Thinking about SWAP

A Sewing With A Plan contest starts at Stitcher's Guild on Saturday, and although I have been sewing bits and pieces here and there this week, that I could write about, all I am really thinking about this week on the making front is the SWAP. The key to this SWAP is the jacket, which must co-ordinate with 4 bottoms and 6 tops. I have decided to make a work SWAP, but as I do not wear a jacket very often, I expect it to work hard, and it will need to look just as good with casual clothes.

I am thinking of a Chanel inspired jacket. I have borrowed a Metropolitan Museum art collection book about Chanel from the library, which has beautiful, detailed photographs, and I have this pattern, V7975.
(from Vogue Patterns)
I am thinking of view B, with the pockets moved - The boxy Chanel look does not suit me at all, so I expect to use those princess seams to change the shape a lot. The major problem for me is that the instructions for this pattern are not for a quilted Chanel style jacket. I do not really know where to start finding alternate instructions, but they must be somewhere on the internet.

Smocking sampler

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I was teaching a friend to smock. She is doing really well, and has finished her practice strip and also the smocking for a garment. If I ever have a weekday at home again, she will come over to finish her project.
At the time, I cut out and pleated a similar width piece, as a teaching aide. I smocked it with variations of the first two stitches I teach, cable and trellis, to keep my friend company whilst she smocked, and to show her some design options before she picked a smocking plate for her garment. I made it as a sampler, but always intended using it for something. I finished smocking this a little while ago, and it called to me this morning in my sewing time before work, when I was thinking about all the things I would like to sew in the near future, but am putting off until November 1 in case I decide to put them in a SWAP collection for the stitcher's guild contest!
I made up this little top, from Australian Smocking and Embroidery issue 78 in a size 4 (scaled up one size). I will give it to my niece as part of her 4th birthday present next month.

 

There is a close up of the smocking here. The fabric is cotton voile, from Spotlight.I bought it last winter, when Spotlight seems to ship all the cottons up north for winter. It can be quite difficult to find voile locally in spring and summer, when I really want it. The thread is DMC stranded cotton. I have used 3 strands.

 

Shirtmaking

I am making Vogue 8096, a shirt for my husband. He has been very keen for me to do this for some time, but I have been rather scared of attempting one, as (he is not looking) my husband is very particular about his shirts. In an attempt to encourage myself I bought David Coffin's book "Shirtmaking" and have finally started working through it this weekend. The book is fabulous.
I started with a toile made from calico. My fitting adjustments were very slight. I have widened the yoke by 5mm overall, and trimmed 1cm from the front neck. I am unable to show fitting photographs, as the subject declined. He has agreed to one photograph of the finished object, so I do not want to push my luck!

 

I practiced the placket. I have messed up the topstitching, but did not really find it too tricky following the book. I attached the cuff purely to check the length of the finished sleeve, so do not look at the rough stitching.

 

I thought I was all ready to construct the real shirt yesterday, but instead have ordered a flat felling foot for my machine. Then I thought today that I would make the shirt with welted seams instead, and do not have matching thread. I will use ordinary thread rather than the fine cotton thread David Coffin calls for, as I do not want to make another overseas order this month, but the shops are closed until tomorrow, when I will be at work. This may be a lengthy project.
I will start a new knitting project instead. A cable jumper is calling me.

BWOF 06-2008-118 Mark #2

I am much more happy with second attempt at dress 118 from the June BWOF than the original due to my following the suggestions of the ladies at stitchers guild. I have scaled the pattern down to size 34 for my daughter.

 

I think I could have made her a 32, but the dress fits reasonably well. The waistband is higher than in the pattern, and I could have made a petite adjustment between the shoulders and the bust. This is the second time I have felt this with a BWOF pattern on my daughter, so I will definitely do this for her next BWOF garment.
I am particularly happy with the smocked and pleated middle section of the dress.

 

The green voile sash needed more balancing against the pink than we originally expected. I have both piped the bodice seams, neckline and armholes, and finished the hem with bias binding in the green.

 

The flower at the centre back is a lazy daisy with stem stitch and detached chain in the same green as the sash - DMC 732.

Construction notes BWOF 06-2008-118

I am spending far too much time at work this week, cramping my sewing, but I guess it is good to keep the fabric funds trickling in.
I am working very slowly on the Mark #2 6-2008-118 dress from BWOF, as I want to enter this in the cotton competition at pattern review, so no major errors are allowed to creep in, and it is all happening late in the evening or very early in the morning - prime mistake times!
I have made minipiping, using a double thickness of the green voile to prevent the perle cotton filling thread from showing through. I did not pre wash the filling thread, so am trimming each section so that the filling will float freely within the piping, not be sewn through, which might give it the potential to shrink and make the seams pucker.

 

The fabric is very fine. I reinforced the shoulder seams with selvage trimmings.

 

I have altered the position of the waistband openings. They are wider by around 3cm, and quite a bit higher. The smocking extends to the original length of the pleating, but finishes well above the hips, so I did not need to unpick any. I am quite happy with the proportions.

 

I thought a bit about the buttonhole style openings for the sash. On my last attempt, I backed the buttonhole with high count percale sheeting fabric, which was firm without being heavy, but when I pinned this to the new pink voile dress, it showed through. Instead I have used selvage trimmings from the voile to reinforce the buttonhole opening. It does not shadow through to the right side of the fabric, but was not terribly easy to sew. The other one is much more messy, so I am not taking a photograph of it! Fortunately, these buttonholes are not visible in the finished dress.

 

My next decisions are whether or not to add a contrast border to the hem, and to work out if a petticoat or lining are needed for the skirt.

Smocking and BWOF

I am eating my words, and making another attempt at BWOF 6-2008-118. I described my earlier attempt at this as a Nana's nightie, and I still think this is true, on me, and in a Nana-ish floral print, but after some very helpful comments here and at Stitcher's guild (thanks ladies) I have decided to go ahead with an altered version for my daughter.
Kathryn and Liana both commented that part of the Nana's nightie aura of the dress was that the pleating details were lost in the print , and that the dress would be smarter in a solid colour ( I am paraphrasing here, they were both very nice to me!). Kathryn suggested a much wider belt to reduce the puffiness just below and above the waist, and Liana suggested emphaising the design lines with piping. I really appreciate these suggestions, and after finding some very pleasing voile at Oh sew Noosa during the week, have started on Mark #2.
I decided to smock the centre gathered section. I have pleated and blocked to 5cm, the center gathered section of the front skirt. This took considerably more fabric than BWOF allowed, and the fabric was only 114cm wide, so I will be making some hem alterations later to allow for this change.
I have used a very simple cable and trellis combination in the same colour as the contrasting voile I will use for piping and the sash (DMC 732).

 

My daughter felt that this smocking was a little plain, so I added some glass beads to the upper section of the smocking. She is happier with a touch of bling on her "going out" summer dress.

 

This has taken me most of the weekend (I did a little gardening too), and I hope to start on the construction this evening.

BWOF 07-2008-136 baby romper and hat

I have started making Christmas presents, as I hope to make pretty clothes as gifts for each of my 7 nieces. Today I was lucky enough to look after my next-to-youngest niece for the day, and took the opportunity to do a little fitting and also take some photographs of her in some of her presents. I guess this means her present is really a gift for my SIL! I will have to buy my niece a book as well.
I did not have as much luck with the photos as I would like, due to lack of toddler co-operation. Here is a flat photograph of my version of hat and romper number 136 from the July 2008 Burda world of fashion. I made the size 80cm, equivalent to size 18 months, as my niece will be 18 months old in December. The hat is size 48cm, the largest size in the pattern.

 

I left off the sleeves, as it is very hot here in December. I bound the armhole with constrast bias binding, and piped the round yoke.

 

I particularly like the pocket details. I made the ties thinner than the pattern called for - around 5mm wide finished, as I felt the original width covered up the v cut-out.

 

The size is a little smaller than Australian RTW 18months. My niece is not particularly big for her age, and the clothes fit her quite well now, at age 16 months. The fit of the hat is quite close, and if I were making it again I would make the circumference a little larger. I have used hat elastic to keep the hat on, rather than ties.

 

I think this is a very pretty toddler outfit, and hope my sister-in-law likes it.

BWOF 07-2008-103

I asked my mother to look at the July BWOF, as she had been hinting that she would like some work-worthy travel garments for a "medical mission" trip she is taking to India. The long sleeve Jalie t shirts I made her to take to France last year were a great success, but these garments for India need to be not only quick drying, no-iron-required garments that do not look too "tourist" or "backpacker" for my adventurous, widely traveled, mother, but also suitably modest and professional. She thought that #103 would be suitable, so I tried very hard to make this blouse/jacket for her birthday, last Monday. I had the perfect fabric, that I had purchased with my mother in mind, a baby blue rayon and cotton blend, with a seersucker sort of crinkle. It is hard to photograph, as there is a slightly shiny stripe.

I nearly managed it. I had set aside all of Sunday for this 2 and 1/2 dot pattern, and had no trouble at all until I hit the zipper.

 

It looks pretty good hanging here IMO, but this is after reworking. :(. I particularly like the side pieces that allowed me to play with the stripes in the fabric.

 

The BWOF instructions for the zipper were a little hard for me to understand. This is what I did in response to the first instruction "Open zip. Pin halves of zip face up on front edge of front facings(right side of fabric)from neck edfe so that teeth of zip oint toward the side and edge of zip tape exactly meets marked seam line. Stitch along centre of each zip tape" See any problems?

 

Next instruction " Lay teeth forward and press seam allowances on-to facing. Press edges of facing below zip to inside. Lay halves of zip with facings right sides together with fronts so that teeth neet with seam line on front edges. ....Lay allowances at front edges outward and pin in place over facings"

 

I thought I was going pretty well, but I somehow missed that the zip was in backwards
until after the next two steps, which naturally included not only 2 stitching rows, but topstitching!!!! I was sewing late at night again, when will I learn?
I took the jacket to Noosa, where I was meeting Mum for lunch, tried it on her - with birthday wishes, then snatched it back so that I could fix it. 5 hours of unpicking, basting and hand sewing later, it looks respectable.

BWOF 07-2008-116

My daughter needs a few summer tops, so I have started on 116 from the July BWOF. I scaled down to a 32 at the bust, and raised the front neckline 2 inches.

 

 

I made the ties a little more skinny than the pattern called for, so that there was plenty of room in the casing.

 

The fabric is a quilting cotton. I have piped the neckline in one of the colours from the fabric.

 

. I will review the pattern at pattern review this evening. I made a few construction changes, but it was a pretty easy pattern.

BWOF June 2008, skirt 121

I have made another skirt from the June BWOF. This is number 121, from an Indonesian cotton batik sarong length. I have reviewed the pattern here

BWOF June 2008 dress #118

Photo from Burda World of Fashion Magazine website

Continuing to work through BWOF June 2008, my next attempt is dress #118. This dress was reviewed by NancyWin back in July, and her dress looks lovely, cool and fresh. Unfortunately, when I made this dress, I was thinking "Nana's nightie" when I cut it out (admittedly, the fabric I chose for my trial version was originally purchased with summer nightwear in mind), and although I really enjoyed making this dress, with its interesting waist pleat and belt detail, and new-to-me machine finished shoulder lining method , when I put it on, the Nana's nightie feeling just would not go away.

 

I have been aware for about 25 years that gathers at the waist are not my most flattering look. I was hoping that the controlled gathers at the centre front in this very light voile would let me get away with it. I have chosen the above photo as the most flattering to my figure, because I am vain, but a more truthful photograph below shows you why I should not wear this style of dress. Frumpy comes to mind.

 

I had planned to convert the back tie into a belt with secret fastening under the waist pleat detail, as I know that bows at the back do nothing kind for me, but instead I have pinned this to a smaller size for my daughter.

 

Although she is slim, 13 and IMO gorgeous, I don't really think the dress shape looks fabulous on her either.

 

I will not be cutting out my luscious purple batiste from Gorgeous Fabrics just yet.

DKNY Vogue 1027

The dress version of Vogue 1027 turned out quite well.

 

I did have to unpick the waistband once, as the bodice, rather loose in the cotton lycra I used for my practice run, was rather tight in this cotton/rayon knit. I find this difficulty in relying on toiles in knits a little annoying, but the speed of sewing these garments makes up for a little unpicking.
The fabric is from textilestudio.
It is the first time I have bought fabric from this particular internet shop, and although the fabric has a lovely hand and appears to be of high quality, I was a little disappointed when it arrived. I was also a bit disappointed with the slightly snarky email I received when I asked for an approximate quote on postage, I guess I am getting spoilt with the wonderful service from other internet sellers.
On my monitor, this print reads as quite purple, and I see that it looks that way in the photo of the dress too, but in real life this fabric reads mustard to me, hence my disappointment. It took me a while to get around to making it up, but adding purple swimwear fabric (matt side up) to finish the neckline and cap sleeves seems to have improved the fabric considerably.

A girly weekend

photo credit BWOF June 2008 Archive

The girls and I are home by ourselves for a few days, so we have been doing some girly things. Aside from a few days at work, which did cramp our style a bit, we have managed to do rather a lot of sewing, quite a bit of baking and eating cake, and this evening we are getting take away and watching a girly video. We think there is a lot less work around here without the blokes!
Here are two of my efforts so far. The first one is the skirt 122 from BWOF June 2008. I really like the skirt, especially the pleats, but I am not sure that it really suits my shape, I look kind of thick around the middle. I am thinking of making this up again for my daughter.

 

This effort is a wearable toile for the Vogue Donna Karan dress 1027. I have made up the upper bodice in an 8 (usually I take a 10-12 in Vogue) after reading the reviews suggesting that it runs rather large, and have done a little tweaking and technique practice before I start on the dress. The bodice is a bit low, and seems a little big still, but I am reasonably happy with it. I think the weight of the skirt will pull the waist and neckline lower on the dress, so I am planning to raise the neckline, and maybe take a little more from the shoulders when I make the dress this evening. For this version I added a band to the lower bodice to make it into a knit top.