Pavalino Construction steps

I have tried to list the steps and construction details for how we sewed our the pavalinos.

2) We then sewed a small double ring of 9/16" tubular nylon. 9/16" tubular nylon has a breaking strength of 1500 lbs. When combined in a double ring, it exceeds 4000 lbs. One source of tubular nylon is Para-Gear.com or from the John Howard Company .

This double ring of tubular nylon was put at the top of the roof section, around the outside of the roof wedges and stitched down (by hand).

We then sewed another piece of canvas (cut on the bias) to the inside of the roof wedges, running out over the tops of the roof wedges, over the nylon ring, and sewed down on the outside. The spike at the top of our center pole goes through the hole at the top of the wedges and this ring of tubular nylon prevents that hole from every ripping, enlarging, or otherwise coming off the top of the pole. Below are some thumbnails of the top, showing the canvas ring stitched over the nylon ring and roof wedges.

3) Because we have doors on both the front and rear, we have two wall sections, one on each side. Each wall has a door piece, 5 side wall pieces, and another door piece. (Our doors are two pieces that overlap.) This covers half of the pavalino.

We sewed one half of the walls together (door piece, 5 walls, door piece). Again, flat fell seams. Now, we positioned this on the roof piece, and sewed the WALL sections (not the doors) to the roof. This time we used a wall-to-roof seam that is similar to, but not actually, a flat fell seam. See our seam instructions.

4) We repeated the process for the other half. Here is a shot of the details of the attachment. Click on the thumbnail for the full size photo. On the left side in the photo, it shows the underside of the flap, showing the fold of wall as stitched down (you can see a small bit sticking out). On right side, the flap is down and shows the dual row of stitching on the outside of the wall-roof seam.

5) We sewed the pockets and sewed these in. For the first several years, we used a significant change (in the "shape" of the spoke pocket) from Master Dafydd's design. If you read his article and compare to my picture below, you will see that I changed the 'sew shut' and 'leave open' sides of the final triangle.

This resulted in a "horizontal" bottom of the pocket, which encouraged the spokes to remain in place. Here the pocket is shown turned and stitched into the pavilino, with a spoke inserted. We now use the spocket pocket design detailed in the revised article by Dafydd's apprentice (Lady Sorcha). The article is accessible from the main pavilion page.

6) We created canvas loops and toggles and attached those. The canvas loops are simply small tubes of canvas turned inside out. See toggle details here.

7) We then sewed stake loops of the tubular nylon that stick out between each set of bottom flaps. We then tie a small piece of nylon cord through the tubular nylon loop, and actually use that cord as the loop the stake goes though. We then sewed tubular nylon all the way around the bottom on the inside (at the top of the ground flap). This prevents stretching the canvas or ripping the flat fell seams at the flap joint, when pulling it tight as you stake it out.


Inside showing spoke pocket as attached	Same spoke pocket showing spoke