Seam Allowance App

night morning

setting
Seam Allowance app setting

As a metric user, one of my pet peeve when using certain sewing patterns are the seam allowance conversion. I couldn’t seem to remember what are the equivalent of 5/8″, 1/3″, 3/4″, 1/4″ and so on in centimetres. Sure I can use Google to find out that 5/8″ is 1.5875 cm, and then I would round this number to 1.5 cm.

It is not so easy the other way around though. When someone asked me what 1 cm seam allowance is in imperial, Google told me that it is 0.393701 inch. And how was I supposed to know that this number is close to 3/8″? I’m not good at mathematics, you know.

One day I told my husband about this and he said, “How about using an app for that?” That’s a great idea, except that I couldn’t find an app designed specifically for this purpose. In my simple sewing world, 5/8″ is 1.5 cm and vice versa, I don’t want all those little numbers. I wished that such app existed.

Luckily, the great thing about having a programmer for a husband is that he can make you an app for your needs. So my husband spent several weekends and came up with this Seam Allowance app!

This is a very simple app designed specifically with this one purpose, and that is how I want it. To convert a measurement, you just drag the slider and the app will show the rounding numbers. The numbers are based on the guidelines on sewing machine throat plate. You can set the metric on top or imperial on top and set the schemes to dark or light.

download

If you’re an iPhone/iPod user, you can download the Seam Allowance app for free here!

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