Tag: versatili-tops

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A Sports/Casual Versatili-Tank

I was pretty restrained with US-based fabric buying when my mom visited from the States in May, but I did splurge and buy two fabrics from Sew Dynamic for her to bring over in her suitcase. You already saw the botanic/animal print athletic lycra which became one of my favourite Triumph Suit samples, but I also bought a yard of their Drirelease base fabric in the “Prism Peaks” print.

This particular print may be sold out already but I am absolutely sold ON this Drirelease base fabric! Like all their fabrics, it’s made with recycled poylester (82%), and despite being an activewear fabric, it feels like a soft teeshirt material. It’s really, really wonderful and as soon as it arrived, I kicked myself that I didn’t buy more (and at $25/yd that’s saying something)!

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A Cheery Bamboo Versatili-Tee

I’ve been sewing quite a lot of “blanks” recently – basic tanks or tees. Some of these I’ve used as vessels for heat set vinyl (like the green and black IWTV ones), but others I’m keeping plain.

I’ve not got too much to say about this particular teeshirt, but I think it’s nice to share wardrobe workhorses as well as fancier makes, because often these are the sort of garments that get worn most of all.

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An “Interview with the Vampire” custom tribute tee

My obsession with the “Interview with the Vampire” tv show has not waned in time since it premiered (and broke my brain) last October. In fact, I think it’s safe to say that not a day has passed that I haven’t thought about this show. The brain rot is real.

Anyway, I’ve been playing with my Silhouette cutting machine recently, as I talked about in my last post, but this shirt design is one I worked on for quite a few weeks, and the idea just wouldn’t let me go.

It started with San Diego Comic Con, where AMC put a ton of money into building a recreation of a New Orleans street with live actors and swag, but also filled whole buildings with enormous posters to promote season two (out some time next year). But the image that really stuck with me was from some lifts (elevators) within a hotel, where there was a huge photo of the four main characters on each wall inside.

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Black Pietra shorts and a doubly soft Versatili-Tee

I’ve been doing a lot of sewing recently, but haven’t been very good at either documenting all my post-Triumph Suit makes or taking photos of them, so I’m going to start with some of the first!

Ever since I made my first pair of Pietra Shorts using the ramie from Textile Express, I knew I’d need more, specifically in black. So when their black ramie came back into stock, I pounced on it, buying enough to make Pietra trousers and shorts. This stuff is so great for bottoms – it’s similar to linen but wears a thousand times harder, doesn’t crease, and just goes with everything. So making this pair of shorts out of the remaining black ramie was very high on my “need this in my wardrobe right now!” list as soon as I could. But then our summer turned into 5+ weeks of cold and rain so it hasn’t been a big deal they’ve been stuck languishing on my To Photoshoot pile…

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IWTV tribute crew shirt

It should come as no surprise to anyone who’s been following me on social media for the past few months that one of my first makes of the new year should somehow involve the “Interview with the Vampire” tv show (aka “the show so good I think it altered my brain chemistry”). I also spoke more about it in my end of year roundup if you want more explanation of just how good this show is, and how to watch it (short version: AMC or Amazon in most territories).

Anyway, in the official Behind the Scenes documentary, Sam Reid (the actor who plays Lestat) wears a slate blue teeshirt with a coffin drawing on the front, which I really liked, so I did a bit of investigating. Sam’s a massive Anne Rice nerd (to an encyclopedic degree!) but it turned out that this was the “crew shirt” for the show – a promo item made and distributed to cast and crew only. Usually these are pretty tacky affairs with just the show logo on a tee or trucker cap, but I really liked the subtlety of this one – it looks like it does have the show name on the sleeve and a bit of text on the back that can’t be read (my guess is maybe “Memory is a Monster”?), but mostly, I was into the coffin drawing. I did some cursory searches on eBay but with NDAs these days, I didn’t really expect to find anyone selling theirs. So if I wanted one, I’d have to make one myself!

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Green pocketed Versatili-Top (with tutorial!)

Today I wanted to show off a new Versatili-Tee I made myself since the launch of our Versatili-Tops pattern (which includes both tank and tee versions), since I took my own suggestion from the Variations section at the end of the pattern instructions and added a back pocket! This is a really easy addition that only adds a few minutes on to the construction but makes it even more useful, especially for low-impact activities like hiking or cycling.

For this Tee I used some forest green aerated polyester activewear fabric that’s been in my stash a few years. I believe it was an ex-Tracksmith deadstock fabric I bought from FabricMart (US), and it’s nice and cooling with the micro-holes, plus it’s got a lot of good stretch and recovery, too. However, those holes were created REALLY off-grain, which made cutting out a bit more challenging than usual since I needed to fold and cut based on the orientation of the holes instead of the selvedges. But perhaps this is why it wasn’t used in RTW and was sold as yardage?

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A long sleeved bamboo Versatili-Tee

As you all know, I am a huge fan of bamboo jerseys for workouts when you won’t be sweating so much (I see you, yoga and Pilates fans!) so I knew I had to make one of our Versatili-Tops samples in it! The pattern not only comes in Tank and Tee versions, but the Tee also has your choice of short or long sleeves, which means this one pattern really can work for both summer and winter workouts.

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Versatili-Tops pattern – out now!

Please welcome our newest activewear sewing pattern, the Versatili-Tops! This is actually two distinct tops in one – the Versatili-Tee (get it now?) and the Versatili-Tank, which share the same back piece and feature a front that wraps around to join it.