In addition to my exercise gear you saw yesterday, I actually made another top and trousers the weekend I got back from Montreal! Since I wasn’t in a fit state for a photoshoot until now, I kinda feel like I’m clearing out the cobwebs here…
This top is another “Flip turned for a draped effect” top from Pattern Magic 2 (drafted on my Morley College course!), this time using the tulip sleeves from Jalie 2806 for a more Spring/Summer look. This is the third time I’ve used these tulip sleeves and I really love the look and love wearing them – they really make a top much more special than just your average short sleeve! I used a lovely orange marl viscose jersey from Tia Knight here that’s just sooooo soft and lovely to wear! Hurrah for an impulse purchase!
The trousers are from the March Burda magazine (#126), using some stretch cotton sateen I bought at Tissues Dreyfus in Paris last month. It looked black in the dark lighting of the shop, but I got it home to realise it’s actually dark brown, which was fairly annoying, as I wouldn’t have bought 3m of brown had I known!
This time when I made the top though, I made a small facing for the underside of the flip so I wouldn’t have to hand-tack the seam allowances down like I did on my grey version. I think it looks a bit neater here, but still not 100% perfect. C’est la vie.
I really liked the seam lines of these trousers in Burda, but I thought it was really missing a great opportunity for front pockets, so I inserted some into that horizontal seam, and they now span the front leg seam. And since I now had usable front pockets, I didn’t bother with the back welt pockets!
One thing that’s not obvious front the tech drawing, though, is that these are fairly low-rise in the front. I’m not a big fan of low-rise trousers, so this was a surprise, but it’s one I can live with. Also not apparent in the tech drawing is that there are no side seams on these. These are also strangely very snug fitting in the lower thigh (just above the knee, where the diagonal seams lie), which isn’t a problem I’ve ever had with Burda trousers before.
(This photo has been lightened to try and help show the seamlines!)
I’m not totally in love with these trousers – they’ll do as a nice wardrobe addition for a while, but I’m not reaching for them anywhere near as often as my grey trousers or my Jalie jeans.
The sad thing is that these trousers were the last thing I made before Bosco died, and I sat up on the garden deck on a sunny Sunday afternoon, doing my handstitching on the trouser hook while Bonk rubbed up against me and rolled around on his back in the sunshine. And as an added unforeseen tribute, I’d also made the pocket linings and fly underlap from the “naughty kitties” fabric since the brown of the print matched this perfectly. Little did I know…
Overall, I love this top (though I think I should put this pattern to bed for a while now!), and I’m just so-so on the trousers, despite the emotional connection sewed up in them. But when we sew, we need to have some good basics to turn to every day, or else we soon find ourselves with a wardrobe full of formal gowns and nothing to wear to the grocery store!