Cross-Grain
Fabric — one of 56 in the glossary
The direction across a woven fabric, perpendicular to the selvedge — the weft direction. It is not the diagonal, which is the bias. Cross-grain matters because a woven behaves differently along each of its three directions: it is most stable along the length, slightly stretchier across the cross-grain, and stretchiest of all on the bias.
Three directions, three behaviours
Lengthwise grain, or warp, runs parallel to the selvedge. Those yarns are held under the most tension during weaving, so the fabric is most stable in that direction.
Cross-grain, or weft, runs across at right angles. It has slightly more give, because the weft yarns bend around the warp.
Bias is the 45-degree diagonal, and it has real stretch — enough that garments are deliberately cut on it where drape and cling are wanted.
Why it shows if you get it wrong
A garment cut off-grain twists as the fabric relaxes, which produces a shirt whose side seam spirals or whose hem hangs unevenly.
It can be invisible on the cutting table and obvious after the first wash, which is why it is a real quality issue rather than a theoretical one.
Striped and checked fabrics make it unmissable, because the pattern goes visibly crooked.
In practice
For a buyer, off-grain cutting is one of the things to check on a sample: hang the garment and look at whether the side seams fall straight.
For a decorator, a garment that is off-grain cannot be squared on a platen — square it to the hem and the design is crooked on the body, square it to the body and it is crooked to the hem.
The knit equivalent of this problem is torquing on tubular tees, which has a different cause and the same symptom.
Common questions
- What is cross-grain in fabric?
- The direction across a woven fabric, perpendicular to the selvedge — the weft direction. It is not the diagonal, which is the bias.
- What is the difference between grain and bias?
- Grain runs along or across the fabric, following the yarns. Bias is the 45-degree diagonal, which has far more stretch and is used deliberately where drape is wanted.
- Why does my shirt twist at the side seam?
- On a woven, usually because it was cut off-grain and the fabric relaxed. On a tubular knit tee, the same symptom comes from torquing instead.
See also
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