Pattern Emporium Pleats to meet you pants

 My friend Tessa recommended these to me as I wanted to try out some new lounge pants. It took me ages to find the right fabric as in my mind it needed to be very drapey, and the pleats/darts mean it does take up more than a scant meter of yardage.  

Finally found a winner - viscose from The Fabric Box in Auckland.  It's a metre of fabric but just barely wide enough.  Well.  I shortened the legs 1" at the thigh lines in order to have enough space to cut out the waistband.  I figured I'm short, I might as well shorten them.  I've never shortened at the thigh lines before, that I can think of, but knees are always in the wrong place on RTW so it seemed sensible enough.  

Tessa assured me to choose my size by the measurements, so I cut a size 10.  There is a lot of info about final measurements which I did not really pay attention to so it's hard for me to tell whether I could have been forewarned about just how much ease is present.

 

Thank god I did shorten them!  They are a fine length now, though I could shorten a bit more if I wanted.  They are very drapey and, well...VERY drapey.  My first instinct with this pattern was to use a drapey woven and I still think that might be better.  I don't think the fabric has to stretch anywhere at all.  It feels a bit precariously loose on as I don't like droopy crotches in pants I'm going to wear out, but I see it looks pretty great in the pictures.

I was very grumpy while I was making these, which means I had little patience for annoying quirks.  The most annoying of those quirks was: not sewing down the pleats at all, you just sew across the top.  Really everyone: sew down your pleats 2-3 cm.  It will make your life easier and the pleats will look neater.  

The other most annoying feature of this pattern was the layout of the instructions.  Luckily other than a quick glance to check the direction of pleat folding, there's not much instruction needed.  Which is good because the instructions are *IMPOSSIBLE* to read.  They are laid out 2 pages across on a pdf, so you have to enlarge to 200%, scan across, at which point the page gets lost.  I really cannot state how important it is for instructions to be written on single pages in a vertical, not landscape orientation.  Maybe other people use tablets or something to read their instructions??  I would hesitate to buy a pattern from this company that required closely following instructions because my memory of being annoyed is pretty strong.  

Despite that, and despite the careful work needed to maintain 1/4" SA (which I kind of disagree with because I think it takes away an element of safety that a SA of 3/8" provides) - these are lovely pants which exactly match the pictures.  The pockets are just barely deep enough, the pleats create nice shape, the back darts are fantastic.  It took maybe 2 hours to make these.  I'm glad I waited for just the right fabric. 

La Maison Victor Charlene sweatshirt

 SURPRISE win!!

I wasn't going to blog about this because it's just a sweatshirt.  But I think that La Maison Victor doesn't get that much press because of being a magazine.  And this pattern is stellar.  I borrowed the magazine from a knitting friend over a year ago and traced everything I thought I might like.  The actual plan was regarding a different shirt entirely, but I liked the look of this and have a scrap of velour that would be neat as a sweatshirt - sadly I can't find ribbing that suits it and it must be done with ribbing, not self fabric bindings.  Because of that, I didn't sew up the pattern at the time.  I added my seam allowance and everything.  It's size 34.

My friend Tessa is obsessed with sweatshirts right now and that's what inspired me to pull this out.  She wanted it so I traced it for her.  I have followed her obsession and acquired a bunch of sweatshirting and ribbing, which has been a bit of a learning curve - I'm not used to the stretchy characteristics of ribbing! 

 

So I made this from very bright yellow sweatshirting. I decided it was just too safety-uniform-yellow and gave it to Tessa. The waist ribbing is really tight, I plan to cut it a bit looser next time, and I can of course shorten the top a bit, no surprise. The surprise is the elegance of the neckline cut, just a bit boatneck, and the sleeves which are wide but the fantastic cuffs control them. It seemed totally ridiculous to gather the cuff end of the sleeve when you add the cuff but it totally works, like magic.  I loved this fit!  I immediately cut out my precious Japanese wool...hm, what is this stuff?  wooly sort of sweater knit, kind of.  Not much recoil in it and there are a few holes which either are from washing or were in the fabric to begin with, but make me think it's a bit fragile.  I had to wait for my bindings to arrive because I ordered two colours to choose between.  

I shortened by about 1" and did lengthen the waist binding, but I still think it's a tiny bit tight at the hem and too blousy for my taste, I suppose I'll need to keep working on that.  I'm tempted next to make it in a lighter weight fabric, and extend the size of the bottom binding even more.  Autumn is the time to make all the long sleeved shirts but I can never tell until the middle of winter which ones have become winners.  

I can say about this - because it is roomy through the shoulders and easy to pull on, it's really perfect for sweatshirting and sweater knits that are very warm and don't breathe much.  It gives you a little air circulation space while still being warm!

Peppermint mag x Elbe Textiles Bardon no. 2

 All the summer dresses were successes this year (Bardon, Summer fling, and Marcel) and I wanted to make a second version of each of them. I am, however, running out of summer too fast (it's over!)  I'm slowly relinquishing my plans to next year when I get excited about dresses again, but I managed to sneak this one in before getting distracted making sweatshirts and loungepants.  

I adore my first Bardon though it is somewhat oversized.  I was inspired to size down and make another one, seemed like nothing could go wrong.  I had made size C because of the problem of the high bust.  You're advised to use the high bust measurement instead of the bust measurement to choose your size.  Wellllll that never works for me, my high bust consists of loads of feminine muscles, so it's the same as my bust, though distributed differently.  

So this time, size B.  Same shortening: 1" off the bodice, 1" off first tier, and 2" hem.  Again I lined the bodice rather than using bias tape. The fabric is viscose and is almost certainly Dolce & Gabbana. (I bought it from an Etsy store in Ukraine, so you never know, but the quality of the print was convincing enough.)  Though in my head I often conflate viscose and rayon, the difference between my two fabrics was striking. The black rayon star print fabric is drapey and cool with a pretty tight weave, holds its shape, and has a very smooth face. This pomegranate viscose has a soft, nubbly face, a loose weave, and behaves horribly.  It was difficult to cut, and shredded fast.  As I discovered later it also stretches!

I didn't have enough to line the bodice with the same fabric, for better or worse. I used a lightweight silk cotton.  I was really happy that this adds some structure - but once the dress was done I realised how much the bodice had stretched out, as the lining was now something like 2" narrower than the dress.  I spent about a day panicking about whether I'd be able to hand sew it down.  Luckily I had been planning to do it by hand anyway, and I learnt a big lesson as I did which is that hand sewing can fix a lot.  The stitches kind of just gather the seam allowance of the bodice where I united them, meaning that there are a few more gaping spots than I would usually have, but it supports the bodice a lot and I think even with those inner gaps, it's going to be quite secure. If I'd been able to use the same fabric I would have had the trade off of less structure support, but an easier time getting the pieces to match up in that final moment. 

 

Overall the dress feels very long compared to the other one - the bodice seems long, the pockets seem low - and it may be a bit low because of the viscose stretching, but when I put them on one after the other, it is definitely smaller than my black dress.  Maybe the black one feels smaller than it is because it's oversized and hangs away from my body, whereas this one really is smaller and flows closer to me.

Though I suspected it would settle unevenly I didn't hang the dress overnight before hemming. Live on the wild side!

I'm happy about this dress...with caveats.  As an end of summer item I hope I do have chances to wear it before it's too cold.  I kind of hope it shrinks a bit in the wash but I also have the sense that it's a very fragile dress that won't last long (the black version felt like a workhorse wardrobe item, indestructible, machine washable, etc).  I was really committed to using this fabric for this dress and now I wonder what might have caused me less heartache with the fabric stretching out - I think I'll always stay stitch the bottom of my bodices from now on at least.  I can't think of anything else I would have wanted this fabric for, but it did make me think about dresses with less weight to them.  

The day I did all the hand sewing, the weather got hot and sunny and I wore it all day - I think it's also hard to love two versions of one pattern - you have to let them be different items that happen to be sort of similar - they are never exactly the same!  But I started to love this one for its own strengths and I'm really super glad I sized down - the bodice fit is really spot on.