We’re pleased to shine a spotlight on Curious Teachers of the Week, Tova and Tyler of ProfessorPincushion.com. Professor Pincushion features online sewing lessons that make sewing accessible to everyone. The site currently offers more than 76 hours of sewing tutorials--pretty incredible! Tova develops the content and is featured on camera while Tyler focuses on production and website management.
We chose Tova and Tyler as Curious Teachers of the Week because their lessons are just plain delightful. Not only are they super high quality, but the lessons also feature fun, creative and useful tutorials. Next time you want to hunker down with a project on a rainy day or over a long weekend, you know where to look. Please meet the main duo behind Professor Pincushion!
Curious: Hello! To start out, tell us what you teach on Curious.
Tyler and Tova: We feature sewing lessons geared toward the new sewer. Some of our lessons include How to Take Measurements for Sewing, How to Repair a Hole in Your Jeans, and How to Sew a Bow Tie.
Students seem to especially love your bow tie lesson. What was the inspiration behind your site, ProfessorPincushion.com?
We [Tova and Tyler] met while working in the film industry in Los Angeles. Tova had always been a sewer. To share her passion with others, she started teaching private and group lessons at craft stores. Eventually, we realized creating online lessons would allow her to reach students all over the world.
We bought production equipment and started planning lessons, and ProfessorPincushion.com was born. We realized we were passionate about teaching online and interacting with students, so we transitioned from our Hollywood jobs to building Professor Pincushion full-time.
Interesting - congrats on all your success. What makes sewing such a great subject to teach online?
Sewing is visual by nature. The video format lets us break down new aspects of what we’re teaching, so students can watch and follow along the way. They get to learn at their own pace, which is key especially for beginner sewers and makes it less intimidating to learn.
Agreed. What made you decide to teach on Curious?
We like connecting with students, and Curious has plenty of outlets to do just that. Curious is interactive, which offers a great teaching and learning experience.
We’re glad you’re enjoying it. What do you love about sewing?
Tova: I love that sewing is something that you can do on your own to relax or something you can do with others as a fun way to socialize and connect with people. Sewing is a creative outlet, but something I think all people should learn so they can at least do their own repairs. I love teaching because it’s so exciting to help people discover and love a new hobby.
Last but not least, let us know: what are you curious about?
We have a dream to travel around the world so we can learn and share about how other cultures use sewing and different textiles. It’s exciting to see what similarities we may share, but also see how people’s culture is reflected in the things they make. It would also give Tova an excuse to buy lots of exotic fabrics, because one’s fabric stash can never be too big.
Watch Professor Pincushion lessons on Curious: http://curious.com/professorpincushion
