Friday 26 May 2017

Where is the World Going?

America voted for Trump, Britain to leave the EU, the French had an extreme right candidate in the presidential run off and I made a jumpsuit! And I am really considering wearing it.
Ok, I know these are not very comparable, but the French presidential elections were rather stressful for myself, being an EU citizen living in France, an election of Marine would have serious impact on me staying or not staying in France in the future.

So while watching the "Grand débat"- big discussion between the 2 candidates which was extremely hard to follow, I needed a project to occupy my hands. And while my sewing queue is full of little dresses in order to prepare summer (in case we have some this year), I decided to sew up a jumpsuit. Yes, you hear me well, I sewed a jumpsuit.

Just to explain little bit: for me jumpsuit is like wearing pyjamas outside and even though I have seen cute and very elegant ones (on real people, not in the fashion magazine), I was rather skeptical. Also: how much time do you need to spent at the toilet taking it off and on again?

Anyhow, I bought the May Burda (looking into my archives I buy May Burda every year, there must be something about it then) which featured 2 jumpsuits again, one for standard and one for plus sizes. Started thinking, looked into the previous Burda magazines which ALSO feature jumpsuits (is it like: February - carnaval, September - dirndls, May - jumpsuits - go figure...) and found my favourite.

So mine is a model 129 from May 2013, with a simplified bottom from this year May Burda. I was rather surprised by how little adjustments were needed. Basically I only shortened the length of trousers and closed the cleavage by 2cm on each side.
I found this blue/turquoise viscose in my stash. It was originally bought for some homewear/pyjamas. I tried to sew a shirt from it two years ago which was a pretty bad idea: the fabric is slippery and stretches very easily. For the jumpsuit I interfaced the front diagonals, as well as pocket openings, I also staystitched the sleeve curves and it worked magic.

I did not put any pressure on myself, this was supposed to be more of a wearable muslin, if it turned well. And actually I kind of like it. It looked fine already without sleeves, but eventually, I decided to set them as well, any protection of my shoulders against the sun is always welcomed.

The end result is pretty good: it is comfortable, the viscose is very light and feels nice against the skin, it has pockets and the colours suit me well. I put a little snap to keep the cleavage closed, just in case.

The worst thing: I am actually thinking of sewing another one, as I have another piece of viscose in my stash I do not know what to do with it :o)

Sunday 14 May 2017

I Made a Jacket!

Or a blazer ... whatever... it is tailored, lined and fits!
While I am very confident in sewing and fitting dresses, the jacket/coat thing has always been a little mystery for me. I had tried sewing a spring coat 2 years ago but without much success, the whole thing ended up being thrown away. So this time I decided to do things right. I was offered 3 sewing courses by my dear BF which did not have a specific topic. You just came with your project and asked as many questions as necessary. Of course, all this meant I had to be sewing in between the courses to bring my jacket-work-in-progress at the right time: fitting the muslin, inserting sleeves, inserting the lining. I was under pressure and sewed till the late hours several times but it was definitely worth it.

So here it is: my very first jacket, from Burda 103-04/2014, a model with detailed instructions in the magazine. I used some cotton-linen, as this should be a summer light jacket, lined with black silk. The fashion fabric behaved very well, I also interfaced the whole front which helps avoid some linen-creasing. The lining is probably too light so was not so easy to sew. However, once in, there is nothing to say.


In general I am very happy with the jacket: maybe the fit around the shoulders could have been a little tighter, but on the other hand it feels really comfortable like that.

A few details:



So what did I learn during my lessons: I need to be more precise when sewing this kind of things and pay attention to the markings - one of the teachers kindly requested I resew my sleeve and she was totally right.
Jacket is no longer an issue, I am actually planning to sew another one, on my own now :o)

Sunday 7 May 2017

Scrap-busting

This spring I manage to sew a lot, and did not have much time to go fabric shopping. So most of my sewing actually happened based on my stash which not only got me on 2015 levels (yay!!!) but, and I think I am even prouder of that, I managed to use some remnants from previous projects.
I am not done yet, and main scrap-busting projects are still to come, but I am really happy when I see the little pieces gone from my stash.

Most of these were rather simple projects, based on TNT patterns, so I will not bother you much, just show a few pictures.

Yellow top: pattern  based on the Anna dress By Hand London, yellow cotton-silk in double layers


Green top: Burda 116-04/2016, green linen mix, underlined with black cotton-silk


Black top: Burda 115-07/2015, black silk


However, I went also little bit out of my comfort zone by sewing Burda 110-05/2017 bound top.

When I saw this top in the magazine, I thought it does not make much sense. I have read a review on one of my favorite blogs where it was rather criticized. At least, it made me thinking. Then I saw this kind of tops on the fashion shows (a sign, that this is not some Burda craziness, but actually a trend, hahahahha). So I just figured I would give it a try and I definitely do not regret.

The violet cotton was great for sewing, it has just the right amount of crispness to show off the features of this top. I have a ambiguous relationship with violet, though. I like the idea of violet with my hair colour, I like it on myself, but I do not tend to reach for violet clothes often, so hopefully this top will help to change my mind because I just love it!
First, the top is sewn very quickly, I only made minor adjustments in the shoulder area (a must for Burda for me) ad shortened it. On the waist, any adjustments are done with the binding. The top is a fabric hog, though, as I needed almost the whole meter I had, quite a lot for a top for me.
But most importantly, I really like it in real life. It looks muuuuuch better than in the magazine. I just need to sew some white shorts or trousers to complete the outfit.

Were it not such a atypical top, I would try to sew another one! Frankly, a great win for me here!

Saturday 6 May 2017

Me Made May 2017

Which I am not participating in this year and here are a few reasons why:
- I already wear a lot of me-mades mainly because they represent a big part of my wardrobe (even bigger when it comes to dresses, skirts and tops), so making sure I wear me-mades every year is not a challenge
- I often get tired of thinking I need to take a picture of myself every day
- as every May I will be travelling little bit which makes taking pictures every day more complicated

Also I am currently on a good sewing wave so I do not want to break my rhytm:
I am sewing almost constantly since February
I managed to use up a lot of small pieces of fabric in April sewing mostly little tops (more on that later) and I am really happy about that.
I managed to use up a few pieces of fabric I did not have much ideas on what to do with it and the result has more than surprised me every time.
For your illustration, here is the evolution of my fabric stock, I am only 1.3m from the stock level of April 2015 for a total of 114m. If all goes well, I might even get under 100m this year!

I still have a few ideas for the scraps, including a quilt blanket, so hopefully this good vibewill continue.
Also, on my sewing queue:
Burda panel dress

Kay Unger summer dress

Some basics like this one
I might need to get to sewing some shorts because GAP just stopped selling basics for petites.

And then whatever I might come across between now and summer...