A rescued Burda summer dress

This dress has quite the long lead-time to being finished, and most of that time was spent hanging on the “hook of shame” where failures and UFOs go to shame me every time I walk into m sewing room until I fix them, repurpose the fabric, or bin them. You see, this pattern was really the only Burda magazine design that grabbed me enough to actually sew up last year, and what luck, it ended up being a rare Burda dud!

Not only did I actually trace and sew it, but I did so during the publication month, too! Burda 07-2021-120 (which I actually found online in the steaming mess that is their English site!) is a loose fitting dress in two lengths (I chose the shorter one) with short sleeves and a gathered, panel skirt (no side seams!) and a centre front panel with bust darts integrated into the panel seams.

A chambray Luova tunic dress

I will readily admit that I don’t pre-order many books. But I absolutely pre-ordered the Named Patterns new “Building the Pattern” book as soon as I could! I mean, why wouldn’t I after making so many patterns from their first book (and a few more planned, too!)?! The focus on this book is fitting alterations so there are TONS of diagrams and instructions and advice on getting a great fit even before you get to the patterns in the book (which can either be traced from the sheets in the book, or downloaded in A4/AO formats from their website).

The Luova pattern comes in three styles: a blouse, tunic, or dress, with two different collars and three different sleeves to choose from. The tunic (a short dress, really) stood out to me and I thought that perhaps I’d be able to make it from a 1.5m remnant of stonewashed denim from Fabrics Galore I’d recently bought. I got it thinking I’d use it to make another pair of jeans but it’s in no way what I’d consider a “denim”, btw – it’s far lighter than jeans and what I’d call a chambray, suitable for shirts or dresses. So it seemed perfect for this tunic!

The perfect pandemic trousers – for him!

I was encouraged by the effect that sewing for my mom had had on my own sewing mojo, so I decided to stick with the theme of sewing for others and I turned my attention to my husband instead.

I’d bought La Maison Victor‘s special Menswear issue back in 2018 (which I bought first in French when it was originally released, and then, later, again when it was finally released in English). There were so many good menswear patterns in this issue – lots of interesting and different (but still wearable!) designs, but I thought that the “Jeff Trousers” in particular would be perfect for J’s new work from home lifestyle.

A leopard print Wink Top

A month or two ago my mom sent me a surprise gift in the form of the dP Studio book “Fashion Couture”, which had been on my Amazon Wish List since it was released, while I secretly hoped it might get translated into English at some point.

For some reason the dP Studio standalone patterns never really grabbed me, but I LOVE so many of the tops in this book (and they’re all tops, yay!!). The book is only available in French but the instructions are fully illustrated and should be totally fine for any intermediate sewist with google translate to hand.

I’ve gotten loads of Pattern Magic vibes off several of the designs, and there are about five I really want to make! So I started with Le 516 “Wink Top”, but the Slash Top is also very high on my list (and that sweatshirt, yessss!). You can swoon over a bunch of the designs from the book here.

Burda rose jumpsuit

In the May issue of Burda magazine, there was a behind-the-scenes feature into how they design and develop their sewing patterns and the example they used was an amazing wrap-front jumpsuit, which I immediately wanted to sew! But I found out that the jumpsuit would be in the next issue, so I had to wait a whole month before I could get started.

It ended up actually being the cover star of the June 2020 issue, and even better – it also has the fully illustrated instructions for the issue, too! If you missed this issue, it’s also available to purchase as a pdf pattern from the (otherwise awful) English Burda site.

A German activewear mesh top

This top is doubly German! First of all, the pattern is from the German-language book, “Alles Active”, which I bought to see what the “competition” were up to in Germany vs my own book’s German edition (“Näh dir deine Sportswear”). It’s a decent enough book with a handful of nice activewear designs, but there is a LOT of athleisure filler in it and some very ropey-looking samples on the model, too.

But I liked this top (creatively titled, err, “Top”), and traced it out last summer when I bought the book. I even bought two gorgeous and lightweight activewear fabrics from extremtextil’s Berlin shop when I was over last July to teach the workshop, but then the weather turned cold and I missed my chance to sew it up.

A big grey Fail of a dress

How excited was I to discover that the Spanish-language pattern magazine, Patrones, had launched an app complete with digital issues and downloadable pdf patterns!? You know, the thing we’d all wished Burda had done years ago rather than the abomination of a website they made instead!

I literally was on my iPad in seconds (there’s a version for Android, too) and was browsing the previews of a few issues when I came across a dress I just had to have!

A babygrow for an ultra-fast baby

I’ve known my friend Vicky through Run dem Crew for years now, and have run many, many miles alongside her on our Tuesday night sessions. She’s a good friend, and outside of the Crew has run multiple marathons and ultras, too. Last summer, she ran the Serpent Trail ultra with another good friend, and she ended up finishing on the podium as 3rd place lady!!

But even more incredible is that she found out later that she was actually pregnant when she ran it! So when she announced she was going to have a little pre-baby pizza & beer get together with our running friends, I knew I had to make her a babygrow. First I thought I’d upcycle a Run dem Crew shirt for the little speedy baby, but then I saw another friend mention on Twitter how happy he was to see the Serpent being run again this year and I got in touch to a) find out if the race even had teeshirts, b) if he had one, and c) if he could send it to me to refashion. It was Yesses all around so I got cutting!

A reflective wool jacket

Buckle up, because the story of this jacket starts four years when I received a remnant of Dashing Tweeds “Urban Shadow” tartan coating from a friend for Christmas. Now, if you’re not familiar with Dashing Tweeds, they’re a really cool company who’ve revived old tartan and twill patterns and modernised them with great colours and even some reflective threads woven in. The remnant I received was one of these “Lumatwill” designs, and has reflective threads running along all the horizontal yellow lines in the design.