Do you know ZPS?

I didn't, but now I do, and I'm a fan! 😃 ZPS is a manufacturer of precision machinery from Czech Republic, established in 1903 and still going today, see their brief history at the company website. They have always made very diverse machinery, and at some point even sewing machines! 😉 The name ZPS came…

Pfaff’s unsurpassed buttonholes

My Pfaff Creative makes unsurpassed buttonholes. It's a computerised machine, so of course she's got programs for several types of lovely buttonholes. But this is not unique and not particularly remarkable. The most remarkable bit is a simple mechanical aid that makes all the difference. The first thing you notice is of course the sliding…

Sewing crêpe, satin and peach fabrics, or You vs. the Pucker Demon

Crêpe, satin and peach fabrics come in several types and fibres, but they always remain difficult fabrics to sew. In particular, most machines have trouble sewing a straight seam along the length of the material - it puckers. Yes, it means the tension is too high, but no, it is not actually too high, and…

An unexpected grace

When I got my Textima Veritas, it was mostly for sentimental reasons - it was exactly the same model that I grew up with. I knew it was a good machine, but it's been too long ago since I used it to draw a comparison with the other machines in my sewing room. So after…

Textima Veritas 8014

A humble 1960s sewing machine from DDR... but why does it fetch £150 at auction? Textima VEB was created after WWII in East Germany by merging various local sewing machine manufacturers (largely stripped of all their machinery in post-war reparations). Notably, that included Clemens Müller and Naumann from Dresden and Singer from Wittenberge. Crême de…

Vigorelli Maxi 3000

Compared to Vigorelli Fantasy, Maxi 3000 is completely sane, normal even. Compared to every other sewing machine, it is barking mad. Vigorelli's sideways movement of the needle plate is out of this world, and is certainly not something you see every day. The first model to have this feature was Fantasy, and I dubbed it…