Surprise Sewing Bee- update on week one

As reported, the first assignment for the PatternReview.com Surprise Sewing Bee contest is an a line skirt, with waistband, and lining.   It's been a while since I looked good in an a line skirt with a waistband, with or without lining, so I haven't bought that kind of pattern recently, but I managed to find a pattern in my stash, a simple a line with waistband from about 1965.

I also found this image from this years runways:

This looks possibly bias cut, but, with a jacket, boots, sweater hiding the results of wearing a waistband, this may be workable.  The length is nice.   I also found ones with pockets - this one is from Top Shop-which is a great idea:

So I set out with a plan.  A simple a line midi skirt with pockets.   In my stash is a gored skirt pattern with pockets.  Interesting pockets: 

The skirt in the background looks amazingly similar to the Top Shop runway skirt.  This one is from the forties.  But a gored skirt is not an a line skirt and, though it would be more flattering, I'm sticking with the rules.   If I, like these women on the package, had a waist as slim as my neck, it wouldn't matter at all.

So here is the combined pattern plan:

1960s a line skirt

 With a little bit of 1940s for pockets

Which will result, I hope, in something that looks 2014ish.


For fabric, I considered those for which I also had something that could serve as a lining, since I'm trying to limit myself to my stash and not make additional purchases for this contest. 

Two possibilities: a taupey gabardine and a beigy wool crepe or

 A silk boucle that I've had forever, because I can't decide if it looks like a rag or beautiful.  It is a fabric that would look best constructed, but is soft and flexible, so needs a lining.  So why not?

I think of this color as ballerina color.  It goes with lots of neutrals.  I'm trying to visualize a large triangular panel of it from waist to mid calf.

For lining, I am using a leftover piece of very odd silk crepe, from which I made a tee shirt.   You can see it in  this blog under the Two Piece Pattern entry.   Because the boucle is, well, bumpy since it's boucle, I'm also using the silk for the pocket.

I decided to  cut and baste together the lining first and use it to fit the skirt, since I have no idea what type of alterations I would need for a waistband a line skirt.  I added about two inches to the length to make it a midi.

 I also cut the pocket from the silk. Because I'm so impressed with the preservation of this pattern by whoever owned it previously, I did not pin but weighted it, to keep it in its pristine condition.

 After basting the lining together, I decided to add almost an inch to the outer sides of the pattern pieces, to have something to work with for fitting and because, with pockets, I need all of my seam allowance and can't cheat by sizing up by decreasing them.

I actually checked in with Vogue Sewing Book of Fitting, Adjustments and Alterations while eating fettucine for lunch, to see how to size up the pattern of an a line.  I suppose the fettucine may explain part of the waistband problem.

After lunch, I laid out the boucle, ironing it first because the Vogue says the grain is vital to an a line and this is a droopy kind of fabric.  Uh oh.

I sized it up and lengthened it as instructed by Vogue. 

All cut marked and ready to go.  Now all I need is time, this week, to actually construct it. 

Two Piece Pattern: Vogue 2129

This Vogue Designer Original out of print pattern was designed by  Tom and Linda Platt.  I bought it on Ebay.

 I liked the pattern  because the silk tee shirt seems to have good proportions, a little bit dressy, with interesting  sleeves.  The pattern includes a dropped shoulder simple wrapped jacket that could be made out of very light silky fabric - potentially useful.  The dress and skirt look well-designed. The model looks very classy in the photos on the envelope.  So far, so promising.

You immediately are aware, if you're at least my age, that the design of this pattern falls several years after  80s shoulder pads, and heading out of the shapeless with leggings era.

Turns out, the pattern is very simple.  In fact, the garments are mostly made out of two three pattern pieces:   

The sleeves of the shirt are simply built into the shirt itself, like kimono sleeves, but narrow, with a pointed top.No darts.  The back can be cut in two pieces with a zipper, but there's no reason to.   I decided to make it one piece, but split the top back for egress.  So the top is simply a two piece pattern, front and back.  I bound the back split along with the rest of the neckline  and sleeve edges with a bright complementary bias tape for a little glimpse of color.

Here is the sleeve  shape.

The first time I used the pattern, I made a silk tee shirt out of some very odd silk I also bought on Ebay some time ago.

Just two seams, with bias tape binding at neck, sleeve edges, and three inch opening in the back, topped with a hook and eye. It takes about as long to sew as it does to cut the pattern.

This was fun, so the next time I made the two piece pattern from a rayon jersey knit.  I altered the pattern by extending the sleeves, tracing the lower sleeve from the dress part of the pattern.  There was no need for the back slit with stretchy fabric.  Instead of the inside bias tape, I used vintage rayon seam binding and did an outside trim finish.  So this one was two pieces of fabric, three seams, hems and a binding.

This turned out just fine.
Vintage Wrights rayon seam binding is one of my favorite notions, when I can find it.  

It comes in many sophisticated colors, is very soft and flexible, completely washable, and beautiful.  It looks like taffeta ribbon trim.

I'm happy with the knit shirt.  The neck and sleeve interest adds some style to a plain tee.

Next time out with this pattern, I made the three piece jacket.  This was also easy as pie.  The sleeves are not eased.  The neck and front edges are finished with bias tape.  The sleeves and hem are finished with a narrow machine hem.

It's hard to tell from the pattern picture, but the jacket comes in two lengths.  I made the shorter one - the red one on the pattern envelope.

This was made from a paisley (LOVE paisley) silk from Joanne Fabrics that I watched over a few months get marked down and marked down until I had to buy it.  The woman at the cutting counter called it "scarf silk" and told me most people bought a small cut to make a scarf.

 

I also made the tie belt, but think it's too much pattern.  I prefer the skinny leather belt.  I think I'm just not girly enough for the bow with the paisley, though it looks good on the dress form.

A third way to wear it closed is with a little magnet/button that I bought in a boutique.  It is a high quality gold button with a magnet back.  An additional bar with the opposing magnet secures the button wherever you want it.  This is great for this kind of thing, or anything without buttons that you might want to close once in awhile.

Here it is on the jacket.  With this button, you can close it loosely, like a brooch on a scarf, but no holes and less droopy because of the support of the bar.

The bias tape finish shows when you wear it open, sometimes, as the fabric swings, but that's okay because it is merely a black line.  I think, if I did this again, I'd look for something a little softer - maybe even try to use the vintage rayon seam tape.

I think the jacket  looks best open, with a belt under it.  That way it is scarf-like and not at all bulky, because so flowy and thin.

 Next time, I'm going to make the tee shirt out of a lighter silk like this, with the short pointed sleeves.
But first I'm going to tackle another vintage Vogue Designer Original  a little more challenging.  Vogue 1839 by Oscar De la Renta

 Stay tuned.

Surprise Sewing Bee - patternreview.com

I have endless fabric, notions, patterns, of all kinds from all eras, but little time to shop.  So this contest, which promises to rely on things you will most likely already have stashed, is perfect and promises great fun.

 I'm starting the contest with this skirt from Vintage Simplicity 8503, circa about 1965.

When the pattern requirements for the first part of the contest were announced, I was certain I had nothing that fit the description: Aline lined skirt with a waistband. But after looking again, I saw lurking in the back of this coat pattern, a woman sporting an aline with waistband - just in case you want to match your skirt to the reverse of your coat.

Aline skirt with waistband, to me,  brings back memories of Villager clothing, matching cotton blouses with tucks and skirts with waistbands, in liberty type prints.  I had a school friend in  the late sixties whose mother outfitted her this way.   My  pattern shows a tweedier, older, wiser, Mrs. Robinson type of crowd, off for a martini at the club, a cigarette, and a hand of bridge.

 This pattern hails from when they changed the sizing of patterns.  A size 12 is now a 34 bust and the pattern costs 85 cents.
I haven't made the coat yet because I need to find a tutorial on adding inseam pockets to a reversible coat.  If someone knows of one, let me know.

Updated Kilt -McCalls 2302 OOP

      

 I’ve had a black and white border print in my fabric stash for years.  It’s cotton with a little bit of lycra stretch.   I bought it somewhere online.

I originally thought to make a border print dress but the repeat is huge and, I soon realized, with the border at the bottom of a garment sized piece,  the design is sideways. 

It therefore stayed in the stash until the other day.   I was looking through The Complete Book of Sewing, Greystone Publishing, 1967, which I bought at a library sale. 

I saw this picture and thought  a skirt with a straight wrap edge, like a kilt, would use the side border of the fabric pretty well.  By the way, isn't that Susan Dey, of the Partridge Family and L.A. Law?

The only new wrap skirts patterns I could find didn’t have a straight edge.  The only actual kilts were for men.  So I searched ebay sewing patterns for “kilt,” and came up with this.  It was $2.00.

The border print of the fabric is wide enough to encompass a couple of pleats

so this pattern seemed good to try.   I decided to make view B and think about the final length later, once I saw how the fabric’s design looked on the skirt.   

A laundered swatch of the fabric turned out exactly as it started.  Here is a close-up of the border print with the laundered swatch that shows the width of the border. 

This looks easy enough.

 The pattern calls for a tab with Velcro closing, probably dating from when Velcro was a newer wonder.  I have doubts about this.  My skirt could not only pop open after a big lunch, but pop open with ripping sound effects.  I’ll make the tab but consider substituting a buttonhole or hook. 

Because the print is so bold and large, I had to think about the motifs.  Michael Kors, on Project Runway, has alerted us to the danger of placing unintentional bullseyes.  Also, there are certain portions of this pattern that look a bit like an internal anatomy chart from health class: 

Maybe I had a heightened awareness.   

While paging through The Complete Book of Sewing,  circa 1967, I also came across this unfortunate example of pattern placement.

 I don't know if this was a "do" or a "don't" but, inspired to caution, I tried on the skirt pattern front and used pins to mark places I didn't want unintentional bullseyes.

Initially, I wanted to place the edge of the wrap to include as much of the border as possible, 

 

...but that would leave the front of the skirt unbalanced...

...so I centered the front on the heart motif...

...which left the border like this.

After that, there was nothing left to do but tracing and sewing straight lines, lots of pressing and hoping for the best.

 

I tapered the A-line on the sides of the back.  Here is the work in progress skirt from the front.

And here is the pleated edge of the wrap...

Here is the flap area. 

 I haven't decided yet on skirt  length.... or velcro.  

To be continued...