Wednesday 13 May 2009

Unfinished business

I have at least 50 sewing projects in my mind, but nothing new to show you. Instead of fantasizing about what I might sew, but probably won't get around to, I will be terribly organized and show you one of the V7903 blouses from my SWAP that I did not post about earlier, due to some misbehaviour on its part giving me a temporary dislike of the garment. I promise, this is not as dull as the last two.(IMO, anyway)

I was inspired by blouse 120 from the January 2009 BWOF. Link to technical drawing Going back to look at this, I see that it is orange, just like mine, although maybe a little more subdued! I bought the fabric for mine at Gorgeous fabrics, and it arrived rather brighter than I had expected. (Prompting the purchase of a Pantone's guide) Thanks Karla!.
The Burda blouse is made from batiste, and has 4 horizontal tucks. My fabric was rather off grain, like a lot of cotton twills, and my first attempt at making tucks was not successful. I posted about this earlier. My second attempt was made after tearing and tugging at the fabric, and I did not use the Burda pattern, just made tucks in my fabric at a depth that pleased me. After stitching these, I tugged at the fabric again, and cut out the fronts of the V7903 blouse in a single layer, then constructed as previously, as if the fabric was flat.


That last sentence sounds rather easy. Unfortunately I had a bit of trouble with the blouse, and not just cutting holes in the wrong places!. I did not like the front openings after I had applied the facing. They did not sit nicely at the pleats on the turn of fabric. I unpicked, and applied self fabric piping to the front edges, which made things cleaner.
I also had trouble with the collar stand. Due to the fronts overlapping, the point at which the collar stand met the neck of the garment appeared uneven. I was not able to fix this, but tend to think I am being over picky. Burda has avoided this problem by having the horizontal tucks start at a lower point on the blouse. I wish I had looked a little more closely at BWOF's blouse before cutting mine out!
I avoided the button hole issue over the tucks by starting the fastenings below the lowest pleat.


I did add a few details to the blouse. I drafted my own long sleeve, cuff and placket, using the instructions from David Page Coffin's shirtmaking book. I am very pleased with the outcome.

I made another "action back" for this shirt. Instead of a back yoke, I made a deep inverted box pleat, and used some machine embroidery over the top to give those stitches on my machine a little exercise. The embroidery is practically invisible when I wear it,just how I like it.

13 comments:

Sew-4-Fun said...

Lovely blouse! I like all the extra little details you added, especially the piping along the front edge.

Sue said...

I think that colour suits you very well. Great job on the blouse!

Uta said...

Great blouse. And beautiful, beautiful cuff and placket! These details are what's special about sewing (as well as you do)!

Claudine said...

Beautiful blouse! I've been thinking about making that pattern, too.

Shannon said...

Your new blouse looks fabulous (even if it did give you a few problems). And I don't think I've mentioned how much I love that skirt in you. Nice work!

Lori said...

Very pretty blouse, I made this blouse, too and really like the tucks.

wendy said...

I love the tucks. They look great that high up, and you really can't see any unevenness in the collar. So pretty!

gwensews said...

I wonder if the trouble you had with the blouse is because of the fabric itself? It could be the weave of the fabric working against the pleats. You did a nice job of handling it though, and the shirt turned out well.

Tina said...

Beautiful understated use of embroidery! Did you use embroidery thread or something else? (I am one of your lingerie sew-along partners.)
Tina

Claire S. said...

This blouse caught my eye, but I haven't tried it - yet.

Yours looks great, especially the color!

Carol said...

I love this blouse and I love this fabric! I nearly bought the same fabric myself to go with my vanilla, chocolate and orange autumn wardrobe and now that I've seen it made up I think I will. It really looks good on you and I especially like it with the denim skirt. I like the details you've added to this blouse and I think I'm going to have to purchase the David Page Coffin book.

Anne-Marie said...

I have this think for orange. This is so neat ! I love it. Your sewing skills are evolving very rapidly. congratulations, you are good!

cidell said...

I have always loved this blouse and the color is honestly just delicious on you.