Continuing to pull unworn or little worn clothes from my wardrobe, here are the clothes I bought just after Christmas in Melbourne. At the time I was prepared to spend large amounts of money, and did spend 2 whole days trying to find work clothes, and this is all I could find, even whilst shopping with my sister, who is an expert shopper, and shares some figure oddities with me (However, she has long legs, is taller than me, and curves less, so she can get away with a lot more than me, surprizingly I still like her!). You can see why I started sewing a SWAP. The colours do not suit me, and the clothes do not fit. The shirt is grey and white striped cotton, from Jag, and the pants are from Jacqui E. I have been planning to alter them for some time, but I do not like alterations. I am making another note to myself not to buy colours that do not suit me, this is getting repetitive!
The shirt is actually quite a good style for work, having a back pleat from a yoke, like a man's shirt. It does not quite fit across the bust, showing skin inappropriately, but is quite enourmous at the waist, increasing my apparent width in a most unfortunate manner.
The rotten thing was flat felled, so it took quite a while to unpick the side seams. However, due to the flat fell, the seam allowance was around 1cm, and I was able to squeeze a little more room at bust level at this seam. I increased the dart width. I did consider unpicking the dart and pointing it more towards my bust line, but the fabric is quite dense and closely woven, and the needle holes showed after unpicking the side seam, so I decided that the dart would have to stay put. I took in the side seam at the waist, and added a front waist dart on each side. The back is now longer than the front, but as the blouse is very long, and will be worn tucked in, this is not a problem.
Despite my bust line changes, which I feel are as much as I need, there still seemed to be a danger of flashing lingerie. To avoid this, I extended the button placket widthways.
I originally thought that I would need to reduce the sleeve length, but fortunately, the cuffs are beautifully finished with the stripes cut on the bias, and simply buttoning them folded over once looks fine to me. I will probably push them up at work for practicality.
I think this looks fine with the new navy Marlene pants. The wardrobe progresses, now if I could only stick to flattering colours I would be well dressed.......The dreadful grey trousers are next, but may need another month or two maturing in the mending pile before I can face them.
Edited to add: The alterations took just over 2 hours, including unpicking. I hope I remember this next time I think it will be quicker to buy than to make.
1 comment:
Karen, I have trouble wearing white as well. I've found that a chunky dark or bright necklace is often enough colour near my face to make the white look much better.
I also HAVE to wear make up with white, as it totally washes me out otherwise. Black, no problem. White = blah!
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