I’ve always tried to use genuine athletes to model our patterns, starting way back in 2014 with our second pattern, the Duathlon Shorts. It means I get to big up other incredible people, tell their stories, and hopefully inspire you all. It also means you get to see the patterns on bodies other than mine, and bodies that actually exercise instead of just skinny models doing “fake running” like you see in so many magazines!
Meet our Triumph Suit athlete model An!
Sage green Aina trousers
In amongst the absolute frenzy of pattern sample sewing (the trisuit pattern is with testers now, for an estimated mid-June release!), I managed to squeeze in a small amount of Non-Work Sewing! Woohoo!
I’ve been wanting to sew the Named Aina trousers ever since they were released – I’m pretty sure I even bought the pattern on release day! I love that they appear to be a standard jean-like trouser from the front, but in the back they’ve got a half-elastic waist and tabs that extend around from the front to snaps. It means they still look like normal trousers, but have some elevated details.
Tutorial: Add a full-length zip to your Surf to Summit Top
As promised, and after many requests, I’ve created a tutorial for changing the half zip in your Surf to Summit Top pattern to be a fully-opening zipper! This is a pretty straightforward change but I like to be very thorough in my explanations so don’t be scared by the amount of steps – half of them are me just adding clarification.
This tutorial not only works for the Ladies version of our Surf to Summit Top pattern, but also the men’s version, too! I did this same change for our athlete model, Jason, when he wore the Surf to Summit Top with our men’s Lightspeed Leggings pattern.
FREE Berlin activewear workshop!
Hallo there all my Berlin sewing friends! What’s better than a workshop all about sewing activewear? A FREE one!! 😝
On Tuesday 9 July Melissa will be talking about all things activewear at a very special event – she’ll discuss how to adjust for your sport’s movements and stance, how to pick the right fabrics then what to do with them once you’ve got them (including the opportunity to fondle all of extremtextil‘s AMAZING activewear fabrics!), and finally, get personalised advice on your dream activewear wardrobe.
Sewing fun in Virginia and Baltimore
We’ve just come back from 10 days in America visiting my family spread across three states. My parents moved down from where I grew up in Pennsylvania to be closer to my brother and his family in Norfolk, Virginia a few years ago, so our first stop was down there to visit my immediate family.
I absolutely took the opportunity to order a few fabrics online to be shipped to their house before we arrived, since I knew the in-person fabric opportunities weren’t great down there. I have a limited space for my fabric stash (on purpose!) and that space is pretty full so I made a conscious effort to only buy a few fabrics that I had specific projects tied to.
Happy 2019! (My year in review)
Happy new year! It’s traditional for me to reflect on the year that’s just finished on the first of a new year, and this year’s a weird one because I’d love to just say “this year sucked”, but there were some fantastic things that happened this year amoungst all the sickness, disappointment, frustration, and hard work. So let’s try and focus on those.
Learn with me – on Craftsy!
I know those of you who live outside London were disappointed to not be able to attend my all-day activewear masterclass in July and September, but I’ve got great news because you can now learn activewear techniques from me wherever you are!
Yes, I’ve filmed my first video class with Craftsy, which you can watch now!
Activewear Masterclass with me!
First of all, thank you for all your kind Get Well Soon messages! I’m really hoping to feel […]
An uninvited rest period
Sorry for the radio silence over the past few weeks. I try to keep to a regular (and on-topic!) post schedule but having partially recovered from the awful flu I’d picked up in February, I then had three other separate, nasty viruses jump on board for the ride, meaning I’ve been sick for over 2 months now. 🙁
How to make your Split Shorts less revealing
I designed the Split Shorts in my “Sew Your Own Activewear” book to have the greatest mobility possible to minimise the chance of the inseams riding up while running (a really common issue with running shorts!). These shorts do show a bit of thigh, but the back of the shorts stay close to the body, and the inseams really do stay put. In fact, they can be mistaken for a skort or running skirt while you’re in motion, and they look really feminine!
But some of you may find that the Split Shorts as drafted in the book are a little more revealing than you’d like, and the good news is that there are two easy ways to adjust for this! Note that by making these less revealing, though, you are limiting the mobility of the leg, so be sure to make incremental steps and sew and test your muslins along the way to make sure you can still move effectively in them. But if you’re planning to wear these for an activity that doesn’t require the extreme amount of forward leg motion needed for running, then modesty may be more important to you than the range of motion anyway!