Two Tees

  

This was a fast sew, two tee shirts from Butterick 6084. I've used this pattern since 2006, so I'm pretty sure it is no longer sold. It's a fitted tee with an oval boat neck and 3/4 sleeves. One tee is made from an heather cotton knit in a color I would call oatmeal. The other tee is a white and beige stripe knit of the same weight. I bought both of these pieces of knit at a sewing shop in Wurztburg, Germany.  Cut, sewn and into the closet in about a week, I like that time frame.

I did look this pattern number up. It has now been reassigned to a little girl's dress pattern. This is the pattern I have and it is one of my tried and true patterns. I haven't found a tee shirt that I like better, but, honestly, I haven't looked very hard either.

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Vintage Reissued

This is Simplicity 1278. It is a 1950's vintage reissued pattern. I made it up in size 16. This is view C. This particular pattern does not have any side dart shaping the "B" bust cup comes from some waistline darts and the pleating detail at the neckline. This was not going to work for me. I added a "D" sized bust dart at the side seam. With this FBA, I did a prefit muslin for the top and found I also needed about 3/4" width added to the upper arm sleeve. After the adjustments were made and tried it out on some viscose lawn in a blue and brown leafy print.

I was happy with the pattern and wore this blouse several time this winter. It looks nice with skirts or pants and the neckline detail means I don't need any jewelry or anything fussy at all. Sweet and simple. The sleeves in this photo look like they are two different length. I assure you, they are equal length 3/4 sleeves. Perfect for me!

A trial of upcycling shirts

I constantly have an endless supply of worn shirts and lately they have been arriving in my sewing room at an alarming rate. I blame the "non-iron" shirt trend. These shirts wear at the collar and cuffs within a few washes. If I get one year's wear from these items, I'm lucky. I really think the non-iron resins allow manufacturers to use cheaper fabric. Combine cheaper fabric with stiffer interfacing and everything wears at the edges. You can see this in the second photo of the cuff.

I chose one of these shirts which I thought  had better fabric than the others. I ripped it apart and removed all the seams except for the front buttons and button hole placket. I re-cut the shirt using one of my simple camp shirt patterns. There is little room for give in this area as I need some room in the bust and the shirts don't have anything extra in this area. I didn't have enough fabric for a new collar and inner front facing, if I used the old sleeves for new sleeves. I chose some quilting cotton in a 1930's reprint fabric for these new pieces.

Here's the front of the new shirt after darts and a collar are complete.

 

Instead of using the print fabric on just the collar, I used some as trim on the sleeve. Rather than looking like I "ran" out of fabric for the shirt,  I thought it gave a much more planned look to the project. I used a small band of folded fabric in the seam line of a stitched cuff for the short sleeve.

Here's the finished upcycled shirt. I think it was reasonably successful. The button closure is "backwards" as I started with a men's shirt and I wished to save this feature. The non-iron fabric does not take a crisp press easily so the shirt looks unpressed and "home sewn". Oh, well. I was not after something that would be presentable to the office, but rather something for Saturday at home. I can wash the car in that shirt. Let's see how the fabric holds up now that all the old interfacing has been removed. If it holds up to Saturday chores, I've got 5 or 6 more shirts to remake for casual wear. Now, off to convince my husband to buy more colorful business attire!