Hand sewing is incredibly labor-intensive, and takes far longer than using the machine (except for me when putting in zippers: because I honestly suck so much at putting them in, I rip them out so many times, the time evens out, which is why I put them in by hand!); for some things I like to use the machine, and for others I like to hand sew them...for some reason lately I've been liking to hand sew my 18thc stuff.

Really, though, my philosophy on sewing machine-usage on pre-c1860 costumes is: will using the machine result in a really, really obvious ugly seam? If the answer is no, then I'm okay with it (except when worrying about what Other People Think, apparently)! Especially on things like shifts. I hate making shifts, and always want to get done with them as quickly as possible!