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Sewing Translations and Japanese Fabric

Mind = blown.

Why has it taken me this much time and this many fabric-store panic attacks to do this simple google search? I am obviously not the first person in the world to need English translations of Japanese fabric names and sewing terms! Here are my finds from this evening. (Please excuse the heavy sewing jargon in this post-- I swear I only learned what most of these words mean, even in English, about 5 minutes ago...)

接着芯 : interfacing

ゴムテープ : elastic

ボタン : button

木綿 : cotton

麻 : linen

内: inner, inside

外: outer, outside

Elastic is pronounced "gomu-tape," in a lovely mangled form of Japanese-English... gomu meaning rubber or "gum" like consistency. Erasers are called "keishi-gomu." Condoms, while never mentioned in polite conversation, are sometimes called "gomu," or "rubbers" among friends.

I literally bought iron-on interfacing, thinking it was a lightweight lining fabric, until I got home and noticed the little glue nodules on the wrong side.
Can you see the glue? Source here.

My late-night internet search did not, however, answer all of my fabric questions.

エイティスクエア -- this doesn't make any sense. Eighties care? Eighties core? Eighty square? It's a 100% cotton fabric, with a moderately soft "hand" and slight stretch. I really liked this fabric, and it's only somewhat extortionate at 819 yen/meter, so I'm considering making a dress out of it... unless it's actually quilting cloth or something.

スペックワッシヤー  -- um... specuwashya? this one looks like linen. I'm wondering if the "shya" isn't a perversion of "challis" (pronounced shall-ee), a lightweight wool similar to crepe. I thought it looked like linen, but what do I know.

80綿ローン -- this one says "80 cotton lawn," which kinda makes sense, except for the 80 part.

ネオクリーズ -- had a wrinkly, rough hand, but not slinky and crepe-like.

... and this was just one aisle at the fabric store! Some things may always be a mystery. I'll post pictures next time if they'll let me whip out my camera in the fabric store. (Is that bad form? I dunno...)

1 comments:

kajsicat said...

I know this is late after the fact, but just in case you never did figure out the "eighty" that keeps popping up on your Japanese fabric..... It's a number related to thread count. "Eighty square" is a very nice quality fabric that is tightly woven but has a buttery soft hand (it drapes beautifully). I believe that it indicates that per inch, your fabric has 80 threads warpwise (the threads that run parallel to the selvedge) and 80 threads weftwise (the threads that run perpendicular to the selvedge).

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