Fusible stitchable foam

 

I’ve seen several clips online of people using fusible foam to make cute sewn hats, so I wanted to get some and try it out to see how it would hold up for stage millinery. 

This material is primarily marketed to bag makers as a structural interfacing, and is available online primarily from specialty quilt shops.

I bought a yard of the single-sided type to conduct some efficacy tests, with the idea that I would share it with my fall millinery students if I like how it works. It is sold in both single- and double-sided; the single-sided is already fused on one side to a tricot knit, kind of like headliner foam.

 

I made a couple of stitching samples, one with a flat fell seam, and one with the seam topstitched open.

Then I laundered them to see how the fusible bond would stand up to washing, and whether the stitched foam would rip because it’s perforated by the sewing needle or maintain structural integrity. 

here you can see the fused fabric peeling away from the foam after machine washing 

Because of the fusible nature, it needs to air dry, and whatever your fashion fabric is needs to be pre-washed/pre-shrunk. I worried about the foam losing structural integrity after stitching, but I attempted to rip my samples and did not succeed.

I can imagine how this would be a useful foundation material in costume applications, although I’m not sure it’s worth the trouble of sourcing and buying a specialty material when it seems like you could get the same effect using something like EVA foam and Wonder Under/Stitch Witchery.

Good to know it exists, and in a circumstance where you need a lot of a material that does something like this, then good to know that you could buy it and save the time of making it yourself.

This material is made and sold under several different brand names, and several colleagues mentioned working with it in various craft applications, not just bags and hats, but also items such as masks and shaped belts.

The foam is 100% polyurethane and the textile layer is 100% polyester.