Covered Grommets

[Minch]

I have a court dress that is about to withstand its second season of very heavy use on a faire actor.  The dress is in excellent shape, overall, but I am moderately concerned about the grommets in the bodice.  They are the large Dritz brand, put in there with a lot of foul language, my hands, and a pliers-style hand-clamping grommeting tool.  This means that the inner ring of the grommets has some edges rough enough to make my laces ratty after a little while.

As I know that metal grommets were not part of fashion in the sixteenth century, I know that some fastidious costumers, when using metal grommets, will cover them with fabric or thread.  I am considering doing this to help the lace endure, and also, to give the bodice an even longer lifespan (torn grommet holes are awful costume killers, sometimes)!

Does anyone have any first-hand practical experience with this?  I can't seem to Google the right combination of words to find what I am looking for, here.

[Lady L]

I just sewed around mine with a heavier thread, I happened to have the right color of candle wicking thread, so I used that. Some people use buttonhole thread or upholstery thread.

[Pipere]

I'm searching for an ever-elusive eyelet foot attachment for my machine in hopes that someday I won't repeat my November of '07 bodice. AKA: 16 holes of DOOM.

[Baroness Doune]

The roughness of the Dritz grommet set will also cut through any thread used to cover them.  And the Dritz grommets will still pull out.  You will be doing all that work for nothing.

There are two problems with Dritz grommets:
1. The neck is too short.
2. The end of the neck is designed to split rather than roll over smoothly.

The first piece of garb I ever made, used Dritz grommets.  When I discovered how rough the set was, I looked for alternatives and replaced every single grommet with better ones.

I buy my grommets from Grannd Companies but there are other places where you can buy grommets online.  Many people buy grommets and setting kits from Home Depot.  I buy the 00 size (this is the smallest size available, I think) and I use the hammer set kit, which I purchased from Grannd also.  I get a perfect set everytime and they have never pulled out.

[isabelladangelo]

Do you have any scraps of the fabric used for the dress left over?  Is it a common enough fabric you can just go out and by a half yard more?  If it is, I'd just cut the grommets out altogether (Like Baroness Doune said, the rough edges with cut through the thread) and either piece the back or replace the back and add eyelet holes with hand sewn edges...or lacing rings.

If you are brave enough (and what I did with my eyelet grommets a long time ago when I realized how much I didn't like them) you might try to carefully take the grommets out, sew up the holes, and add lacing rings to the inside. 

[LadyStitch]

I wish I had the Grommet "thing" my tutor had.  It allowed you to put grommets in with a stamp on the lever and it was nice a pretty no hammering needed, and no rough edges /sigh

Since that is thousands of miles away I have had to make due with the dritz, and loath them, but it is all I can find.  The closest I have been able to come is by getting a size large I can put in the grommet then using a button hole stitch and heavy weight thread sew over the metal and reinforce the area around it.  I don't know how many times I have put the grommets in only to find the edges in the back have cut their way through and made the hole big enough for the grommet to fall through. 

If any one has a better way I'm open to it. It's one of the reason I don't like making bodices that much.

[Minch]

I had considered pulling the grommets out and replacing with something else, but the garment has worn very, very well, and every little fibre of my being is telling me that this would be a horrible mistake.  I think I would mangle the thing removing them and trying to sew up the holes (which are too large for this to be a practical option) or replace them with better hardware. 

I can say, with confidence, that these grommets are not going anywhere anytime soon.  Unless someone takes a seam ripper or an exacto knife to the area directly around them, they will not pull out of this dress.  I was very careful to interface, fray check, and reinforce the holes within an inch of their lives to prevent the nasty habit that grommets have of pulling through the bodice (before I started sewing seriously, a few of the bodices I purchased at faire suffered from this malady).

There isn't time for me to make a new bodice if I wreck the thing trying to repair this.  I'd have to special order the fabric again to have enough to match the pattern appropriately. 

I think my best option, at this point, is to replace the lace every couple of weeks to keep it from looking too ratty, and try to replace them with better grommets after the end of the season.

Thanks for the Home Depot tip, Baroness, I had not thought to go looking there for kits.

And thank you all for your input.

[Lady Kathleen of Olmsted]

I take bodices to my local Shoe Repair for grommeting that does not come out, nor do they tear the corded ties. I trust my Shoe Repair guy to come through for me every time and he does a bag up job too.


If I need to sew over them, I use a heavy thread to make them look more period. I am going to do that with a Tudor ensemble I am working on.

[Hoowil]

Any time I get fabric I think I might put grommets in, I make sure to get embrodery floss that matches at the same time, to give me somehting to wrap with.

[Lady L]

I bought the tarp grommets at Runnings Fleet Farm, with the tool to pound them in. Ace Hardware was supposed to carry them, but they were out of stock.
I have put in hundreds of Dritz grommets and never had any of them pull out. I didn't like that they split instead of being smooth on the back, so I tried the grommets. I do like the way the hardware grommets are smooth, however, they are the ONLY ones I have ever had pull out. Those are the only kind  I had to sew around. And, they are the exact type that Grannd Garb carries.
Just wanted to clearify.

[Baroness Doune]

There may be subtle differences between the grommets specifically made to be used in clothing (such as the ones from Grannd or similar costuming supply places) vs. those found in a hardware store or home supply store.  I have never purchased or used grommets from a hardware store.  I only suggested it because I have heard of others that have used hardware store grommets successfully and some people dislike purchasing anything online or have no time to order online and wait for the order to arrive.

I HAVE seen plenty of commercially applied tarp grommets pull out of tarps and such.  The Barons says, "Oh, just replace the grommets with one of your good grommets."   Well, no, that won't work.  The holes made for the grommets in the tarps are huge.   The holes also seem to lack adequate reinforcement.

The holes I put in garments to apply grommets are very tiny and I must "work" the grommet into the hole.  This working of the grommet into the hole takes most of the time when setting the grommet - as much as a minute or two - whereas, setting the grommet takes less than 5 seconds.  My preference would be not to punch a hole at all but the fabric I am usually sticking grommets in is closely woven - at least two layers of linen canvas or cotton duck cloth. 

[Marietta Graziella]

After attending Baroness Dounes bodice workshop I became a Grannd Co grommet convert.  The first couple bodices I made (several years ago, with princess seems *gasp!* and dritz grommets) were awful.  I had no idea what I was doing, they didn't fit, they didn't have the right "look" and the grommets tore the heck out of the fabric. 

The first commercial bodice I purchased, the grommets pulled out after the first season.  I wore it only 4 times. 

I have since made several garments using the Grannd 00 grommets and have never had a bad set, or pull out.  Huzzah!

(This was not a paid advertisement for Grannd Co. or Baroness Doune)

[gem]

I think my best option, at this point, is to replace the lace every couple of weeks to keep it from looking too ratty, and try to replace them with better grommets after the end of the season.

You might try stitching over them with silk thread, which will help the laces slide through more smoothly.  Yes, eventually the silk thread will wear away, too--but not straightaway.

[Lady L]

The holes I put in garments to apply grommets are very tiny and I must "work" the grommet into the hole.  This working of the grommet into the hole takes most of the time when setting the grommet - as much as a minute or two - whereas, setting the grommet takes less than 5 seconds.  My preference would be not to punch a hole at all but the fabric I am usually sticking grommets in is closely woven - at least two layers of linen canvas or cotton duck cloth. 

Aye, that's what I did on the next bodice. Made a VERY TINY hole and worked the grommet in. I had really sore fingers for the next 24 hours. Then, I put locktite white glue around the hole/neck end of grommet and put the other piece on top and pounded it in. I think the previous problem was that the tool/hole punch that came with the grommets made the hole too large. My Mom gave me a smaller hole punch and I did a test grommet with it. Yes, I was also going through several layers of canvas duck.