A simple silk jacket and pants - Vogue 8089 completed

The holidays are getting nearer and I am crossing things off my "must sew, need to sew, want to sew" list. This one was a must, as the lovely Anne was flying off to Seattle for long holiday visit so I was able to finish it prior to departure. She is the one who chose all these beautiful and interesting fabrics that I have been making my way through.
The embroidered silk organza was a fabric I have never worked with before. While sewing I was imagining using this for the very full overskirt on a vintage style party dress, wouldn't that be pretty? Luckily she had already decided on something a bit more practical, although maybe only a little more!

Here is the finished jacket, it is Vogue 8089 with quite a few adjustments for fit which you can read about in the previous post . As I wrote in that post, for a very simple style it had a suprisingly large number of adjustments and I think if I were a beginner I would have been very frustrated.

In person I think this looks a lot better, you see the shimmery quality of the embroidery threads and the paisley pattern on the silk.

   

One thing I do like about this pattern is the neck band, the front pieces are cut on the straight of grain but the back neck piece is cut on the bias, so it fits nicely and hugs the neckline perfectly. Clever!

I also made pants from a matching grey silk charmeuse. Just a straight leg pull on pant with an elastic waist. The pants are pinned on my dress form, over a simple black tee shirt just to show the outfit but Anne has a purple sleeveless top she will wear over the pants and it complemented the other colors well. Looking at this photo I can see a few wrinkles. Charmeuse is maddening, sometimes I seem to accidentally press in few extra creases when I am trying to take them out. 

The pants are simple and so not much to tell about, I used this old Butterick pattern which is one of my favorites (I have made this dress maybe 4 times) made the pants full length and fully lined them with Ambiance rayon. Whenever I make pull-on or elastic waist pants I put some stitching in a contrast color in the back so I know which is which.  Kind of silly but who wants to put their clothes on backwards, no matter what age? (I even mark some of my turtlenecks...maybe this is my issue, backwards dressing.)

       
Here is a closer look at the jacket fabric. I did french seams throughout and since this fabric pressed like a dream they were very little extra work. You can really see the purple embroidery thread accent here.

Anne has an eye for fabric (as I have already documented) but she is happy to have me sew up her garments. When she came to pick up her silk outfit she brought the fantastic project that she had been working on and I had to take a photo since the color complemented this blog post so well. It is a Hawaiian style quilt for her daughter and son-in-law.  (another one of my not so great photos). The border is muted blue-grey batik. So pretty, I love Hawaiian style quilts, in fact I bought a pattern book on my last trip. Haven't made anything yet although perhaps I should start small, with a pillow :)

Happy pre-holiday mad rush sewing,  

Beth

A simple silk jacket and pants - Vogue 8089, part 1: Lots of Fitting Details

Based on the comments and feedback this past year there is endless interest in information on fitting. I agree and voraciously read any blog post where the writer discuses their fitting issues, changes made to the pattern, etc. I promised to do more posts about the fitting details and when I was making this "simple" jacket I realized that for a style with a basic shape and relatively few pattern pieces I had made a lot of changes for fit.
Vogue pattern 8089 is out of print but I see it pop up on blogs and Pattern Review once in a while so I think a lot of people have it in a drawer somewhere. It has a lot of potential, style-wise and could be made into a lingerie piece, a lightweight linen wrap style, or even a lined and quilted version. I was making this for my sewing client who brought me these beautiful silks, an embroidered organza for the jacket and silk charmeuse for the pants.

The pattern envelope and the technical drawing.

   

You can see from that drawing that the shape is really boxy and calls for 1/2" shoulder pads which I omitted. My quick verdict on this pattern:  it turns out well but needs more adjustment than I expected.

Ready for some details? Sandra Betzina for Vogue patterns have her own sizing system so I made a muslin based on the wearer's measurements (High B 36" B35" W 30.5" H 38.5") using the pattern size C. Which is virtually an exact match for her so you would think that would turn out well, right? Nope. I have made 3 of these Vogue Today's Fit patterns and had a lot of adjusting on each of them but I can't say that they have any one issue, there were different issues on all of them.

This photo is not the greatest as I was taking the pins out of this muslin before tossing it in the trash and then realized that it would be a good visual. The most glaring adjustment is that big vertical pleat down the jacket front. I had pinned that out on the body and then I mark where my pins are using a Sharpie marker or pencil. You can see it is a bit wonky, not the same amount pleated out from top to bottom but that is OK, I just pin it and mark, then deal with it later on the flat pattern piece.  I put some blue pieces of paper at the top to indicate where I added at the shoulder, even though the wearer is about 5'3" she has a longish torso, in particular the upper section, which I dealt with before I even made this muslin and will show the detail in the next photo.

Another big change on this pattern which unfortunately is difficult to see in the photo above, I reduced the width of the neck/front band by about 1.25 inches. As designed it is really wide, almost 3 inches and looks very odd. Final band is about 1.75" and proportionally looks better. 

• Lowered bust by 1" (horizontal 1" addition both front and back)
• Reduce width of front pattern piece, about 1.5" (vertical tuck front).  Note what that does to the shoulder seam.
• Reduce width of back pattern piece to match front, vertical tuck.  Also affects shoulder seam on back.
• Build shoulder seam back up on both front and back to make up for the vertical tucks.
• Add another .5" height on front shoulder seam based on muslin fitting.
• Armhole adjustment.  See the original shape of the armhole. I think any pattern where the front armhole has that very sharp curve is problemmatic, and on most people causes it to feel very tight across the chest or even the arms. If you make a top/dress/jacket with sleeves and it seems to fit but feels like your armhole is strangling you, take a look at the pattern and see if the angle of the armhole is as this original shown above. If you make that addition it will give you a lot more room and be more comfortable. If you do that then what about the sleeve? You can baste in the sleeve to test and then either adjust the ease a bit or possibly remove a bit at the underseam.

The last fit issue on this jacket was the fit around the chest/back and upper sleeve. It was strangely tight and uncomfortable despite fitting well around the bust. I blame this on the design of the armhole and the sleeve which is a one-piece sleeve that was cut very straight and not likely to fit the anatomy of a real arm. After I adjusted the armhole I knew that the sleeve piece would be even more of a problem so my new go-to jacket pattern (Vogue 7975, my faux French jacket)  came to the rescue. I had the sleeve from the muslin sitting on my desk so I made the jacket body muslin, basted on the sleeve muslin from the V7975 and viola! a very nice fit.  I did measure the jacket armhole and the circumference of the finished V7975 sleeve to see if they were a good match and they were, the sleeve was about 1" larger in circumference which is great.  Below is the original sleeve on top of the V7975 2-piece sleeve so you can see the design differences. There is more room at the top of the 2-piece sleeve as well as more width at the bicep.



The last adjustment was to add a little bit of a gusset to the underarm to add a bit more mobility, comfort and reduce the strain on this sheer fabric. If you look at the front and back pattern pieces above you can see there is a small triangle wedge added at the top of the side seam both front and back. I added .5" tapering to zero about 3" down. Correspondingly, I split the under sleeve at the center dot, added 1" in width and tapered that to zero at the wrist. It really doesn't make the sleeve much bigger below the elbow but adds a the needed bit of space at the underarm.  In total there is a 1" wide diamond of extra fabric under the arm which disappears when the arm is down but just adds to the ease and keeps this sheer and delicate fabric from ripping when you reach for something. You see this feature on a lot of vintage patterns, often it is a sewn on gusset but for a small addition you can use this method. Note tt does not make up for a sleeve that is too tight across the bicep - for that you need to slash and spread the actual sleeve piece.

To test out all these adjustments before I cut into that pricey silk I made a final (hopefully) muslin using some garage-sale find fabric that was very similar weight. (unusable for anything else despite the pretty color due to fade marks). Look at that lovely arm-shaped sleeve :)  Good thing I made this version as the sleeves needed a good 2 inches in length and I would not have been happy had I cut them out too short!

So it is all finished in time for holiday wearing. Here is a  tiny sneak peek of the finished jacket. I did french seams throughout (what else could be done with this sheer fabric?) but due to it's crispy organza deliciousness they were the easiest french seams I have ever done.

I hope these pattern fitting details are helpful and I will try to do more with my next projects. I think it's time for something fun and casual, I need a quick and easy result. Although I saw this post recently and now I want some plaid wool shorts too!

Happy pre-holiday sewing,  Beth

A very very holiday refashion - Yes Virginia, you can remove those gigantic shoulder pads

Lurking in the back of my closet are a few more refashion possibilities and since December is here this one seemed the best candidate for a quick update. While I don't recall making this specifically as a holiday item, could this be any more aggressively Christmas-y? I think it was Pendleton wool and probably sewn by me in the 90's based on the pattern and the humongous shoulder pads.

It does not pay to dwell on our fashion choices from a previous decade! Perhaps if this had aged gracefully for 40 or 50 years it would become delightfully vintage, but looking at it today all I see is old-man golfer or stereotype country club character from a movie. Also I buttoned it a bit wonky on the form but indeed the plaids do match across the front and all the way around. I had started to take the sleeves off as you might be able to see on the left, then remembered to take this picture.

I started playing around with the proportions and pinned up the hem plus extracted those gigantic shoulder pads and it was looking better already. I removed both sleeves and reduced the top shoulder seam from zero at the neck to about 3/4 inch off the front and back at the outside. That is a big reduction! It was interesting to open up something I had made a while ago, I had done a lot of hand stitching plus taping the lapel and collar roll line. Check out that crease in the collar, and I will bet you will find that on the pattern pieces the roll line is marked. Thank you, Vogue patterns in 1990-something! And why don't you do that anymore??? The result was a lovely turn of the collar and a perfect fit around the neckline.

Because I keep everything...well not everything but a lot of patterns, here is the pattern envelope. Which I found after a very short search (amazing, that I found it.  Why can't I find the lining which I just bought last week? chalk it up to the mystery of the fabric closet) And why it has a stamp from a bank is another mystery.

To refashion this jacket I decided to "harvest" the fabric from the sleeves and add a peplum detail in the back, and then update the look with contrast sleeves. I am not entirely sure it is successful but I do like the back detail. I have that other jacket with the contrast sleeves which is one of my most popular makes, blogged here, so I thought it might work. The fabric for the sleeves is bengaline  - at least that is what the label said. Not a fabric I am familiar with. I cut the sleeves on the cross-grain as the stretch is vertical on that fabric, not horizontal (selvedge to selvedge) as is typical. 

To tell the truth it was a bit tight across the hips, so the gathered detail is a trendy way to make a bit more room over the backside. Sneaky huh? Also I like the look of bias plaid and then I didn't have to match that section to the side seams.

A look at the insides, I had used armo-weft fusible on the front, knit fusible around the welt pocket and on the upper lapel. I reused the sleeve heads in the new sleeves. The lining was completely removed to do these changes so it was certainly fun to have a fully complete lining to pick up and sew back in, with a slight adjustment in the center back to accomodate the gathered section.



Since it is now December I figured it was time to start wearing this jacket which will have a very short shelf life (and I went to a holiday lunch today). So here it is, a side view so you can see the back detail.

And what is that in my hand? A tulip bulb, which I found right there on the retaining wall. Just recently planted by me and then dug up by the evil masterminds also known as squirrels. My nemesis. Nemeses? because they run around in a pack. Curse you, squirrels. Why am I smiling? because I have devised a plan to thwart them, to be revealed...



Happy Holiday sewing, Beth

P.S. If the title of this blog post is confusing to any readers, perhaps those outside of the US, I will direct you to this Wikipedia entry which explains the origin of the phrase "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus" and then hope you will excuse me for twisting that sentence into a blog post title.

Fabric choices and a Tunic style Renfrew

Do you think some people have an extra-special talent for choosing fabrics? I do. We all have those garments where pattern, style and fabric are a marriage made in heaven. Sadly we also suffer through the opposite were the fabric is fighting us all the way and the end result shows it. A trip around the sewing blogisphere shows so many creative uses of interesting fabrics. I find lots of inspiration and occasionally a desire to copy outright.
Do you start with the fabric or the pattern? For me it mostly starts with the pattern, I am more attracted to shapes and techniques and then I find the fabric in the color family that I like.
Currently I am making a few garments for someone who had already purchased the fabric and her choices got me thinking about it. This is unusual as most often I work with a sewing client from the beginning to choose both the style and the fabric. In this case I think she has a real eye for choosing interesting and beautiful fabrics and the results have been a good stretch for my creativity.

She wanted a top made from a textured sweater knit and described a "drapey turtleneck type top". Which made me laugh a bit because I had been so wanting to get the Sewaholic Renfrew top pattern and that is why I made a few test versions last month before cutting into her lovely fabrics. By the way, all her fabrics were purchased at Stone Mountain in Berkeley.
Here is her Renfrew top, which I lengthened to be more of a tunic as she requested.
First a close up of this interesting fabric, very Missoni-like don't you think?

A few sewing details. I put a strip of knit fusible interfacing along the hems and then turned up about one inch and stitched. I lengthened the top about 5 inches? something like that, as much as the yardage would allow. I sewed this on the standard sewing maching, straight stitch and then after it was put together I serged the seam allowances. I don't like to serge things before they are sewn together, I think it distorts the pieces. 

The item that I sewed first from her stack of fabrics was this dress made of silk duppioni. I have kind of a love-hate relationship with silk duppioni fabric, the colors are fantastic, it does press beautifully but the dress/design needs to fit perfectly and the pattern needs to be a good one as there is no fudging the seams or easing sections like you can with a nice malleable wool. 

This plaid fabric really scared me, I was actually kind of shocked when she pulled it out of the bag and said she wanted a dress. I think this looks much better as worn rather than on the dress form, the warm bronze and coral colors give the wearer a golden glow and it is very pretty. 

Some sewing details, I used New Look 6643 which is my favorite basic sheath dress pattern. I made a muslin for fit, ended up lowering all the darts by about 3/4" and then made full pattern pieces (both sides of the front and back) so I could lay the full pattern pieces on the single layer of fabric and hopefully match the plaids everywhere. One thing to note when making a dress with plaid, if you have bust darts at that side seam, you must match below the dart. I recall I jumper I made in junior high where I carefully matched at the top of the side seam and then cried when I sewed it up and saw my mistake. Good learning lesson!

             

My last interesting project for her will be a 3-piece outfit (if yardage allows). The sheer embroidered silk will be a floaty jacket and the silk charmeuse will be a pajama style pant and sleeveless tank.
I plan to line the pants and tank with bemberg rayon. It is interesting how the design on the sheer fabric shows more when contrasted with the darker grey silk.

Here is the pattern I am using for the jacket. I like the style of this but the pattern has turned out to be very problematic but I have finally succeded in making a muslin that fits nicely. So this weekend will be all about sewing silk.

In garden news I impulsively bought bags of daffodils and tulips the other day - I cannot resist the colors on the packages - so those will need to be stuck in the ground. Then I will be on squirrel watch. Last year I read that the brown papery layer on tulip bulbs are like potato chips for squirrels and they find them irresistible. Nature, a constant battle even in suburbia.

Happy weekend sewing,  Beth

Sewing book Giveaway Results

Here are the winners of the sewing book giveaways:

First random draw is comment # 15, that is Carol S

 

Second random draw is comment # 30, that is Shar



So if you would email me and I will get your sewing books in the mail next week.
sunnygalstudio (at) gmail (dot) com.

I will keep on the lookout for more of these Singer books and I suggest you check your local library system. Search "sewing" in the catalog and you will be quite amazed at how many they have. My county library system is very good and I put an on-line request whenever I see a new book that seems interesting, have it transfered to the hold shelf at my local branch and pick it up at my convenience.  Use those local libraries so governments will know we treasure them!  Confession I checked out the BurdaStyle book 3 times - remember this coat I made last year?

Also a quick search on Etsy (search words: Singer sewing book) yields a few of this series as well as quite a few vintage books.  You can tell the books in this Singer series that I am referring to, they all have the same style cover, a photo superimposed with Singer in red and the title in white letters. There are a few copies available of "Sewing for the Home" and I can't tell you how many times I have referred to that one. It shows all the variations on decorative pillows, window coverings and comforters/bedspreads etc.

Thanks for all your great comments on my black tweedy plaid jacket and you have motivated me to do more process and technique posts in the upcoming months. 

happy sewing, Beth

Time for a Giveaway: in Autumn we turn to Tailoring

There are a lot of good sewing books out there but my favorite is the series of Singer Sewing Reference books. They have clear explanations and great photos to illustrate any technique. I have a couple that I bought ages ago in a bookstore but over the years I have found many of them at estate and ASG stash sales. If you see one, buy it!
Topics include Knits, Pants that Fit, Home Dec, Time-Saving tips, Formalwear, and my favorite, Tailoring.  I see they are available on Amazon (search Singer sewing reference library). Books with illustrations (only) just don't do it for me, the way this series photographs the works in process and also shows many alternative methods is really key to my understanding a technique.
I am always on the lookout for these books and this week found one that I already have in my library, so how about a giveaway?

The title is a bit misleading because it mostly about technique and construction, and covers a lot of tailoring as well. I don't know how they cram so much into a relatively thin paperback. They include pockets (all kinds), facings, creating a lining, lapels, shoulder shaping, shirt collars etc.

Example of page from the book: how to sew a shirt collar with a stand. That looks a whole lot more comprehensible than the instruction sheet in a pattern. 

Second find for the giveaway and now I will contradict myself! These Palmer and Pletsch paperbacks are only illustrated, no photos but they are good. Very clear. If you are a beginning to intermediate sewist I suggest reading this like a novel - run through the whole book and just let it sink in. Perhaps these P & P books are the graphic novel for the sewing set. Lots of good tailoring info and they include tips on fitting, fusibles and timesaving techniques. 

So leave a comment if you would like to be in the drawing for one of these books (random drawing, first name gets first book, second name gets second book.)  International is OK. 

If you are a member of Pattern Review and you liked my Faux French Jacket, I entered it in their Lined Jacket Contest. The voting is now open until the 9th so click over there and vote for me today :). Despite thinking it was an item that would have limited usefulness, I have worn this jacket so many times in the last week and really love it. So all that fringe-making and hand stitching was worth it!

As for my previous post on the potential refashions, thank you for lots of great suggestions and I will report back in an upcoming post. Not sure when I will get to them as I suddenly have quite a sewing to-do list plus I feel like re-organizing my sewing space....eeek.

Beth

Edit:  drawing closed now (11/9, 10:30am Calif. time).  I just did the random number picks and will be posting later this afternoon. 

Struck with a passion for refashion and I need some suggestions

Merci beaucoup for all the great comments on my faux french jacket. I wore it today when took a shopping trip over to Stone Mountain in hopes of finding something to make a top but didn't see anything that grabbed me. I am about to start on a similar jacket for a sewing client using the same pattern but the look will be very different, more on that soon.

Recently I got together with my neighborhood friends for a clothing swap. Great way to clean out the closet of some no longer worn items and maybe get something new. Of course I intended to come away with nothing but more space in my closet but instead I got 3 pairs of pants, including some black jeans. Yeah! No shopping or trying on in stores, just a fun get together (drinks involved and lots of encouragement). In preparation for swapping I did a closet clean out and came across some items that I never wear but seem like they might be good candidates for some refashioning. So I am looking for suggestions, please chime in.
First up is this suit I made about 9 years ago, pattern date is 2004. Dates back to my former life of tedious meetings negotiating with ambitious people all trying to outsmart each other. Yikes, could it be any more serious?
Business executive nun?  Tweedy schoolmarm or librarian? (no offense to any of these lovely vocations). What was I thinking? Although I didn't run around with the jacket all buttoned up like that of course. Wore it with a silk top, nice heels etc. I don't like black but this fabric tempted me to try it.

                                        
Separately the pieces have potential. I played around with the skirt and I think that changed into a pencil skirt instead of the A-line I would wear it this winter. It even has a hidden inside pocket at the waist for my mad money and business cards. Prepared, just like a boy scout! Looking at the technical drawing I can see why this jacket fits so well, it avoids the issue I often have of too wide across the top with the front shoulder and back neckline darts. Also I see that I used a size 10 instead of a 12 so I am definitely going to try that on my next Vogue and save some narrow shoulder alteration. A very nice shape I might revisit. It's the little puny collar that bugs me.  What about lopping that off and changing it to a V-neckline? or some other kind of collar.  Ideas welcome.

            

Item # 2:  faux fur coat in deep emerald green.  Yes this one is a bit wacky but I have worn it enough to justify making this - maybe 17 years ago?  OK, now you can see that I keep almost everything I make (at least in the coat or jacket category, I do let go some dresses/skirts etc that are past their prime)

It is a very nice quality of faux fur, despite the color, which actually looks near black at night. The big shawl collar is so cosy. Just imagine wearing for a long car ride home from a party on a late winter night - like having a blanket to snuggle into. Having other coats now I never wear this but hate to part with it. What about a long tunic type vest, maybe with a soft black leather belt for a closure?  Suggestions please!

Item # 3:  men's cashmere overcoat. This one is quite a find. My sister called me one Saturday morning, she was at the local thrift store which was having a 50% off everything sale. She is quite the one for finding expensive handbags among the array of worn out vinyl or cloth bags. So she said, do you want a men's cashmere coat for $ 20? Her words were "I think you can make something with this...maybe for me"  After my initial confusion as to what it was I said yes, absolutely, buy it! I figured it would be in a sorry state but this is what brought home. It seems to have been never worn, or so we thought until we found $ 5 and change in the pockets. But believe me I have lived here all my life and do not know any men who wear overcoats  - it is just not cold enough for that here. The label is Dillards which I believe is in Texas? or somewhere back east. It is labeled 100% cashmere and very luscious. There are few seams which means lots of fabric but do I dare cut it up?  So I am very much wanting to refashion it into some type of jacket for my sister but still giving it thought and welcome yours.

Those are my potential refashion projects, the second and third are quite daunting and would take a lot of commitment.  If you have any ideas or style suggestions please leave a comment and let me know your thoughts.

Happy weekend sewing and enjoy the extra hour of sleep,  Beth