A while ago I was minding my own business, innocently googling sewing accessories when I came upon the RUFFLER! Now, mainly making menswear, I haven’t needed to do much ruffling. But I have made a couple of silk pillowcases as gifts. The first ones ‘ruffle’ was pleated at regular intervals. The second one was gathered on basting stitches: which nearly drove me insane.

Maybe it’s the ‘sandwich-toaster’ of the sewing world, but it looks like the ‘nutri-bullet’ to me! Even if I never used it, I decided that for the sake of a fiver, I NEEDED that ruffler in my life!…

… So I also bought a metre of lovely blue silk to make myself a pillowcase. Then I made a plan…


It took a while to work out what order to sandwich the front, ruffle & flap in. I got there eventually. In the end it didn’t matter as the ruffler was so enthusiastic that I only had enough length to go around three sides. I left the opening ruffle-less. This isn’t such a disappointment. I see it as soft furnishings statement on the perils of excess. It keeps my feet on the ground. (Or something like that!)


Fabric cut. I’m ready to ruffle! Of course, I tried it out on scraps first, playing with all the settings and seeing how they came out.

The lever on top selects how many stitches between tucks (1,6,12 or *no tuck).

The screw slider selects how deep each tuck is (1mm -8mm). And the results are also varied by altering the stitch length on your machine.

Here it is in action…

For maximum value, I suppose I need to spend the summer making girls dresses and cafe curtains, but I feel it has more than paid its way with my lovely pillowcase. I slept very well on it last night.

Happy sewing!