Sew what, you ask? Just about anything.

Holly Unger, taking a sewing workshop at Spark Craft Studios in Cambridge, is learning to make her own clothes. (Aram boghosian for the boston globe)

It's a breezy spring night in Somerville's Davis Square and the door to the Singer Sewing and Vacuum Center is slightly ajar. Inside the smallish store, several women gather around a long table, cutting fabric, pinning, chatting, and puzzling over basting and zippers.

Suddenly: squeals.

"Ooh, I love it!"

"Can I take a look at your seams?"

The sewing students gather around Shelly Steitz and her hand-sewn, deep purple minidress, cinched with a chic wide belt.

"I made this in two classes," the Cambridge crafter, 27, admits. "It doesn't have any darts or zippers."

The crafting craze is still in full swing, and the renewed interest in making clothes, bags, and house decor is part of that. But the continued success of "Project Runway" has also made fashion design and sewing attractive to the mainstream, spurring wannabe Christian Sirianos to pick up needles and thread.

The sewing surge has even gone digital: German fashion magazine publishers Hubert Burda Media launched the online sewing community BurdaStyle.com in July. The site offers free weekly patterns and allows people to post tips, pictures, and patterns from projects they've tried.

Students at Singer and at Spark Craft Studios in Cambridge gave myriad reasons for winding the bobbin. Some want to make custom clothing that fits. Others hope to save money by using bargain bin fabrics to create designer-looking digs.

Libby Meehan, sewing department manager at Spark Craft, says that all the sections of the store's "sewing intensive" are full, and there's often a waiting list. The intensive consists of six classes, tailored for beginners, where students make tote bags, aprons, and skirts, and then pick a project to round out the training.

Meehan said most students are professional women in their 20s and 30s, many of whom are trying sewing for the first time. They even have a few men in the classes from time to time.

"We always get excited about one guy," she said.

The demand for classes has grown so much that Spark will offer several new workshops for the summer where students can make bathing suits, sundresses, and pillows with piping.

"We want to give people who already learned how to sew other opportunities to apply the skills," Meehan said.

Spark student Holly Unger, 27, of Somerville, who was finishing up a dark pink Mod tunic (fashioned from a 1960s pattern she bought online) on her antique 1948 Singer machine at a recent class, said she's excited to make more clothing.

"I buy vintage clothing, but it always falls apart," she said. "But if I make it, I know the craftsmanship is good."

Ronnie Gormley, a manager at Singer Sewing in Davis Square, said she has also seen the interest in sewing classes increase over the 15 years she's taught courses. In recent years, she's had students who watch "Project Runway" and decide they want to become designers, and quickly.

"They come to a class, and see that sewing is actually a bit of work," she said, laughing. "They leave, saying, 'this is not for me.' "

But while not every student who takes a class will go on to design for Michael Kors or Roberto Cavalli, some local sewers are turning a hobby into profit through Etsy.com and independent boutiques.

Lauren Hallworth, 24, of Boxford, makes sweet clutches and bags under her label, la-ni-ha. She is a self-taught sewer who has never opened a pattern. After her friends kept asking her to sew bags for them for presents, she decided to make a business out of it.

"I have so many friends who always say they wish they could sew - I tell them anyone can do it," she said.

And she has a tip for any aspiring sewers looking to peddle their creations: Hallworth always makes bags she likes so that if they don't sell, she can happily add them to her own extensive collection.