Morgan Boyfriend Jeans

I just had my first go at the Morgan Boyfriend Jeans by Closet Case Patterns.

Okay, so maybe not "boyfriend" in this fabric. 

This fabric is a cotton that I bought from Potter & Co.  I'm not sure exactly how to describe it.  It is a little like a brocade, with raised texture, but also a little like corduroy, with very thin wales.  

I didn't make a muslin.  Fitting changes that I made on the run included letting out the hips a little (possibly need to let out a little more), flat pubis adjustment and scooping out the back crotch in an attempt to reduce the under-the-bum wrinkles I always get.  I can see that if the legs were skinnier, I would need to do knock-kneed and extended calves adjustments, but it doesn't bother me so much in this leg width and in this fabric.  I didn't do the button fly, just a regular zip fly.

The shirt I am wearing is an unblogged make from last year.  It is the Named Geneva raglan tee, made up in a viscose I bought from the Morgan and Mark's fabric sale last year. 

These photos were taken at the park near my house, where I have been walking most evenings for the last couple of weeks.

Named Inari Tee

I bought this fabric the moment I saw it, because I thought it would pair so nicely with my peach jeans.  Which it does, but it was warm the day I sewed this up and I was wearing these shorts.  The fabric is from Miss Matatabi, and is a rayon, cotton, wool blend..

The pattern is the Inari Tee, lengthened by 15 cm.  I had read quite a few comments about the restrictiveness of the sleeves, but I decided that this first time, I would make the pattern up as-is. I go through phases of making muslins, but at the moment, I am in a not-making-muslin phase.  I did make a forward shoulder adjustment, as you might be able to see as the pink penciled line in the photo below, which worked out quite well. I took some off the back of the sleeve and added some to the front.  The sleeves are restrictive, as you can see by the wrinkles in them, but this fabric has a bit of give, so it works out okay.  I will change them for next time.

My daughter used the scraps to sew up Jalie 3352 - a dolman sleeved top.  Actually, she finished hers before I finished mine, because I had to stop and cook dinner.  This is her third Jalie 3352 top, so I should do a post on those soon.

More jeans plus Named Geneva Raglan Tee

These are the jeans I made after altering my pattern to eliminate the back wrinkle that was annoying me so much.  I'm pretty happy with the fit of them.  You can't see in the photos, but the front is low cut and the back rise is higher.  They still loosen over the course of the day and drop down if I am not wearing a belt, but now they do that evenly, rather than have the back sag much lower than the front.

There is some evidence of "internal rotation of knees", according to my fitting book, but not so much that I feel I need to correct it.

An acceptable amount of wrinkling in the back...at least comfort wise!  I am wondering if I could remove a little bit of length from the back yoke, but I will wear these for a few weeks before attempting any more jeans.

The front pattern stayed pretty much the same.  I have laid the old and new back patterns on top of each other.  The new one is underneath.   If you look, you can see that the upper half of the back is tilted over, resulting in a smaller body space for my rump whilst keeping the same width from crotch seam to side seam.  The crotch curve is also steeper.

Close ups of my top-stitching.  My button holes have not turned out so well.  The waistband is not interfaced, which may contribute to this, but also I think it would be better if I did them in normal thread rather than the top-stitching thread.  I used a fancy stitch on my belt loops.

Back pocket embroidery.  The front pocket bags are made from a silk faille remnant, that I dyed a bright purple / fuschia for another project.  The dyeing did not go well, so I did not use the fabric for that project, but it sure does feel nice as pockets.

I am heading south this weekend, so wanted a couple of long sleeved shirts to take with me for the trip.  Last year I made 3 long-sleeved shirts for winter (unblogged), but I only like and wear one of them.  This year I tried my first Named pattern, the Geneva raglan sleeved tee.  I have pretty square shoulders, which can be a hassle when fitting raglan styles.  This pattern has a darted sleeve, and the Named models seem to have pretty square shoulders, so I thought I would give it a go.

The only fitting change that I made to the pattern was to add 1 cm to the hips.  I could probably benefit from a narrow chest alteration, but did not bother for these first versions.

I have had a busy week, so it took me 4 days to make this!  I used a different construction order than that outlined in the pattern.

Monday - printed and traced pattern, cut out body

Tuesday - cut out sleeves.  Overlocked side seams together in main body colour.

Wednesday - changed overlocker threads to sleeve colour.  Overlocked sleeve side seams together.  Attached sleeves to body.  If you set everything up, both sleeves can be attached in one pass, which eliminates any hassles with sleeve allowances on the back neck before binding.  I attached down front armhole on one side, up armhole on back, kept overlocking across back neck, then down the back armhole and finally front armhole on the other sleeve.

Thursday - sewed one shoulder dart closed with regular sewing machine (I find it easier to get a nice dart finish on my regular machine.  Set up coverstitch machine.  Attached binding.  Different reviews seem to show different widths of neckline.  I cutoff the neckline seam allowances on the pattern, because I was going to bind, rather than attach a neck band.  My binding is much narrower than a neckband, so I have probably ended up with a wider neck than the designers intended.  I don't like high necks though, so I am happy with this neck size.  I sewed the second shoulder dart closed, joining the binding in this seam.

I then hemmed the sleeves, changed the thread colour on my cover stitch machine and finally hemmed the bottom of the skirt.

After that, I whipped up a second one in an evening.

I really like the casual style of this tee shirt, and happy with the fit.  I wasn't going to buy patterns this year, because I am having fun with drafting, but I am focused on drafting jeans at the moment, and did not want to get distracted with t-shirts.  This shirt fit so well out of the envelope that I just may have to try out some other Named patterns.