The Shirt.

The shirt.  It's on all those wardrobe essentials list, mostly accompanied by the words "classic" and "white".  I can't seem to work it into my wardrobe very well.  I did want to sew one though, so that's alright.


My fabric is a Liberty print.  The pattern is Vogue 2634.

You may have to enlarge this next picture to see that the bottom bottom hole is horizontal, whilst all the others are vertical.  I have seen this done on men's shirts.  Not sure why, perhaps to anchor the other buttons in position?

 The back view.  I added back darts.

 The pattern had the option of sleeveless, short sleeves 3/4 sleeves and really long sleeves, but no wrist length sleeves.  I adjusted the length to the wrist and added a placket.  This is the first placket I have sewn.  I used some very good instructions in an Australian Stitches magazine.

See these buttons.  They cost $2 each.  I nearly felll over when the shop owner told me, but I am not spoilt for choice in sewing supply shops.  Just another reason not to sew collared shirts.  Sadly, I only checked the vertical placement of buttons and not the horizontal placement and the under-placket shows. 

You can see here that I used a contrasting fabric for the collar stand and plackets.  Only it is in a similar colourway, so this effect is subtle.

 This is how I styled it today.  Actually, it was about all I could come up with, unlike the mustard pants that I showed you on Monday that lent themselves to dozens of wardrobe combinations.

I suspect that not many women look great in a collared shirt.  All the views on runways and magazines show the shirts unbuttoned to a deep V, giving a strong vertical line that you don't get if you wear it buttoned up.  If I went out like that, it would only take moments for somebody to tell me that my buttons had come undone.  So this project was more about the process than wearing.

Like many of you, I love reading style guide books.  Earlier this year I picked up Wardrobe 101.  I compared their essentials checklist to my own wardrobe

- tailored jacket, short jacket, fitted jacket and trench coat.  Whilst I own these, I only really wear my Chanel style jacket.
- tailored pants - again, own these, rarely wear them
-wide-legged pants - tick
-jeans - tick
- the perfect skirt - tick, tick, tick
- full skirt - I'm not sure that this is an essential, outside of a bush dance or ballet concert
- collared shirt - see above
- statement top - tick
-knit sweater or cardigan - tick
-tee-shirt - tick
- day dress - I have several, but none of them is the perfect dress, still searching
- little black dress - which I do wear occasionally, but I always feel boring in black
- special occasion dress - plenty of these, but they don't leave the cupboard too often.

So it seems, I meet the list, but these are not the clothes I wear every day.  I've started my own list to work against instead.
* jersey dress, appropriate for work or somber occasions, when you need to grab an outfit in 30 seconds after you have just sat in somebody's yoghurt.  Essential that this dress does not require ironing.
* pull-on dress, no fussing required, to be grabbed on your way to answering the front door, or when you should have been somewhere 20 minutes ago.
* t-shirts, take the time to find a flattering fit
* knit tops, dressier than t-shirts, but also must not require ironing
* statement top, for all those times when people mostly only see your top half anyway.  Throw on with jeans for any occasion when you are not sure what the dress code is.  Ironing is permissible.
* cardi / scarf that is able to be rolled up into your bag
* tights / leggings, to go under all those dresses you made / bought, forgetting that you are not in your twenties anymore
* skirts / pants / shorts.  Forget the fashions,  Choose styles and lengths that flatter.  Pockets are handy but not essential.
* one dress that makes you feel gorgeous.  Matching heels.  You may need a matching bag if you don't have a bloke with pockets.
* pretty pjs
* swimmers in which you are prepared to be seen in public.  It is a lot more fun in the water than watching from the sidelines.
* cute exercise clothes.  I only exercise to help me look good and it defeats the purpose if I am wearing baggy old uglies for the duration.
* underwear that you can forget about once you have it on.  No pulling, pinching, fussing allowed.

What do you think?  Anything missing?

Underwater Dreaming Dress

Can you tell that I've been playing around with the self timer?  Trouble is, I'm not sure how to get the photo to focus on me, and not the background, which means that the details of this dress are a little obscured, sorry.
 
Fabric: "Underwater Dreaming", printed silk satin from Tessuti
Pattern: Vogue 8529, previously made in a silk jersey

This fabric was a gift from Colette.  The colours are divine and the shine is really opulent.  In spite of all this fabric gorgeousness, it has taken me a year to make it up.  It was that whole stripe dilemma thingy.  I would sit down at the table, pattern and scissors in hand and go...stripes across?  stripes up and down?  to the mirror.  pin.  pin.  pin.  oh, I don't know. an hour later, put everything away again.

Genius that I am, it only took a year to figure out that I could mix them up a bit.  No project runway deadlines in this house!

The wide hem band and the princess seams give the back of the dress a bit of a mod look.  The front cowl does not drape as nicely as my jersey version.  It is possible (can't quite remember) that I changed the grain of the pieces to get the stripes how I wanted them, so this may be my fault, rather than the pattern drafting.  I love the colours.  When I slipped it on during a late night sewing session, I suddenly looked a whole lot less tired, so one of these colours must be "my" colour.  Just need to figure out which one. 

The fabric did fray.  It would have been nice to use French seams, but I wanted to fit as I went, rather than make a muslin, so I just finished my seams with an overlocker.

Pegged Trousers

Okay, confessions time.

So last year, trousers came back.  After what seems like a decade of the dress, trousers were featuring in the fashion mags again, and I wanted some of the action.  I dallied with Vogue 8657, but really, elastic-waisted pants are best left for jammies.  I ummed and I ahhed and then I saw Jorth's pants.  I wanted Jorth's pants.  It was too late for me to get that copy of Burda.  I scoured the pattern books looking for something similar.  I hung about the Burda box at the library, hoping that someone would return this edition.  Then one night, I sat down to draft my own version.  I was just putting pencil to paper, when I paused, thought how ridiculous,  I do not have time for drafting, it is nearly the end of the year and I have about a gazillion things to do before kids break up from school.  So I went and bought trousers.  I, who never buy clothing, went a bought a black pair of pants.  They did cost me a small fortune (which I think is why Jorth sewed hers in the first place).  They do look good and I do wear them.

This month, the Burda mag finally showed up at the library (I could have reserved it, but I did not want to put that sort of pressure on someone who might actually be using it, or thinking about using it, or hoping to get a moment to trace off patterns before the due date....like I am hoping to trace off patterns from another edition I have that is waaay over due.)

I made up Burda 6/2010 #105 using fabric from my stash.  I can't remember the composition of the fabric, though I suspect it is a blend.  It is more robust than I expected.  I was expecting it to fray badly, but it didn't.  It is a little springy, but presses well.  The colour matches more of my tops than I anticipated.

In these photos, I have already been wearing them for several hours and they have bagged out a bit.  This is my first time sewing Burda trousers.  My hip size is 42, but after comparing the pattern with others I use, I went with a 40.

Here I am, reading the camera manual, trying to work out setting in my new photo location.  I may be deceiving myself, but I think the pants look less clown-like in real life.  Though, I don't think I'll make another pair in this style.  There's probably a good reason why pegged trousers all but disappeared for a while.

 So the Burda pants don't fit as well from the back as my Marfy pants.  I'll know this for next time.  I could unpick them and fix this, which would also reduce the clown-like bagginess a the front.  Or I could just stop taking rear view photos.

I do like them though.  I'll just make sure I wear them before the fashion fades away.  Not everything has to be classic, right?

Would you share your jeans?

This month, in bookclub, we read The Necklace by Cheryl Jarvis.  It is the story of a group of women who share a luxury diamond necklace.  They each paid about $1500 and get to wear the necklace for one month in the year.

This prompted discussions about what we would not share (my list...my bloke, my babysitter and my toothbrush).  Then when I asked who would share their jeans, I got a resounding "no way" from everybody.  I was genuinely surprised.  I have been meeting with this group of women for about 10 years and some of them I would consider close friends.  When I badgered a few of them about it, they replied, well, my jeans wouldn't fit you anyway, my jeans wouldn't look good on you, you wouldn't get a hot date wearing my jeans.

Personally, sharing my jeans wouldn't bother me in the least.  Either my store bought ones or my homemade ones.    How about you?