When an elderly female relative moved from a hospital ward into a care home, she needed new nighties in a style that would make it both comfortable to wear, and practical for the staff to help dress her. She had been wearing hospital gowns on the ward, so I decided to try and make some nighties in a similar style for her.
The pattern I used (linked at the bottom of this post) specifies using pure cotton fabric, but I picked polycotton. Not only was there little need to worry about synthetic fabrics interfering with anything (as mentioned in the original pattern), but they needed to be able to withstand multiple washes and not look like they need ironing!
“Feminine, pretty, and the kind of patterns my relative would’ve chosen for herself“
I needed to find the perfect fabric design; something that was feminine, pretty and the kind of designs that my relative would’ve chosen for herself. These floral designs fitted the bill, although the only disadvantage of a white background fabric is that it could have the tendency to be a little see-through. Fortunately the floral was detailed enough to prevent that being a problem.
Because the pattern is designed as a hospital gown, it has the option of button & velcro closures for the shoulders. I skipped those elements, as it wasn’t necessary for my relative. That made this a much speedier sew as I could just sew French seams for both the side and shoulder seams.
The style of the hospital gown meant there was quite a lot of hemming to tackle – not just at the base, but also both rear edges of the nighties. The pattern said to overlock the raw edges before sewing a single-turn hem, but I decided on a slightly different method.
I don’t have an overlocker so my alternative would be to zigzag the raw edges… that would leave the potential of a rogue raw edge, so I felt that a double-turn hem would be more suited. I turned half of the hem amount and stitched it down, before turning it again and stitching it to finish.
From the outside, it just looks like a regular hem:
But from the inside you can see the additional line of stitches. Not only did it mean that I found it easier to get an accurate hem on the second turn, but also if the final hem stitching does break at any point then the raw edge is less likely to be visible. This means there’s much less risk of the fabric fraying before the hem can be restitched.
When it came to the sleeves, I knew it would be an interesting challenge as the hem is particularly narrow. I used three different methods to sew these – hemming as usual, ‘traditional’ bias bound (where the bias binding is wrapped around the raw edge), and ‘French style’ bias bound (with the bias binding invisible from the outside).
You can see the difference in the sleeve finishes with all four together:
While the narrow hem is a faster sew, I think that the ‘traditional’ method of wrapping the bias binding around the raw edge gave the neatest finish, but I do also like the look of the hint of bias binding colour on the inside of the sleeve.
Much like the sleeves, the neckline was a little challenging – it’s another narrow hem, but also on a curve. After attempting a couple of normal narrow hems which stubbornly refused to lie flat, I decided to use bias binding around the raw edge. The bias binding gives a much neater neckline and should ensure the nightie withstands multiple washes by covering every raw edge to prevent fraying.
The only other thing left to make a true hospital gown style nightie, are the straps! If I’m honest, I was pleased the straps were just folded into the centre like bias binding, as I don’t have the knack of turning narrow strap tubes!
The majority of the strain on the nightie will be where the straps are attached to the main fabric, so I wanted to make sure they were firmly attached. I stitched an X on one nightie strap (like you would use to attach a handle to a bag)…
…but on the next one I thought I would try out one of my sewing machine’s decorative stitches, and stitched a heart instead.
OK, sewing the decorative heart in a white thread on a white-background fabric meant you have to look closely to see it, but I know it’s there and that’s the main thing.
It wasn’t a particularly long sew to make one nightie, but I did complicate things by working on a couple of nighties at a time. All that’s left is to sew a name tag onto the neckline (that’s a necessity for hospital or care home clothing!), and that’ll be a finished hospital gown-style nightie.
The over-sized nature of the hospital gown-style nightie meant I didn’t need to worry about an exact fit, as the ties at the neckline and waistline can be pulled tighter if it seems a little on the baggy side.
And here we have it – one of the finished hospital gown-style nighties, complete with a hint of colour from the bias binding on the inside of the sleeve hem.
I never thought I would need to sew a hospital gown, but using this pattern to make nighties for my relative worked really well.
Pattern: Free Hospital Gown Pattern by Lazy Girl Designs
Fabric: Polycotton from my local fabric shop