Havel’s Seam Ripper and Scissors
While at Quilt Festival in Houston a few weeks back, I came across my all-time favorite seam ripper! I had no idea it was made by Havel‘s. I was there chatting up with some friends when it suddenly caught my eye! Yipee!!
To explain: I bought my original seam ripper many years back but managed to break the plastic case (yes, overuse). Even so, I continued using it. It was an enormous help on my Blushing Triangles 3 quilt, which is now in the National Quilt Museum in Paducah (the image above is a close-up of Blushing Triangles 4, which uses the same type of quilting). After putting in many hours of quilting, I realized I heavily stitched a large section of it going in the wrong direction. However, a larger section was already finished (large than what is shown above). My choices were to the scrap the piece and start again, leave it and hope no one noticed, or take out the area and restitch it. Because that seam ripper works so well, I decided to take out the stitches using the blade itself (since I snapped off the plastic). It was a laborious process that took several weeks. Even so, that blade, or as it’s properly called, “the Ultra-Glide Curved Blade Seam Ripper by Havel’s.” helped me to remove those stitches without once cutting into the silk.
You can see the original blade sitting on the packaging to the right of the new seam ripper in the top photo. I’ve kept it on my magnetic pin cushion for years while I tried to find a replacement. While I bought some others, nothing I’ve tried works as good and I continued to use the blade by itself. I am SO glad that I found my favorite! I also see on the Havel’s website that they have a “heavy duty” model here, but, even cooler, little ones, perfect for stocking stuffers, here!
If you do any kind of stitching and ever need to remove stitching, you will save yourself a lot of aggravation by using this tool! It’s very inexpensive, too. I have no affiliation with Havel’s other than being a VERY happy user!
I also got some new scissors. I love the serrated edge (which you can see if you look very closely). Yummy!! You can find out more about their fabric scissors here and embroidery scissors here.
November 24th, 2012 at 11:12 pm
I LOVE my Havel scissors but haven’t tried their seam ripper. It looks like something I would cut myself on. :S But it may be worth a try if it works so well and you were able to not cut into the silk. Thanks for the recommendation.
November 24th, 2012 at 11:22 pm
Lisa, go for it!
November 26th, 2012 at 3:40 pm
I have that seam ripper but did not realize Havel’s made it. I also bought their curved scissors, great. I used them last night, while making a scarf out of silk ends, I somehow sewed a long end to the body of the scarf, I was able to cut close enough to get the silk end to shread and not have to rip out the stitching, yeah!
November 26th, 2012 at 4:29 pm
Robin, I think they need to etch their name in the blade! :)