That 1950's sweater

Ok, I know I said I wouldn't do this... but after two posts about making this kind of thing, I thought I should show you what it looks like when worn.
My patience for posing has decreased quite a bit and I have lost my appetite for stern faces. So, this was the best picture I took.

New loose shapes

This past month, I have been sewing and I have enjoyed it... It just took me a long time to take pictures of what I had made. I finally caught up. Today, E took pictures of three different new garments. Actually, four new garments but two of those are in the same outfit. That's the one I will show you today.

I've had this heavy mystery-fiber (definitely synthetic but luckily without static cling) crepe in my stash for a while. Originally, I had it earmarked for a dress with elaborate draped and pleated details but I never quite got around to making it. I think I was right not to. This stuff is too bulky for such use. So, some weeks ago, I decided to make something else I liked the idea of: Retro-style very wide trousers.

I always liked the idea of culottes/trousers and I have made a pair before. And now that my increased level of exercise (all that climbing!) has made me loose some of the roundness on my hips, they look even better than before.
So, I thought that would be a great use for that fabric. And did I mention I love the colour? That bronze-ish tone tends to look very good on me and it can be combined with so many other colours I like!

The previous pair of full-length culottes were drafted as culottes, based on a skirt sloper. This new pair isn't, these are actually very wide trousers. The only real difference is in the shaping of the crotch seam and in the angle of the center back seam. 

I also made a better informed choice about the pockets: The old pair had in-seam pockets. Not the best choice in a garment that is at its most fitted from waist to hip. Here, I have made slightly curved slanted pockets.

Oh, and I didn't want to make a fly front in a fabric with so much drape. Nor put a zipper a the side seam, come to think of it. So, the closure of these trousers is another of my odd zipper-less inventions. There is a button on the waistband at the left pocket, not a the right side. The inside of the left pocket extends to center front and is buttoned to the inside of the waistband there. So, the trousers open far enough through the side of that pocket for me to get in and out of them. 

Making these trousers, I was thinking about vintage lounge pyjama's, like these from Beyer's Mode from 1937,

or these from Gracieuse magazine from 1931.

I have some patterns for those but I drafted my own anyway. I have studied the patterns of those 1930's examples and they all have very loose and low fit at the crotch. I didn't really want that here, I think it would have made the trousers less wearable in a "normal" setting...

Oh, and I also made the top (this is not a great picture, E took it while I was putting on my shoes. It looks a bit odd but it does show my work with those stripes). I used the loose fitting, dropped shoulder shape I made earlier this winter and tried my best at matching those very thin wavy stripes (and gave up on that half-way through). It's simple and comfortable and in this thin jersey, it is perfect for tucking into high waistbands. 
The combination is quite loose all-over by standards but I still really like it. There is a sort of laid-back glamour about wearing lots of flowing fabric... 
And I actually like the idea of these trousers so much that I'm already dreaming up lots of other outfits to create using them. Outfits for which some parts still have to be created...

Simple stripes...

... with a little twist. 
I can't believe I didn't get round to blogging about this all week! E took these pictures a full week ago. However, I've been busy and I have had a cold so I'm not going to blame myself.
This is The first thing I wanted to show you (I'll write a separate blog post about the skirt later this week):

A simple long sleeve t-shirt made from the red-and-white striped fabric I used before. 
In that first top, I got creative with unusual pattern shapes and the direction of the stripes. This one is much more normal. A simple, fairly close-fitting top with raglan sleeves. And matched stripes, of course.

It's only with those sleeves that I tried to be a little bit clever: Along the raglan seams, the sleeves are gathered a bit and I have used some satin-edge lingerie elastic as piping on those seams.

Fellow pattern makers may know that if you take a normal sloper with a set-in sleeve and make that into raglan sleeve, you end up with a dart where the shoulder seam was. You can sew that dart or eliminate it in the way which is usually used for sportswear, essentially taking away the sleeve head and bringing the sleeve up to almost a right angle to the bodice. Here, I have slashed the raglan pieces and folded the dart closed, creating room for those gathers. I could have added extra length to make the effect more pronounced but I only added a little bit. 

It may not be the most exciting top but I think it will serve me well. 

Well and twisted

This is the last thing I made before going on holiday. I just finished it a few days before I left and it has stayed unblogged since: My new nejiri or twisted top!

The pictures aren't that good. I asked E to quickly take a few snaps when he got home yesterday. He obliged but we were both kind of tired and distracted so the result is eh... less than great.

Anyway, I have made this top, from Pattern Magic - Stretch Fabrics. The design is very similar to the nejiri from the first book (a design which was also intended for stretch fabrics) which I had made years ago. I've explained the differences, and my quest to better understand the design, in this blog post.
Coincidentally, I happened to have a fabric in my stash which looked very similar to what was used in the pictures for the book. A kind of olive-y, brown-y cotton jersey. So, obviously, I used that. 

I started using my own sloper, not the basic pattern from the book and I seem to remember I didn't add quite as much length as the instructions tell you to (I think I left out about 5 cm and also didn't make the bottom band quite as wide). I am slightly taller than the average Japanese woman these designs were created for but I noticed before that I apparently make different style choices when it comes to the length of tops. As it is, the top is still pretty long by my standards but I think the length is needed to make the "stopper" end up in a place on my hips where those are at a fairly even width. 

The looser shape of this top (compared to the previous nejiri) is interesting. In a lot of places, it doesn't show. All of the excess width there is taken up by the twist. But at one side of the bodice, there clearly is some extra ease. 

Oh, and those stoppers? They really work! At least, the one on the bottom does. My old top would start moving back the moment you had put it on with the twist in place. This one seems MUCH more stable. At the armholes and neckline, the bands are not as snug and there is less twisting in those areas. I don't think those stoppers really make a difference.

All in all, it was a fun experiment and it led to a wearable top. I think I will wear it but it doesn't feel completely "me".

The nejiri and the stopper

And now for something completely different! I haven't used the Pattern Magic books in a while, have I? 
Well, I decided it was that time again. This time, I was going for something fairly simple: the nejiri or twist. A design which appears both in Pattern Magic 1 and in Pattern Magic - Stretch Fabrics, all be it with some differences.

I made a nejiri top based on the instructions in the first book way back in 2011. I didn't even blog about it but I did put it on Burdastyle. This is the picture I showed there. I don't have it anymore. The fabric got a bit worn out and I remember finding it annoying that I had to keep adjusting to the top to keep that twist in place. This is something which is hinted at in the book. And in the third book, there is a version of this top in which the issue is addressed: The twisted top with stopper.

This one. 
There are some differences in the drafting instructions (like the amount of horizontal shift and whether or not the armholes get shifted too) but the twist principle is basically exactly the same. The top itself is not quite the same. In the older instructions, the twist is added to a basic sloper (without waist darts, but still), in the newer book, the top itself has straight sides and would, without the twist be loose-fitting. 
I decided to try out the new version as described.

This also gave me a good opportunity to investigate something I have wondered about for a long time: Are the shifts on the front and back pattern pieces the same or mirrored? 
When I made my original top, I followed the instructions given in the book to cut the whole top as one big pattern piece. This meant both front and back curved in the same direction. Later, I saw a blog post by someone else who had made this top but seemed to have mirrored the pieces. 
Now, it was time to try out. Luckily, I had enough fabric to cut three body pieces and those stoppers (which are just bands of fabric). 

These are the pictures of the top with the same pattern piece used for front and back (my apologies for the lighting issues in all the following pictures. I was in a bit of a hurry and didn't check them properly).

The twist looks pretty much like that in the picture in the book (especially if you keep in mind that the "stopper" at the bottom will help to keep that waist twist in shape).
Laid flat, it looks like this:

Do you see the way the seam curves to the front?

And this is the result with a mirrored piece for the back. I somehow thought it might provide more relaxed twisting but I think it may be a bit too relaxed...

It was really hard to get the top on the dummy in such a way that the armholes were more or less at the same level while there is no real twisting at the waist.

Flat on the table, this one looks quite interesting:

This shape might work better in a more fitted garment but I think my test here proves I did understand the instructions all along. The nejiri top can be a bit fussy to wear, but I did make it the way the book intended and I will do that again.
Now, I just have to put on those stoppers!

Stripes and more

It is Saturday and E is back from a three-day trip for work. So, the perfect moment for him to take some pictures of the clothes I've made recently ;)

This is what that striped top looks like when worn.

As I mentioned before, it doesn't allow for a full range of movement but it is nowhere near as confining as the first version. 

And the thing I wasn't sure about? Well that would be those points at the shoulder which came into existence as a result of my decision to graft the big rectangle for the back and sleeves onto the original shoulder seam, keeping the corner where shoulder and armscye met in the front bodice block. I could have made a curve there. In fact, I could still do that but I kind of like the points. Curves at the shoulder would weaken the impact of those stripes. Yes, the point are a bit odd but E said he thought they looked intentional, more of a design feature than a mistake. I think that is good enough for me.
Oh, and it actually nice to wear. 

The other thing, which I made over the past days, is a new pair of slightly cropped trousers.
I love the denim ones which I made last winter and thought it would be nice to have another pair. Slightly longer this time (the length of that pair had been determined by the amount of fabric I had). 
I had a fabric in my stash which I thought would work for it: A cotton (probably blended with something synthetic) in mid-weight satin weave with a sort of floral design woven in (in the texture of the fabric). It is a peculiar fabric. I have made fitted dresses (the most recent one is here, the first one here. They both look better in the pictures than they did in real life) from it before but I never really like the way it behaved in those: the bulk of the fabric makes skirt creases really visible and its stretch (it has a bit of stretch) always meant things had to be taken in.  
The fabric doesn't have a nice hand either so I've never really been tempted to make a skirt from it. Its properties might be good for trousers but there was that floral pattern... I could never imagine trousers that didn't look silly in that. Until this week that is. Somehow, probably because this style is sort of between trousers and culottes, I think I can get away it. 

When it came to cutting out, I made some more alterations than length alone: Instead of a curved waistband just under the natural waist, I now made a straight waistband on it, I made back darts instead of a yoke and changed the the shape of the front pockets from scoop to slant. 
Then, when I had started sewing, I also started second-guessing myself about the fly front. The vast majority of the trousers I sew have a fly front but the combination of this design and this fabric didn't seem right for one. So, put in a side zipper instead and I am glad I did. 

Loose fitting and too short to reach the ankle, I suppose these won't be to everyone's taste but I like them. 
Now, I should really get going on those trousers for E...

Getting creative with stripes

Cotton jersey with stripes... Gotta love it! 
I was given about 4 meters of this fabric as a thank-you for helping with the fashion show at the high school where designer friend M teaches (I'm the person who comes in during the last few lessons before the show to make sure that everything gets finished). They had a whole pile of fabric and notions I could choose from but most were really synthetic and/or stuff I never use anyway. So, I managed to summon some self-control and didn't take more than this to add to my already bulging stash. 

I really like sewing with stripes. Knitted and woven ones. There's just so much interesting stuff you can only really do with a striped fabric! 
Oh, and there are loads of good classic looks which use striped fabric without trying to be clever. In fact, I have a small piece of reddish and dark blue striped jersey in my stash which I have been afraid to cut into because I have too many ideas for it... At least with this stuff, I have enough to test out the different basics and have some pattern-nerdy fun.

This top, my first creation in this fabric, is of the last variety. 

I wanted to make a design which would really showcase those stripes and that made me realize how many things like that I have already done. 
A simple top with the stripes meeting in a chevron shape? So simple and more suitable for a woven fabric. A twist top? Done that. Twice. 
No, I wanted something a bit more experimental, something which would be ALL ABOUT those stripes. And then I thought of some part free form tops I had experimented with way back in 2010. 

The first one started with my idea to make a kind of t-shirt using a popular super-simple shrug pattern for the back and sleeves. The original post is here but it doesn't show the shape that well.

It looked like this. Only with a bit of gathering at center back but I don't like drawing gathers in Illustrator.
It was a fun design but there were some wearability issues. Like just how far the top pulled up with just about any arm movement. I wore it anyway but I also continued with the experimentation. The new-and-improved version abandoned the simple pattern piece shapes to create a top with a more defined version of the same silhouette. That top is here and I even wrote a pattern tutorial for it here. I still have that one. 

This time, I decided to go back to that first design and alter it to suit my stripe-y fabric. Fortunately, my original pattern had survived the two pattern clear-outs I had in the years in between. 
There are more angles in this new design. I kept the original shoulder line of the front bodice sloper and simply sewed the rectangle of the upper back/sleeves around it. I didn't keep the original side edges of the front bodice but brought those a bit to the front. With a square corner at the waistline. For freedom of movement, I cut the back/sleeves with some extra length and made the sleeve openings not on the sleeve seam but by folding and sewing the sleeves and then cutting their corners to create openings. Oh, and I cut the lower back in one with the front bodice. Just to make sure there would be interesting things going on with those stripes everywhere in this top. 

Of course, this top is not quite as easy to wear as a normal t-shirt either. And there is at least one feature I'm not 100% sure about (which you can only see when it is worn) but I really enjoyed doing this kind of random fun-with-patterns kind of thing again. 
I will ask E to take some pictures of me wearing this (and maybe even some next thing too) in the coming weekend, so you'll be able see how it works on a person. 

eh.... 1950's!

May I present my first finished item for the 2016 Vintage Sewing Pattern Pledge? It is not an exciting project by any stretch of the imagination but I think it is something I will wear a lot. 

The pattern comes from a German magazine called Beyer's Junge Mode (the "young fashion" edition of Beyer's Mode) from 1956. For me, there is a clear advantage to sewing from a "young fashion" special. More choice of patterns in my size!
The sizing in German magazines was/is very similar to that in Dutch ones which means the information from the previous post also applies here. As far as Beyer is concerned, I have the smallest of women's sizes. So, that size gets a lot more attention in a magazine which targets an audience under the age of 25... 
This particular magazine includes patterns for bust sizes 84 to 96.

What did I make?

Well, I loved this simple top from the first time I opened the magazine. A simple jersey top with a V-neck at front and back. And in my size! 
I was a bit worried about the jersey though. I always get the impression that vintage jersey was completely different from the modern version. A lot less stretchy, for one. And probably less inclined to be bulky either...
After a bit of stash diving, I found the dark brown cotton pique which I had used to make trousers for climbing before. Fairly thin but strong and not very stretchy AND a super-wide and knitted in the round which made the fabric lay-out for a top only two parts which both had to be cut on the fold a lot less awkward. It is not the most interesting of materials but this was very much a test so that didn't really matter.

I didn't make any alterations to the pattern, I just cut about 4 to 5 cm hem allowance because it seemed quite short. When I started sewing it, I stitched the bust darts at an easy-to-remove long stitch length first because I was fairly sure they would be too high for me. At a first fitting, they looked just fine so I stitched them properly. 
If I understand the instructions correctly, you are supposed to face the neckline and then stitch down the facing. Which is what I did.

It is a rather loose-fitting top, clearly intended only to be worn tucked-in. I actually have the largest size the pattern was made for and I took the body seams in by 1 cm at each side (not the sleeves or the curve to the sleeves though). This only confirms my suspicion about period jersey...
I have plenty of high-waisted skirts and even some trousers so I think I can put a top like this to good use.

Pattern development

Last week, I made yet another piece of sportswear. Another climbing top to be precise. 
I had hoped to illustrate it with some nice action pictures (like last time) but we had a change of plans today so we didn't go to the climbing hall after all. Hopefully, I'll get another chance in the coming week. 

I have written about the issues of Y-back sports tops and climbing (and other sports which lead to muscle development in the upper body) before so it will come as no surprise that I decided to stick with a design with shoulder straps (even though I should really order some bra sliders to make those straps actually adjustable). Those give more freedom of movement and are easier to change if I need more length at the shoulder in a few months.
This type of design would probably not provide enough bust support for sports like running but, as a climber, I don't have to factor in repeated bouncing so it is fine. 

On the topic of bust support, I did decide to try and incorporate a shelf bra in this top. My first one. I basically just made lining pieces for the top front and back of the garment. I made those pattern pieces the same size as those for the outside but cut them entirely from the least stretchy lycra I am using for this top. At the bottom of the "bra" there is a piece of wide, soft elastic.

Other changes to the design were basically just cosmetic. Instead of the old wide scoop neck, I now made a V. Slightly lower in the middle, higher above each breast. Nicely finishing a V in materials like this is a bit tricky but I think I really like the look. 

I also really wanted to improve on that arrow shape on the back. The earlier version didn't quite work and I think it could be such a fun design feature for a climbing top. This time, I made a seam between the tip and the shaft of the arrow so those could be at a right angle, making it look more arrow-like than the curved edge top the previous top. I also make the center back section higher and introduced side back pieces so the tip of the arrow could end lower than the edge of the top. 

The other design lines were basically drawn to accommodate for those. With an added bonus: I could remove the upper side seam! Of course construction would have been easier if I had not done that and in the future, I may curve those pieces at the bottom. Sewing corners in lycra is not the best idea.  

The material I used for the shelf bra, the bust pieces and the arrow is quite interesting. It may look dark grey in these pictures but it is actually a soft black mesh over a silvery background (which you can see in the picture of the back inside). If it catches the light in a certain way, it really reflects it. The black and the brown/red are materials I used for sports tops before. 

I'm looking forward to really putting it to the test. I'm trying to develop a design which works well for me but which would also work for others. First of all for a friend I often climb with. Of course, there would always have to be changes for body shape and personal taste but if I can get a full enough understanding of all the functional details and how they relate to this sport and the kind of bodies it creates, that would be great.
On that topic, I have also been wondering about fabrics. So far, I have been using lycra-ish materials. Especially the blue and the mesh-and-silver stuff are fairly thick and really intended for sportswear rather than lingerie or swimsuits. RTW tops all seem to be made from a more beefy fabric though. A nylon-spandex blend, according to the one legible tag I found. That stuff is matte and softer to the touch. 
So far, I have just bought fabrics I came across which seemed appropriate but I may have to look up Melissa's where-to-buy list for sportswear fabrics. 

Simple drape-neck top...

... not to be confused with other tutorials for tops with draped details which I have made in the past. This one is for the pattern for this top:

The pattern is easy to make based on a tried-and-tested t-shirt pattern and it's easy to sew as well. Easier that a proper cowl-neck even.

You start out, obviously, with the bodice pieces of your pattern. If your t-shirt block has bust darts, it can be easy in this case to rotate them to center front.

Draw in the new neckline. I made it about 2 cm wider at the neck (starting from a high, close fitting neckline) and made a long, narrow deep scoop to about 10 cm above the waistline. This goes through the bust point and should include any bust darts there may have been. Draw a new back neckline to match the front one at the shoulder seam. Only lower its point at the center back line as much as you need to make a nice curve (no more than about 0.5 to 1 cm).

Measure your new neckline and use the measurement to draft the drape piece. It's easiest to just draw a horizontal line first, in the middle of the paper, of the length you measured. Then, draw the center front and center back lines at 90 degrees from that line (only draw one side). Mine are 24 and 8 cm respectively. Draw a gentle curve between them as shown. 

Now, measure along the curve and adjust the beginning and end of the piece so the curved line has the length required for the neckline of your top. Add seam allowance if you like, fold the paper along the horizontal line and cut the drape piece out through both layers. You should end up with a pattern piece which looks like the one in my drawing. 

When cutting fabric, both the bodice pieces and the center front of the drape piece should be cut on the fold. 

When sewing, start with the shoulder seams of the bodice pieces and the center back of the drape piece. Then, fold the drape piece double with the wrong sides facing each other and insert it into the neckline, treating it as one layer. Because the result drape neckline is smaller than the seam line, the stitching won't easily be exposed. 

Of course, you can make lots of variations by changing the size and placement of that draped neckline. Or you could put the fullest part of the drape somewhere else than at center front. Or you could also insert a piece like a dickey into the neckline, keeping the top even more fitted and eliminating the need to wear something under it.  

And although this is a design for jersey fabrics, there is no real reason why it couldn't be made in a woven. It would just require quite a bit more messing around with darts and you should cut the drape piece on the bias...

I hope you like this tutorial and everything is clear. Don't hesitate to ask questions, just make sure I can reach you to give an answer (if your blog or email address in your profile or comment, I'll use that. If it isn't, I can only answer here in the comments so make sure you check. Or email me instead, the  address is at the top right of this page) And as usual, I'd love to see your results!