An Indie Pattern for the first time!

This is the Plantain Tee Shirt by Dear and Doe Pattern Co. It is my first venture into an independent pattern company, a PDF pattern and a free pattern. Was it successful? Yes and no.

I have always been hesitant to venture to the indie pattern market. So much of it seems to be geared toward a younger, sweeter, thinner fashion sense. This is great for the indies and a perfect market  in order to get more and newer sewing enthusiasts involved in the hobby. But not so much for me, I, the older, the more serious (all right, let's just say....I invented the witchy resting face.) the heavier dressmaker has little interest in sweet summer dresses, leggings and other such fashions of the fabulous young. I need structure, tailoring, and forgiveness. I knew about Dear and Doe for several years, but this season when their promotional email landed in my box, I just happened to miss-click and what opened before me was a trench coat pattern featuring a lovely lady that was more my size. So I took a look again and discovered they offer a free pattern via PDF download, the Plantain Tee Shirt. I like free and I took the bait and I'm hooked, but not on the printable PDF's. Good heavens, shoot me now!

Many folk may like the immediate satisfaction of instant downloads, but not me.  We are very behind the curve on our computers and getting one piece of hardware to talk to another is a mammoth task. Then there is the scaling of the pattern itself, which was accomplished by hook and by crook from a printer whose language is set to something I know nothing about. After two years, I still cannot find the menu to permanently change the language default, temporarily, yes, but from a cold boot that printer remains locked in its mother tongue.

I digress. It is very easy for me to fall off the crazy cliff when dealing with technology and as one of the earliest adopters of home computers I have, in the last five years, become increasing hostile to the direction in which my human/computer relationship is shifting.

Back to sewing, after walking away from the printer, I still didn't have a pattern. There was cutting and taping and then I couldn't tissue fit the pattern. Tracing paper followed and then a tissue fit, luckily not much needed changing except some extra length in the torso. I think and it looks as if it is so, that the other patterns at Dear and Doe are available already printed. I'll pay for that and be patient with the post office.

I made it up in a light weight cotton jersey with a bit if viscose in it and this is where the project falls apart. I did not pay for or travel to get high quality jersey. I shopped locally and got something that did not wear well at all. It was nice at first off the bolt, and with the first couple of washings, but then all the cotton fibers in the fabric decided they had had enough and wanted to date the lint screen of my dryer. This fabric is washing away and becoming thinner and thinner. Fast fashion crap fabric has made it to my sewing studio and I DON"T like it. For all my time spent, I will have nothing to show for it in about three more wearings.

Back to the pattern...Even thought the fabric is a terrible flop. The pattern is most definitely a keeper. The neckline is flattering and the top drape very nicely. I will be putting this in my tried and true file and I will be shopping for German quality knits on my next trip east.


A final note for today, theNYTimes  ran an article about the newest fashion trends and noted the move to lower hemline, higher necks and sleeves! Maybe covering my charwoman's knees, turkey neck and bat wings will suddenly become more fashionable. Maybe there will just be more choice. I think the time has come to give ladies of all sorts more choices and the freedom to make those choices about their own clothing.

A One Meter Shirt

I had big plans for chemise silhouette dresses. Not only did I have one meter of olive twill in my stash, I had one meter of a matching woven stripe. When the plans crashed and burned, I had more stash than any woman has a right to own. I believe in reusing my mistakes and these two projects are a result of a poor choice. This is one reason why you will not often see me choosing bright colors and large prints. I change my mind about fabrics and patterns often and by the time I actually sew something the game plan has changed a dozen times.

The plan for these fabrics was the striped dress on the right, from a Japanese pattern book call "Feminine Wardrobe" by Jinko Matsumoto. It became the photo on the left, as skirt from Butterick 4461 and the shirt from McCall's 2094.

 McCall's 2094 is a tried and true pattern for me. I don't even think that it is published any longer. These little shirts have been part of my wardrobe for nearly a decade. I've done a FBA on the pattern years ago and I prefer the short and sleeveless versions of this shirt.







Here's a closer photo of the collar and the fabric. This is more utilitarian sewing. There is nothing fancy about this. It is more about using the resources I already have to make something that I will use for many years to come.

Back to the One Meter Skirt.

 I had originally purchased two one meter pieces of fabric to be used to make a chemise dress. After I decided that silhouette was not for me, these fabrics went to the stash. My stash is much too large and so I made a 1 meter skirt. This is from Butterick 4461.  I made View A in size 14 and I added  about 3 inches to the length. Let's say this another way, when I laid out the pattern on the fabric, I took as much extra length as I had fabric. The heavier twill and more somber color lends itself to a longer skirt. The summer breezy cottons shown on the pattern envelope are better suited to the knee length design.



 I lined the skirt with a grey lining fabric, also from my stash. Here it is on my dressmaker's dummy with the blouse from the last post. It a very simple slightly A-line skirt with no waistband and two front and back darts for shaping. The zip is at the center back.

 Front View - It is so plain that there isn't much to talk about.
I would call this piece a wardrobe basic. One of those items that gets worn a lot with everything.

Here it is fresh out of the closet and tossed on the floor next to my other one meter project, a camp shirt.

Photos!

Remember these blouses? I quickly tossed them on the floor, took a photo and moved on to more sewing. My sewing room has seen a lot of thread this spring. I finally had some time today and a clean room, so I took some more photos. Here are some closer views of the blouse on the right.

The back of the collar is secured with two buttons with self fabric loops. This version of the blouse has an open neckline and you don't really need to use these buttons to put the blouse on, but they are a very nice visual detail. The other version of the blouse with the higher jewel neckline has these also and there you most definitely would need to open the collar to get the blouse on or off.

Here is a full view of the back. There is a side seam zipper on the left.

This is the front detail. There are a bunch of fiddly little pleats going left and right. Choosing a stable fabric, cutting accurately and marking carefully are critical for this pattern detail.

This is the finished blouse. It's all over tiny print makes it nearly a neutral olive green grey texture. I happen to like this print best of all the three I've made from this pattern this spring.

One Meter of Olive Twill

....makes one casual straight skirt using Buterrick 4461. There is nothing special about this project. It is a quick stash buster. However, this olive color goes well with the last two tee shirts that I've made and the three blouses from Simplicity 1278.



...AND I don't have photos of this or the next project that I made, a little striped shirt. I guess that is tomorrow's project.

A Reason to Buy? No, The Reason I Sew.

Today's blog is really about why I sew and it's a couple of links because I'm in the middle of a larger project and these people are far more eloquent than me.

The first link is from Peter Lappin from Male Pattern Boldness. This is one of my most inspirational blogs. He reminds me that drive, ambition, and an eye for excellence is all one needs to master a skill. Here is his most recent post about clothing quality. The "crapification" of underwear.

The second link is a podcast from the website "Adam Ruins Everything". He interviews a young woman who has worked in the fast fashion industry and now teaches at the University of Georgia. Why Fast Fashion Fails Us

Two More Blouses

I seem to be on a sewing kick at the moment, well at least, I'm working through some of my stash. These two blouses came from some Liberty of London cotton that I picked up over a year ago. I had Simplicity 1278 in mind when I purchased this fabric, I just need the confidence to make up the reissued vintage pattern. I made this blouse previously in an inexpensive viscose lawn and the pattern needed quite a bit of alteration before it fit correctly. Here are the two new blouses. I photographed them on the floor. They aren't the type of garment that looks particularly attractive on the hanger or on the floor for that matter. I need to get my mojo back for taking pictures. Trust me they look much better when worn. The blouse on the left is a turquoise and beige print with short sleeves and the second blouse is a tiny allover floral print in olive green and beige with a tiny orange flower center. Both blouses will go with an upcoming project that is now in the works.

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!

From 1952 The Sheath Dress

This is a reproduction from the Vogue Book for Better Sewing (c1952). It is the Late Day Sheath Dress. I've made it up twice; once in a printed linen and the second time in black linen. Both dresses fit well but I took a little width from the neckline between the green linen and the black linen. This drew the straps together a bit more and made the dress easier to wear.