Finished Project: Merino Plantain Top

This is fabric piece #4 of 5 of my beloved merino stash. When I originally purchased the other pieces my main goal was to make warm activewear for winter running. But I couldn't resist buying this extra piece, which color was called 'Seattle Grey'. Living in Vancouver, only 3 hours north of Seattle, that reference to our most common winter weather totally spoke to me.

Instead of activewear, this time I wanted to make a simple every day top, so I decided to try Deer and Doe's free pattern Plantain. I liked the A line shape and the wide round neckline.

I cut a size 36 everywhere except for the hem, where I cut along the size 46 line (which added about 3.5cm to the length). The fit was good right off the bat, although I think I could probably use a bit more ease around the bust.

Other than that, I added 2.5 cm to the sleeve length (long sleeve version). The sleeves where still feeling a little short even with the added length, so instead of hemming them, I added a small sleeve band, which also created a slight gather at the wrist. I like the result.

I've had some issues with my previous merino makes, to get the hem to sit properply and not get all wonky after a few wash - mostly due to the stretchiness of the fabric. This time thanks to the A-line shape, the hem doesn't need to stretch over the hips, so I actually added stay tape to the hem. It worked perfectly to keep it nice and clean (at least much cleaner then without tape).

The pattern came together super easily, nothing difficult about the construction. Overall, a pretty simple to make, easy to wear shirt, with the added bonus of warmth without bulk, as merino fabric is incredible that way.

I've only got one piece of merino left (but quite a bit of scraps which I could probably make underwear out of even), destined to be another running top. But that probably won't happen until later this year as I'm now in the process of making myself...a pair of wide-legged super comfy sweat pants...

We took the photos at the bottom of Bridal Veil Falls near Chilliwack, BC, a pretty scenic setting for an otherwise

Finished Project: Knit dress

This is Vogue 1315.  I found the pattern in the $1 bin at Fabrics, ect... in Vancouver. It's a loose-fitting dress with elasticated dress, with pleating and slouchy pocjet design which make it a bit more interesting than just plain knit dress. I bought it thinking it would go into my stash to be made at a later time, but when I saw this fabric on the top of my stash, I thought it would be a could match, and an easy project to complete.

The fabric is a wine-coloured cotton jersey bought at Gala Fabrics shortly before they closed down.It's a medium weight with a good balance of body and drape.
The most complicated step when making the dress was figuring out how to fold the pleat on the skirt before attaching the pocket. The instructions where pretty straight forward but I mistakenly made the pleat on the wrong side, which I only realized later on when trying to line up the sides of the dart and they didn't match up. Fortunately I was able to reverse the darts without having to undo all the pocket seams.

The top was a no brainer. The only thing I modified was the neckline. The neckline is supposed to be finished with two ovelapping bands with raw edges, which, when using the proper fabric weight/content, end up rolling down. I liked that design detail but my fabric would just not roll (it was either too heavy, or maybe 100% cotton doesn't roll the way lycra does?). Anyways, I didn't want to waste the pieces so I ended up sewing both bands together along their longer edge. Since one was narrower than the other, when folding in half lengthwise, the seam did not end up on the fold, but on the inside, which was perfect to conceal it.

I then attached the band to the neckline and finished it with a pretty stretch topstitch.

I attached the sleeves to the shoulders first, then sewed the sleeve seam and side seam in one go. Adding the elastic at the waist was easy,. The casing for the elastic is created by folding the seam allowance from the bodice down towards the skirt and top-stithing in place. I finished the hem with the same stretch topstich as the neckline.

Confession: I haven't actually finished the sleeve hem yet ( I was too eager to wear it). I don't think I will leave it raw, but because I like the look without any top-stitching, I might try to use an invisible hem.

Fitting-wise, I made the following pattern alterations:
Added 2.5 cm (1 inch)  to the bodice length
added 2.5 cm to the skirt along the cutting line, as well as 7cm at the hem (and boy am I glad I did, the original length would have been a tunic on me).
Added 2.5 cm to the sleeve length.
I also took out about 1inch at the armhole, tapering to nothing at the elbow and waist.

If I make this dress again I might try to cut the bodice in a size 8 instead of 10, or maybe remove 1.5-2cm from the center front and back, to make the necline slightly less wide and bring the shoulders closer to center.
Overall I'm quite happy, this is a very comfortable dress, easy to wear, I'm pretty sure it's going to be a regular in my clothing rotation.

Fitting: Adjusting the Watson Bra Pattern

As I mentionned in my previous post, I made 2 muslins of the Watson Bra last week. The first one, the suggested size based on my measurements, was way too small. For the second one I cut the size matching my RTW size. The band was good, but the cups were still not fitting right.

Today I took muslin #2 and tried it on again, this time with makeshift straps. It confirmed what I had noticed before: If I shifted the bra slightly to one side, the cup fit actually ok.

While wearing it, I had traced on the bra where the base of the cup should hit. So I took the cups out, and repositionned them slightly more apart (about 1cm -3/8" more towards the sides). It created a gap in the middle, but it actually worked!

To close the gap, all I had to do was add 1cm (3/8") to the inner side of the cup, tapering to nothing at the top.

As I was fitting my adjusted muslin, I also pinned out about 1cm of fabric at the cup seam, so I removed .6 cm (1/4") from the seam on both pieces. Since I removed the extra along the entire seam, I added it back to the outer sides so that the cup would still be the same width at the base and at the top.

Picture above: added .6 cm on outer side seam of piece A, and added a total of 1.5 cm (5/8") at the base of piece B, reduced to .6cm at the top.

On the cradle piece, I extended the curve width by about 1cm on the side, tapering to nothing at the notch. Since I'd moved the cup to the side, I adjusted the notch to match the cup seam.

My final adjustment was to add .6cm (1/4") to the band depth. I did this because the hook and eye piece that came as part of the kit are about 1cm (3/8") wider than the band (once allowances are folded). I figure with the elastic trim, it will fill the remaining .4cm difference.

After I made the changes to the pattern, I adjusted the cradle on muslin #2 to match my new pattern piece, and recut new cups.

So this is muslin 2 1/2, which fits pretty darn good!

That's it for my adjustements! I was quite please that the alterations turned out to be pretty simple. In hindsight, I probably could have just added the extra width on the outer side of the cups, rather than the middle, but it seems like the seam is hitting in the right place, so in the end it probably doesn't matter. Can't wait to get the final version done!

Boxy Sweater

There was a time where I only wore tight fitting shirts. They would look great at first but then I would wash them and they would shrink in the wash, leaving me with an exposed mid-riff and pulling on my sleeves to reach my wrists...and then I realized that wearing a loose top didn't have to look like I was wearing a sack, and some looser shape could actually work for me.  It didn't hurt that trends switched to looser tops and tigher bottoms, which I've definitely embraced, as the below pictures will demonstrate.

This is somewhat of a stash busting project, although the fabric hadn't been in my stash for very long (but stash-busting makes it sound so guilt-free). The pattern is #117 from Burda magazine October 2013. I liked the boxy shape and the clean lines, quite in trend right now.
The fabric is a medium/heavy weight forest green knit with a nice body to it, purchased from Gala fabric.

This was a fast project in that I didn't bother making  muslin. I did however make adjustments right off the bat. I compared it with another burda magazine loose-fitting pattern, my now TNT button-down shirt, and made the same ajustements as I had made to fit that one:
Small but adjustment, and I also pined out a 2cm horizontal tuck in the back (i'm not sure what "body flaw" this adjustement corrects but it seems to get rid of some extra fabric that otherwise gathers in the back). The pattern is a 'tall size' so I didn't touch the length.

First I machine-basted all the pieces together to check the fit, then took them apart to make some additional changes: I took 1cm off the sides and sleeves on both front and back, and took an additional 3 cm off the sleeve width at the cuff.

 

This pattern would be great for color blocking and different fabric textures, or to mix leather and jersey, etc... I only had the one fabric, so I tried adding some extra details to make it a bit more interesting. I considered using the wrong side of the fabric for contrast on the side panels (the color was a more wash-ed out version of the right side), but it didn't look right. I added an exposed zipper in the back and top-stitched the side panels quilt-style. I used two layers of fabric on the sides so that the "quilting " would be a bit more pronounced (even though you can't really see it very well).

 

 
I really enjoyed working on this project, which presented no big challenge but allowed me to try my hands at some new techniques: the exposed zipper (a lot more tricky than the invisible one if you ask me), the quilting (mostly time-consumng and also jersey tends to stretch as you're topstitching so I had to recut the pieces once all the top-stitching was done) and the front slit with facing.

I really like the final product. It's a pretty casual top, but it's super comfortable and has a bit of a modern edge to it I think. I could see making this again with leather accents or in a fancier, stiffer fabric for a more "luxe" look ...