the wrong side of the blouse. The little bit extra is to ensure that the fold goes past your binding seam, and to allow for cloth allowance. 
12. Press the finished binding. This may take some work to push your fabric into shape. The hole in the blouse is a straight slit, but the bias binding makes it want to form more of a circle. Most of this should be resolvable with the iron. But depending on your fabric, if that's not enough...
13. Add a dart in the binding at the bottom of the keyhole: fold the keyhole in half, and sew from the very bottom point to a point about 1/4" or so in from the fold. This will help the binding achieve the sharper corner we're looking for.
14. If you're not using the ends of the bias strip as ties, skip ahead a couple steps.
15. To use the long ends of the bias strip as ties, you need to finish the raw edges. Fold along the length of the strip (both ends) so it's folded the same way as the binding is around the slit, only without the blouse inside it. Basically, fold in the raw edges, slightly less than a third of the total width, and then fold that over the raw edges. If you look at the bias strip where it comes off the keyhole opening, it will show you the pattern to follow. Press to help hold the shape when you sew. This is probably a good time to cut them to the proper length, too.
16. Sew the length of the bias strips. You can use a straight stitch, but I like a zig-zag with one end catching all the layers and one end catching only the central fold. The zig-zag will allow the bias binding to keep some of its intrinsic stretch. 
17. Fold under the ends of the ties (or the ends of the bias strips at the end of the keyhole if you're using a button closure) and stitch them in place. Alternatively, you can just zig-zag the raw edge to prevent raveling.
18. Depending how the final result turns out, depending on how your fabric behaves, etc, you may want to add a dart to make the strips come off the keyhole opening at an angle, so they go horizontal instead of vertical, the easier to tie them.
19. And voila! Extra space to fit a giant head through, without sacrificing the cut of the neckline.

One bonus tip too: I tie my bow just like tying sneakers. If you have issues with the loops of the bow going up and down instead of staying horizontal, switch which way you tie the knot underneath the bow. If you go right over left, try left over right, then tie the bow as usual. The way the bow lines up with that knot determines which way the bow tends to flop.