Smocking

Before elastic, smocking was commonly used in cuffs, bodices, and necklines in garments where buttons were undesirable.

Smocking developed in England and has been practised since the Middle Ages and is unusual among embroidery methods in that it was often worn by labourers.

Other major embroidery styles are purely decorative and represented status symbols.

Smocking is worked on a crewel embroidery needle in cotton or silk thread and normally requires three times the width of initial material as the finished item will have.

[3] Historically, smocking was also worked in piqué, crepe de Chine, and cashmere.

[4] According to Good Housekeeping: The Illustrated Book of Needlecrafts, "Any type of fabric can be smocked if it is supple enough to be gathered.

The iron-on transfers places evenly spaced dots onto the wrong side of the fabric, which were then pleated using a regular running stitch.

Then a row of cable stitching (see "A") stabilizes the top and bottom of the working area.