I've been away. Enjoying the lovely weather. Hoping it never ends! Hence the slow-posting in the past 2 weeks or so.
I found at some point that I have too many knits. Too many T-shirts (as an aside, almost all say "Google" on them in some way or another) and altogether too much of a jeans-a T-shirt wardrobe.
So I'm fixing this. Slowly, but surely. I picked up vintage Simplicity 5513 during the Sew Grateful week this year:
The seller had a 32-bust, which is supposed to be 2 inches too small for me - I figured this would be a problem. Three weeks ago, while Mr T was on a business trip and having forced myself to have at least one night of sewing while home alone, I made a muslin. Turns out - the bust was absolutely fine! However, the hips, which according to the pattern match my measurements were waaaaay too small. I started altering the pattern: increase hip width on each side, lower the French dart a bit and make a swayback adjustment.
Then, the muslin and pattern adjustments just lay around for 10 days. Actually, the muslin, pattern, two scissors (one for paper one for fabric), some silk chiffon and some basting thread + needles made it all the way to New York in my luggage, only to not be moved from it because I was too jetlagged to even try getting the rest of the alterations done.
On Friday I started cutting the real dress in some silk twill I got at Mood and then shipped to a friend in Mountain View in January. I had to make the remaining adjustments on paper - these weren't many, basically just increasing the hip size in the front and increasing the size of the sleeves a bit..
I then decided to make the dress a bit more interesting by cutting some contrast flat piping from the yellow thai silk I bought at Mood last year when I was in New York (I also made this never-really-blogged-about shirt from said fabric). By the time I was done with all the cutting, it was too late to start sewing so I figured - I have the yellow fabric out anyway, why not cut a blouse out of it using the same pattern?
Said and done. On Saturday, I decided the blouse might be easier to make than the dress. The only change I made (except for making everything shorter!) was to stop the CB seam a bit short of the neckline and add a snap closure (this turned out to be a wise decision!). I also cut the sleeves on the bias as I wanted them to have as much give as possible
Today I wore it to work and I have to say I'm quite pleased with the results! My first ever-garment with a proper swayback adjustment!
Apologies for the creases. The blouse has been worn all day - I got the pictures taken around 9PM!
The beige dress is not yet finished. There's not much left to do, but today has just been too hot to plug the iron in, and I figured without pressing I can only really sew 3 seams so not really worth it. Perhaps I'll be able to finish it by the weekend!
I found at some point that I have too many knits. Too many T-shirts (as an aside, almost all say "Google" on them in some way or another) and altogether too much of a jeans-a T-shirt wardrobe.
So I'm fixing this. Slowly, but surely. I picked up vintage Simplicity 5513 during the Sew Grateful week this year:
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| http://vintagepatterns.wikia.com/wiki/Simplicity_5513_A |
The seller had a 32-bust, which is supposed to be 2 inches too small for me - I figured this would be a problem. Three weeks ago, while Mr T was on a business trip and having forced myself to have at least one night of sewing while home alone, I made a muslin. Turns out - the bust was absolutely fine! However, the hips, which according to the pattern match my measurements were waaaaay too small. I started altering the pattern: increase hip width on each side, lower the French dart a bit and make a swayback adjustment.
Then, the muslin and pattern adjustments just lay around for 10 days. Actually, the muslin, pattern, two scissors (one for paper one for fabric), some silk chiffon and some basting thread + needles made it all the way to New York in my luggage, only to not be moved from it because I was too jetlagged to even try getting the rest of the alterations done.
On Friday I started cutting the real dress in some silk twill I got at Mood and then shipped to a friend in Mountain View in January. I had to make the remaining adjustments on paper - these weren't many, basically just increasing the hip size in the front and increasing the size of the sleeves a bit..
I then decided to make the dress a bit more interesting by cutting some contrast flat piping from the yellow thai silk I bought at Mood last year when I was in New York (I also made this never-really-blogged-about shirt from said fabric). By the time I was done with all the cutting, it was too late to start sewing so I figured - I have the yellow fabric out anyway, why not cut a blouse out of it using the same pattern?
Said and done. On Saturday, I decided the blouse might be easier to make than the dress. The only change I made (except for making everything shorter!) was to stop the CB seam a bit short of the neckline and add a snap closure (this turned out to be a wise decision!). I also cut the sleeves on the bias as I wanted them to have as much give as possible
Today I wore it to work and I have to say I'm quite pleased with the results! My first ever-garment with a proper swayback adjustment!
Apologies for the creases. The blouse has been worn all day - I got the pictures taken around 9PM!
The beige dress is not yet finished. There's not much left to do, but today has just been too hot to plug the iron in, and I figured without pressing I can only really sew 3 seams so not really worth it. Perhaps I'll be able to finish it by the weekend!
Loving that colour on you.
ReplyDeleteThanks! I really like it too. It's a lot brighter in real life than in the pictures :)
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