Soft and light as a cloud, our double gauze scarves are the perfect accessory for warmer weather. Their deep ruffled ends add just the right bit of flounce without too much bulk. In fact, our design is so lightweight, you can twist two scarves together for a beautiful blend of color and pattern. And because they’re super fast and easy, you’ll definitely want to make two or four or even more! Some for you and some for gifts… or all for you; we’ll never tell. We used the Embrace® Double Gauze by Shannon Fabrics.

When double gauze fabrics first came out, most were adorable baby prints in soft colors that mix well with traditional pastels. We made a cute set of Ergonomic Burp Cloths that put these sweet combos to excellent use.

However for our scarves, we didn’t want nursery designs, so we turned to the Embrace® collections from Shannon Fabrics, which have a greater variety of prints as well as wider range of solid colors. We love the buttery yellow and teal arrows of our sample scarves, perfect for spring and summer wardrobes.

You likely recognize regular gauze for its sheer open weave. In fact, the process that creates gauze is even called “gauze weave” (or “leno weave”). This weaving process twists two warp yarns around the weft yarn in a figure eight pattern, resulting in a strong yet sheer fabric. Double gauze is just that, two layers of gauze. Teeny tiny stitch tacks, so teeny and tiny as to be invisible from the right side of the fabric, hold the layers together.

These double layers help eliminate the super-sheerness of standard gauze and give the fabric a bit of extra weight, which imparts a wonderful, almost velvety drape.

Our long, lush scarves finish at approximately 70”.

If you love these scarves, you may may also like our striking shawl wrap in double gauze with tiny pom pom accents.

Sewing Tools You Need

• Sewing Machine and standard presser foot

Fabric and Other Supplies

NOTE: Quantities shown below are for ONE scarf

• 1¼ yards of extra-wide double gauze or similar
  NOTE: Because gauze is a natural fiber, the width can vary quite a bit. In general, get a nice wide width. If you can’t get a full 51″ cut as we suggest, cut as wide as you can WOF (width of fabric), then increase the depth of the ruffle panels to compensate. For example, if your gauze is 50″, cut the center panel at 50″ x 21″ and cut the two ruffle panels at 22″ x 21″ .
• All-purpose thread to match fabric
• See-through ruler
• Fabric pen or pencil
• Seam gauge
• Seam ripper
• Scissors or rotary cutter and mat
• Iron and ironing board
• Straight pins
• Hand sewing needle

Getting Started

• From the double gauze for each scarf, cut the following:
  ONE 51” x 21” rectangle for the center of the scarf
  TWO 21” x 21” squares for the ruffled ends
  NOTE: Many of the Embrace® Double Gauze designs have lovely random motifs, so you can simply make straight cuts and you’re good to go. If you use a motif that is more directional (such as our sample with the arrows) or wish to feature a particular part of a design, you may want to buy ¼ yard extra to allow you to be able to fussy cut the main center panel. Center your chosen part of the motif, measuring both top to bottom and side to side and remembering that our design has a seam at the center back, which means it must truly be centered in both directions. 

At Your Sewing Machine & Ironing Board

Center panel

1. Fold the main fabric piece in half, right sides together, so it now measures 51″ x 10½”. Pin in place to form a long tube.
   
2. Leave a 6” opening in the center for turning right side out.
   
3. Using a ½” seam allowance, sew along the 51″ side. Secure your seam at either side of the 6” opening.
   
4. Roll the tube so the seam is centered down the length of the scarf. Your seam line now represents what will be the center back of your scarf. If you have a fussy cut design, make sure the “front panel” of the scarf looks centered as you’d wanted. If not, you can roll the seam slightly off center one way or the other to compensate. Press the seam open, pressing back the raw edges around the opening so they are flush with the sewn seam.
   
5. When flat and with the seam centered, snip off a tiny bit of each corner (less than ½”). This helps mark the fold, so later, when you are inserting the ruffle, you have reference points to insure your tube will finish with a centered motif and the seam down the middle of the back.
   

Ruffles

1. Fold each of the 21″ x 21″ ruffle pieces in half (21″ x 10½”), right sides together.
   NOTE: The folded edge is the bottom edge of the ruffle; be sure to remember this if your fabric has a directional motif.
2. Using a ½” seam allowance, sew both short ends (the 10½” ends). Be sure to backstitch at the beginning and end.
3. Trim off the corners at a diagonal.
   
4. Press open the seam allowances.
   
5. Turn the ruffle piece right side out. Push out the corners with your finger or a blunt-end tool, like a large knitting needle, a chopstick or a point turner. Steam lightly to press flat with the seams running down each side.
   
6. Sew two lines of gathering stitches along the raw edges of both ruffle pieces.
   
   NOTE: If you are new to this technique, take a look at our tutorial on machine gathering.
   
7. Pull the bobbin threads of the gathering stitches to gather each ruffle panel to approximately 10″ wide.
8. With the ruffle panel right side out and the center panel wrong side out, slip one ruffle panel inside each end of the center panel tube so the two pieces are right sides together. You are inserting the folded end of the ruffle first. The raw edges of the ruffle and the tube should be flush.
9. At each end, align those little clipped corners you made at each end of the tube with the side seams of each ruffle panel.
   
10. When positioned and flat, pin in place through all the layers.
    
11. Using a ½” seam allowance, stitch through all the layers along each end.
12. Grade the seam allowance, trimming the seam allowance of the tube shorter than the seam allowance on the ruffle.
13. Turn the scarf right side out through the opening in the back seam.
14. Pull out the ruffles and steam lightly along each seam.
15. Slip stitch the opening in the center seam of the body closed.
    
    NOTE: Our double gauze layers laid perfectly smooth and flat with no twisting when we turned the scarf right side out. If you feel your scarf is not behaving quite as well, you can add a line of topstitching along each ruffle/scarf seam approximately ¼” from the seam line, within the body of the scarf.

Project Design: Alicia Thommas
Sample Creation and Instructional Outline: Debbie Guild