Cobalt Cotton Butterick Top

After my first Sudoku project, the Box Box, I've gone back to my 'vintage' pattern collection for the second easy top in the lineup. 

This one is just one piece of a wardrobe pattern, Butterick 6450. It's a nice button up blouse with extended shoulders, light and airy for summer or for wearing under a sweater or jacket. I love the colour of this cotton that I've had in my stash for a long, long time. (still lots of it left, too). 

This was a straightforward top, although I had to grade between 16 at shoulder and 18 at hip, and also shorten by an inch above the waistline. Pressing up the curved hem at bottom and the armhole was really the lengthiest part of the whole project!

I stalled for a minute on this one because of the buttons. I hadn't chosen buttons ahead of time, confident that I would have some in my stash of 5 full cookie tins of buttons that would work. I sorted through all of these and could not find the right size and colour to work with this blouse. So I had to put it aside for a bit until I had time to get down to the fabric store and pick some up!  

But of course I had another project to work on in the meantime... :) 

I think this is really cute and love the colour. It's a nice basic that will get a lot of use with a variety of the items already in my wardrobe. 

Paper Patterns no more?

By now I'm sure most sewists have heard the news that our beloved Big Four paper patterns have been sold to a liquidator. The idea that we might lose pattern patterns altogether, along with the only North American presses that can even print tissue, is very sad. (Full story here).

I have been sewing with paper patterns my whole life -- in fact I still have the first paper pattern I ever used! I love the ease of use, and the cover art, just the whole package. Good thing I have a large collection. 

But my local fabric store is selling off their paper patterns & then that's it. So I decided to take advantage of the sale, at least for the Butterick & McCalls patterns on my wishlist. (Vogue are still too expensive for me). 

These are the ones I picked up. 

I will look for a few more on my list but I am still hoping that some company somewhere will buy them & get them running again. 

Butterick 90s Flannel makes

I started off my sewing year with an unusual project - menswear of a sort, some briefs for my husband. It's nearly as impossible to find flannel boxers these days as it is to find flannel nightgowns so I decided to make a few. 

I started with this Butterick pattern from my stash. It covers a ton of different projects! But out of the 3 similar patterns in my stash I thought this one was the best option. I made a sample from a cotton poplin sheet first to check on the sizing. Perfect! So I bravely cut out plaid versions next. 

 

These are all brushed cotton but in slightly different weights. I bought the top two fabrics at my local Fabricland & the last one was leftovers from last year's sleepwear project! 

I got the plaids matched up okay -- the green one in the best one. Thankfully I had lots of waistband elastic in my stash so these were done pretty quickly.

The pattern was easy, only 2 pieces, and it worked really nicely. Clear instructions, good diagrams & not to difficult to put together. I am pleased with this project! There are a couple other items in this mix of designs that I may try out later on as well. Pretty good value for a thrifted pattern! 

Black & White Butterick 6655

 

My latest dress fits into my black & white neutrals palette of my fall wardrobe planning colour picks. And I'm glad that my latest round of planning hasn't changed much because I cut this dress out a year ago! And it only took me two evenings to sew it up. 

This is Butterick 6655, which I've made before, but this time I changed it up a bit. I cut the front on the fold rather than including the front seam, because I wasn't going to add in the faux button panel here. I just liked the way this pattern fit and wanted a basic sheath dress to wear. I also added in side seam pockets as I knew from my first one (where I didn't add pockets) that they would work with the fit this time.

My first one was made of a linen blend, but this time I was using a stretch bengaline, which is less familiar to me. The thing to note about this fabric is that the stretch goes lengthwise along the fabric, so you need to cut out on the crossgrain. But there is quite a bit of stretch so I thought it would be suited to a closer fitting dress, for a bit more comfort in wear. 

I used some white broadcloth for the pocket bags, as I thought self fabric would be too bulky. I was worried that there might be some show-through, but when I tested it I realized that the gabardine is quite thick and not transparent at all, even being white. So I didn't line the dress, I'll just use a slip when necessary. 

I didn't want it to be any shorter for this view, and probably should have cut it a bit longer - thanks, year ago me. So instead of turning up a hem, I used some white bias binding and made a 1/4" hem. I decided to hand stitch the hem since this fabric does ripple a bit when hemming - the sleeve required some steam to get the wobbly out. Hand stitching the bias facing down was easy and didn't take long, and it has a much cleaner visual finish. I'm pleased with this neutral - it will go nicely with a couple of bright blazers I picked up at the thrift store recently. And with lots of me-mades in my wardrobe too! 

Butterick 6727: My Fabricville "House Dress"

For my latest Fabricville blogger project I've made myself a classic House Dress...well, maybe I'm stretching it a bit. I've made a faux wrap dress from Butterick 6727, in a fun cotton print covered in colourful houses. It makes me think of  Bergen or St. John's or Kyiv! 

This was a pretty simple project but it took a bit of time thanks to the special details. I made View B, with piping trim and a below knee length. The dress is a faux wrap, with the crossover bodice and skirt both sewn shut together at the waistline seam and then tacked down by the buttons along the front. Which are also faux -- they are stitched on through all layers at the very end, the closure is actually an invisible zip in the back. Although if you really wanted to you could eliminate the back zip and make real buttonholes in the front, as the crossovers are quite deep and all faced. I don't think you'd run the risk of flashing anyone with this pattern any way you chose to make it. 

The only slightly more difficult part was attaching the waist seam. This was because you have to be careful that the two piping ends on the bodice and skirt line up properly so it's a continuous line from neck to hem, and because there are a lot of layers there while you're doing it. With the crossovers on the bodice and the skirt both basted down, along with their facings, you are essentially stitching through 6-8 layers of fabric at one point. So don't choose a thick or heavy fabric for this one! My cotton is very lightweight and crisp, and I used lightweight interfacing, so it worked very nicely. 

This sewed up quickly once I got going. The only alteration I made was to shorten both the bodice and the skirt by 1" each.  I cut a 14 at neck, 16 at bust, and 18 at waist to make easy size adjustments for my figure, which usually works quite well. But, I find there is a bit of extra height in the shoulder area, which I could have taken in a bit so I might add some 1/4" shoulder pads to fill out that space later on. Otherwise, this was an easy sew, with a nice cotton that behaved beautifully. I really like the piping detail and feel secure in this faux wrap, which I never do in an actual wrap dress! My first dress of the season, to appear shortly on the Fabricville blog as well!

Butterick Granny Nightie!

 

My sewing took a bit of turn over the last week or so! I decided I needed a new warm flannel nightgown (just in time for our cold snap here!) I have a couple of older thrifted patterns like this (this Butterick 4939 is the newest one, and it's from 2006) because it's so hard to find a sleepwear pattern currently that isn't a tee and pants set. I prefer a good old granny nightgown! 

I chose View B, mostly because I was a bit short on fabric. Actually I was quite a bit short. I had bought this pretty floral flannel on sale at Fabricland and when I went back to top up, there wasn't any more. So I had to puzzle it out. 

As it turns out, this was quite creatively satisfying. I had an old pair of flannel pj bottoms that I've been meaning to cut up to reuse - they were in great shape but somehow too small... They were an offwhite so I thought they'd blend okay with this print. And let's face it, this is just for sleeping ;) 

So I cut the yoke and yoke facing from the pants. I had to cut the full back with a side seam right down the middle, and was able to cut the two front yoke pieces with just a bit of seam along the edge. If I'd narrowed the yoke first (which I should have done, as the shoulders are quite wide - I could have taken each outer side in by almost an inch) I'd have avoided seams altogether. It's very wearable though, and I'm not going back to take anything in on the shoulders as I've french seamed everything; side seams, sleeves and armscye. It will have to do! 

I also had to cut the sleeves a lot shorter than the pattern, as I was out of fabric. So when I finished the main body, I felt that the stark yoke didn't really look great. Sigh. I made covered buttons from the original green fabric, and that added a bit of tie-in. But it still wasn't quite right. So instead of hemming the sleeves, I cut a 5" wide cuff from the remainder of the pants - that's as big as I could go before running out of white flannel. That really tied it together and it was starting to look good. 

But then my husband offhandedly remarked that I could embroider on the yoke. And I thought, not sure I want to embroider them, but I have two longish, narrow strips of the green flannel left over and I could probably harvest some motifs from there. So I did -- I chose the bits that I thought I could get most of a flower from and fused them to some Steam-a-Seam. Then I cut my chosen motifs and a few little extra leaves and added foliage and put together a design. I really love it! It was really fun to noodle around with the fused fabric and try to see how I could make complete motifs. And they are fused on for now, although I will likely have to stitch them down as well so that they stay put. 

Anyhow, for a project that was supposed to be a fast & easy, functional garment, this turned out to  be challenging in the sense of finding enough fabric and getting a look I liked. I certainly didn't expect to be spending an afternoon choosing decorative add-ons! I had a lot of fun, though, and now I have the perfect William Morris feeling nightgown, both useful and beautiful. 

BarbieCore Butterick 6889

My latest project for the Fabricville blog is just squeaking in to the end of summer dress season. But when I saw this combo I knew I had to try it! The pattern, 6889, is a Retro Butterick 50s release, I've had my eye on it for a while and decided to try it now. There were a few interesting fabric choices in the latest Fabricville options, but when I saw this pink printed cotton I suddenly felt that I absolutely needed to make a BarbieCore vintage inspired dress. 

This is a quilting cotton so doesn't have as much flow as the fabrics that are recommended for this pattern, but I thought I'd give it a go anyway. I do think it turned out well, but in a lighter fabric, the gathers at the waist will fall more lightly that they do in my version. 

I made a few adjustments -- mainly in length, as usual for someone who is barely 5'2"! I found that the bodice of this pattern is quite long, and I ended up taking about 1.25" out above the waist, so that the ties would fall on my waist. I didn't want a lot of blousing, as the pattern image shows that it's pretty sleek. I did end up with some blousing, however, and do find that there is a lot of ease in the bodice, even though I cut it according to my measurements. The neckline fits very well, however, and isn't too constricting, which is something I thought about while cutting this out. I also took about an inch out of the skirt length, and used a 1.5" hem as well. 

The other small alteration I made was to add in a side pocket on the right side (opposite the buttons). I always need a pocket! I think you could add patch pockets as another option, as they would fit quite well into the retro aesthetic. But I just added a side seam pocket, using one of my standard templates. 

I used the required 1/2" shoulder pads as per the pattern, as I felt that they would finish the look, although I didn't cover them with fabric, which was an option, with pattern pieces for that purpose included in the pattern. And I'm quite pleased with the pretty shell buttons that I found at Fabricville to finish this one off! 

As to the pattern itself, I wouldn't recommend this for a beginner. There is a lot of hand sewing to get things secured, and there is also the line of buttons on the side. I do find that I can put it on over my head without undoing any buttons though, so to simplify this project you could easily add buttons to the side band without making any actual buttonholes. The instructions are a bit vague in places; I found them difficult to decipher in the stage of putting the side button bands on (yes, there was unpicking...) I felt like the instructions could have been a bit more expansive, even though the dress itself was fairly simple overall.

So this dress took a little longer to put together than I'd planned but in the end I am happy with my Barbie influenced dress! It's a bit different from my usual style, especially with the close fitting neckline, but it's always fun to try something new.  

Floral Set for Fabricville

My latest project for the Fabricville blog is a little different for me - instead of a dress, I made a two piece matching outfit! Now I have separates that I can wear together for the dress feeling, or break apart to wear in other combos. 

I saw this floral rayon online at Fabricville, but the online image was a bit deceiving -- it looked like it was all floral stripes, but when I received it, the stripes ran along either selvedge edge with the centre more of an open floral. If I would have looked more closely at all the images, I could have seen this ahead of time - but I didn't.  Fortunately the print and colours are very cohesive, but it did mean that I had to make some decisions about how to lay out my pattern and how to use the print effectively. I didn't want the wide band of stripes running horizontally at the bottom of the blouse so I held the fabric up to me and asked for some opinions and finally decided that the stripes would run vertically down the right side of the outfit. I usually tend to put decorative elements on the left so it surprised me that this just looked better to have the stripe feature on the right! 

This is a rayon voile, and it's very lightweight and shifty. It is super soft and smooth, and the colours are so wonderful bright and deep against the dark navy background. But it was tricky to cut since it is so slippery and light. I got it cut fairly well, but I am glad that the busy print hides any mild mismatches! 

The blouse, Butterick 6731, was not a complicated project. And I only made a few minor changes. I shortened the body by 1/2", but did not shorten the sleeves at all. I raised the point of the V-neck as I thought it would fall a little low on me, and I'm glad I did. I also narrowed the centre of the neckline and the centre back by 1/4" each. The biggest changes were with the back darts - I found them extremely long so pinned them in to test it out, as I did not think this fabric would appreciate any stitch unpicking. I ended up shortening the upper point by one inch and raising the lower points by 4 inches - I wanted to leave more room across my butt ;)  I then shifted the dart centre to just under halfway between, a touch closer to the lower point. That pulled in the excess across my back but left lots of movement across the hips. Because of this, I also omitted the side zip. I basted the side seam and tried it on to see if it would go on without a zip and it was very easy to do as long as I had the front ties untied. All in all, it took some fiddling but I really love it. It fits nicely and is a super soft and comfortable fabric to wear. 

I added a lightly gathered skirt, using a pattern from my stash, Simplicity 1542 (a pattern I actually bought for the jackets). I thought this skirt had the right shape to go with the blouse. I had to alter this as well; first to add some length to it (3.5") and secondly, recutting the waistband as it is designed to sit 1.5" below the natural waist. I prefer my skirts at my natural waist so altered it to fit at that spot rather than below.

I added a side seam pocket to the right side of the skirt as well - the left has the zip so I didn't bother fussing around with that. I'm right handed so the right pocket is the main one I use anyhow! I was grumbling about the wobbliness of the fabric while cutting and sewing, but I love how it turned out and think this will be a very wearable set. 

Sweater Knit Skirt with Butterick 6525

After I made my Burda sweater recently, I had enough fabric left over to cut out a skirt. I didn't want to waste any of this fabric, so before putting the fabric away I found a suitable skirt pattern to try out! 

I have had Butterick 6525 in my stash for a while; I bought it for the dress view. However, the skirt included is a quick pull-on, elastic waist style, which was also just the right size for my leftovers. So I cut it out, with a few alterations. 

I didn't really like the hemline style -- so I left the hem straight but marked the curved lines on the fabric in case I changed my mind and wanted to follow them. Once it was done I really liked the straight hem so pulled out my thread markings and left it plain. 

I also used only one piece of 1/2" wide elastic at the waist instead of making two narrow channels. This fabric was just a little too squidgy to easily sew two neat channels and I didn't feel like futzing around too much! 

And then I also added some side seam pockets. Of course! I cut the pockets out of some black broadcloth, and made sure that the tops of the pocket bags were secured into the stitching when I folded the waist casing down. That way they are anchored neatly and always stay put in the front of the skirt. 

This is a very basic skirt, and I've made it even more basic by leaving out the hem detail. However, I really like the fit, and the gathering is just the right amount, not too bulky at all. It's very comfy and cozy -- I just hope there isn't too much stretching out of shape as it's worn. Sweater knit isn't really known for its recovery. Still, I thought I'd give it a try and get another wardrobe item out of this fabric. I'm pleased with it and think this will get a fair amount of wear. Now to make the other items in this pattern!