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About Laurel

Trained by three different European master tailors, by the layout artist when working in high-end wedding couture, and by the top grader in Philadelphia, Laurel rose to the level of production pattern maker, preparing the work for and overseeing factory production in just three years.

When the industry was going offshore back in the seventies, she decided to write down the skills she had learned, eventually resulting in her being hired to teach fashion techniques in the Philadelphia universities’ fashion program.

Retired to raise her children, she realized that a studio that can design, develop, and test patterns and sewing procedures for the factories can be easily replicated in a home. What is needed is not so much equipment, as an understanding of the methods used in a designing department to design, draft, sew, develop, and test the patterns, fabrics, and procedures that are used to make the clothing in the factories.

Her books present, hands-on, the industrial techniques now provided on computers, that students need to know to understand what the computer is doing. Her step-by-step instructions and diagrams make it possible, even for novices, to draft, fit, and grade without computer assistance, and to produce quality clothing with minimal equipment. Developed in the USA during the first and second World Wars, these are the procedures now used throughout the global fashion industry.

Here I am with my grandmother..

Laurel with her grandmother in 1970.
She begged her grandmother to teach her to sew when she was eight. It paid off. When this picture was taken Laurel was working as a grader/pattern maker/fit model at Corner House in Quakertown, PA.

Laurel started a 4-H club for her daughter and her daughter’s friends. Taught industrial methods, the club completed the PA Clothing & Textile 10 year program in three years with top scores. The club’s success resulted in Laurel’s being asked to teach in college.

When Laurel discovered E.F. Schumacher’s book in the local library back in the early 1980s, she realized she was writing sustainable information needed globally.

Laurel tested her program’s material with degree and continuing professional education college students, including many design-room personnel. They gave considerable feedback as to what information needed to be included, and how to write the books so they could be easily understood. Laurel continues to test her books and welcomes any critiques students and customers wish to offer.

Laurel has presented for the ASG’s (American Sewing Guild) membership. She has also given presentations for the ASDP (Association of Sewing and Design Professionals). She will be presenting a three-day master class this October 2022 for the organization when they have their annual conference, this year in the Baltimore Harbor.