Loud boy's shirt BWOF 09-2008-143

My son likes shirts made in loud prints, which are rather fun, and I usually make him 2 or 3 each year. He selected the fabric for this one last summer, (local quilting shop) but sadly, his mother has been rather neglectful of his wardrobe lately in favour of fun teenage girl's clothes. I enjoyed the print challenge, especially as I have a sneaking suspicion that there are only a few years left of it.


The shirt is BWOF 09-2008-143, in the largest size 134, which is appropriate to his height.(I will have to look for a new pattern for next year, very sad) His girth is closest to size 122, but having made this shirt previously in a straight 110, 122 and also in a height 128, girth 122, I felt that the shirt is cut rather slim for Australian boy styles, where the shirts tend to be loose, so left it 2 sizes too wide. Men's shirts described here as European cut are more slim through the body, so I guess this would hold for boy's shirts. As in my previous versions, I reduced the height of the collar and the collar stand by 1cm, although this may not have been necessary this time in the largest size - there is no height variation between size 110 and size 134, and I am sure the neck length increases over this height range!

Because I am proud of my pattern matching, here is a close up of the front buttoned.
There may be a little skewifidness of the button placement to assist in the pattern matching, but only a seamstress would notice ;). I would probably have done a better job of this had I considered the lap direction when I was cutting out.

I lengthened the shirt by 7cm, finding it rather short in the body, although the sleeve length is fine. This is the first time I have made a version with long sleeves, but it was a particular request from my son. I think he fancied the plackets on his Dad's shirt, as he asked for a contrast fabric, and selected this one himself. It is not what I would have chosen, but I think it works quite well.





I drew up the placket taking David Page Coffin's placket from Shirtmaking as a guide.My calculator got quite the workout scaling it down, but I did not think the Burda bias strip would have been nearly so satisfying.



The contrast fabric is also used for the inner collar stand.
I used David Page Coffin's method of folding over the fabric x2 for the front buttonbands, and flat felled the side and sleeve seams (dastardly difficult on the skinny sleeves of a boy's shirt, but otherwise left his methods well alone. This made the shirt much quicker than his father's. I used the lined yoke by machine method for the lined yoke, described here.

I made the back lower piece a little wider, planning to pleat it as needed to ensure reasonable pattern matching.
The pleats are very small, but allowed me to line everything up satisfactorarily. I used the walking foot to help with this, and only unpicked once, which might be a record.



Despite his determination not to smile for photographs, my son is quite happy with his shirt.