Posts

Amy Jumpsuit in Watercolor Voile

/2 Comments/in , , /by

Well I am definitely late, in North America at least, with sharing this make since it’s top of the summer wear but decidedly fall now. This jumpsuit still works well in Los Angeles where it continues to bake like an oven (high of 93 degrees yesterday) but here in Vancouver it’s a whole 30 degrees cooler, plus clouds, plus rain. Just like that, I need to change out my entire closet and transfer all of the sun dresses and cute rompers I brought up to Vancouver in June back down to Los Angeles. But it’s about to be summer in Australia, so shout out to all the Aussies looking for cute patterns to make for the upcoming heat! This is your guy!

Closet Case is my number one favorite indie company to sew from so I am embarrassed to say how far behind I am in catching up with all their releases (at least here on the blog)! They keep coming up with new, amazing patterns (don’t even get me started on the stunning Jasika Blazer, named after yours truly, for which I have already purchased fabric but haven’t gotten around to muslining yet) but my life keeps getting busy because of work, so my output is lower than normal. I am not complaining at all, but I do I miss being caught up with everything on my to-make list.

Although I liked seeing a lot of people’s versions of the Amy Jumpsuit on social media, it didn’t really speak to me much when it was first released, so it took me a while to get around to making it… and then when I finished my own and put it on my body, I realized what a special pattern it is! It’s comfortable like pajamas and easy to live around in, but, at least on me, putting a belt on it elevates the look tremendously and I love wearing it “dressed up” in this way. I made my jumpsuit in a watercolor voile I got from The Fabric Store a long time ago- it’s been in my stash for forever and I was planning on making a Big 4 pattern out of it, but I didn’t have enough fabric. While looking through my pattern stash for something else, I randomly came across this jumpsuit and thought it might be an interesting pairing.

I love the way the jumpsuit came out, but the fabric is practically see-through, so it wasn’t exactly ideal to use. Even so, I love how the fabric is so light that it almost floats around my body- its a beautiful garment for summer because it isn’t clingy, the cotton is very breathable, and the colors are so light and airy. Thankfully the jumpsuit is designed with a partial, free hanging lining at the front and back bodice which takes care of any modesty issues at the bustline; the neckline and straps of this jumpsuit are so soft and beautiful that I didn’t want to wear a bra with it and mess up the pretty lines if I didn’t have to. It’s of course still a bit see-through in the legs, but I can get away with it because the fabric is gathered at the waist so there are folds of fabric spread around the waist and hips which makes it more opaque.

 

I decided to make a straight size 4 in this jumpsuit even though my appropriate sizing required grading to at least a larger size at the hips. I figured that since there was so much ease in the body I wouldn’t notice the missing width, and technically I didn’t. Instead, I missed the depth, for the space that would have been taken up by my butt and hips in a larger size was now transferred into a slight shortening of the crotch depth, so when I put on the jumpsuit, it hugged just a bit too closely in that area. I opened up the crotch seam and put in a gusset which sufficiently fixed that issue and I made a note to lengthen the depth of crotch on my next make since I don’t mind the slimmer fit in the waist and hips but do want room to kick and stretch like I’m 50!

I included pockets in this make, and although I normally hate free hanging tear drop pockets that aren’t sewn down at the waistline, these work well and don’t bulge out, partially because of my super lightweight fabric and partially because the gathered waist gives them less opportunity to move askew. I sewed a fabric belt for this since I knew I would prefer to wear it belted, and as always, I sewed the middle of the belt down at the back waistline to keep it attached to the garment so I wouldn’t have to look for it if it got separated. It also helps to keep the belt in place on my body where I want it to lay, and usually means that I can forgo having to make and sew belt loops.

This jumpsuit was simple and straightforward to make, it was drafted beautifully, and I had no issues with the instructions. I love how beautiful and summery it looks in this fabric, and how the silhouette kind of looks like a dress at first glance, but I also love it with these shoes! (Because I made them, haha.) They were pretty simple and straightforward too: I purchased the pre-made espadrille rope soles on…etsy I think? It was a while ago. They had a few different designs- platform, heel and flats- so I got a couple of pairs. The quality of them is great, they seem durable, and they come with thin rubber soles on the bottom. These shoes were fun to make because they required hand sewing a blanket stitch to attach the upper onto the sole. Originally I planned to have an ankle strap on the shoe but the slide looked really cute and unfussy without it and it stayed on my foot just fine, so I ditched my plans and left them this way.

I actually didn’t end up wearing these shoes very much this summer, and I’m not sure why- they are certainly comfortable and cute! But sometimes it takes me a while to figure out how to style stuff I make, so hopefully by next spring and summer I will have a million things to pair them with. Thanks to Claire for the lovely photos, and hopefully before the year is over I will have finally made and blogged about my very own Jasika Blazer (since I have already made 2 out of the 3 of the patterns in the Closet Case Rome Collection– which is excellent, by the way!) Don’t worry, I’m catching up!

A Jumpsuit in Wheated Silk

/6 Comments/in , /by

This fabric, which I believe is a silk crepe, was gifted to me by a woman that teaches at the pilates/yoga studio I go to. She was a fashion student at FIDM and accumulated lots of beautiful fabric over the years from friends and family adding to her stash, but apparently she just never really got into sewing beyond school and all the textiles that had been given to her were gathering dust in a bin at her home. After following me on IG, she wanted to gift me the pieces because she figured I would use them before she ever would. And she was right! I had a few immediate favorites from the pile she gifted to me, and this bizarre number this was one of them! The actual print, which appears to be, of all things, a wheat stalk, isn’t particularly inspiring on it’s own, but I think the brilliant contrast of the gold and blue coupled with the nice quality of the fabric (which feels so lovely against my skin!) really spoke to me.

I wasn’t sure exactly what I was going to make with this til I stood behind a woman in the airport who was wearing the cutest black double gauze jumpsuit that I couldn’t stop thinking about, and though I don’t remember all the details about it now, I can say that this garment is a decent interpretation of it. Her jumpsuit had wide, open legs and a gathered waist which I liked a lot, so I decided that I would hack the Ninni Culottes by Named Patterns (my first version of these pants is here) onto an interesting bodice and go from there. Seemed easy enough, but I had a lot of trouble deciding on which bodice I wanted to use. After lot’s of hemming and hawing, I settled on this Project Runway for Simplicity #1803 that I had made once before here.

I chose a different bodice view than I had made before (the top left floral version on the pattern envelope) and went to work sewing everything together, having tissue fit the bodice already. As I sewed my fabric together, I loved how everything was looking, but when I tried the bodice on by itself, something was just not jibing with me about the neckline. It fit great and looked like the image on the pattern envelope, but I just didn’t like that neck detail on me at all; it felt fussy and distracting and looked a little like I was being choked with that band hitting across my collarbones. I decided to cut the neck detail off, which immediately looked better, but now I had to figure out how to connect the front bodice to the back bodice since the front yoke had also served as the shoulders of the garment. I decided to cut out some spaghetti straps and use them in lieu of the wide shoulder band straps that are designed into the garment. I liked that it would add a nice little romantic detail to an otherwise fairly bland garment.

Because I used spaghetti straps instead of the neck band/shoulder straps, I also now had to troubleshoot the bust area. I don’t like when a bra shows beneath delicate shoulder straps like this, but I also knew I wouldn’t want to go braless with this jumpsuit. I go braless all the time when I am wearing either a super fitted, rigid bodice or something very flowy, but for anything in between I prefer more support. I decided to take a pair of bra cups from my collection of bra pads that I am always pulling out of RTW sports bras and sew them onto the inside of the lining of the bodice so that they were sandwiched between the lining and the outer fabric and didn’t show on the inside of the garment. This worked an absolute treat! The cups are soft and unobtrusive and the shape fits my girls nicely so you can’t tell that there are cups inside the jumpsuit- no outline of the cup shape or anything, and I feel perfectly supported!

Once I got the bodice just how I liked it, the rest was a breeze- I made my usual pocket adjustment for the Ninnis (I don’t like “free floating” pockets and prefer mine to be extended and sewn into the waistband and side seams), and then I sewed the pants onto the bodice, which was fully lined with self fabric. I realized that I should have lengthened the crotch depth of the pants to give myself a bit more room in the seat area (the rise of the Ninni’s by itself vs the rise of the Ninnis when attached to a bodice is not equal) but they pass the comfort test- when I am putting them on it feels like the crotch will be just a tad too short but as soon as they are properly on my body and zipped up, the jumpsuit feels much better- just need to make sure I don’t impulsively drop into the splits with these, lol!

While installing an invisible back zipper, I also attached two fabric belt pieces to both sides of the back waist seam so that I could tie it in the front- whenever I have a garment that only looks good to me with a belt around it, I try and attach it to the garment in some way because I hate fishing around my closet for lost fabric belts!

And there you have it: a very easy, breezy jumpsuit inspired by something I saw a woman wearing in the security line of the airport, made up in the strangest fabric I have in my stash. Somehow, it works! My wife has celiac disease so the fact that I made a jumpsuit depicting one of the most dangerous foods she can come across is pretty funny to us, but thankfully the jumpsuit hasn’t caused any physical reactions…yet!

Thanks to my Babygirl, Claire, for taking these pictures!

 

Sew Frosting!

/4 Comments/in , /by

 

I’m sure many of you are familiar with the #sewfrosting hashtag that recently started trending on sewcial media. The #sewfrosting challenge is the brainchild of the creators behind True Bias and Closet Case Patterns. It is a call to arms for sewists across the globe to take a little break from sewing cake- cake being the sturdy workhorse portion of our garment sewing, like t-shirts and jeans and button downs- and spend a bit more time sewing frosting, the fancy, frilly, sweet, delightful garments that we perhaps have less opportunities to wear, like cocktail dresses, shiny pants, floral suits, etc. Although I wasn’t calling it by this name, I have been a big proponent of sewing frosting for a few years now. I always used the hashtag #redcarpetDIY because these were the garments I would have a chance to wear when going to work events and promoting tv/film projects, but I might need to go through all my old blog posts and add #sewfrosting to the hashtags now since it is so succinct. I like that the term “sewfrosting” represents something both specific and broad at the same time,  encompassing so many in the community- sewing frosting will look very different to different people, depending on their style, gender identity, culture, habits, ability and even geographical location, but this hashtag allows us to celebrate it all together. Whether your frosting is a gown to wear to an awards ceremony, a fancy pair of pants for church, or a simple shawl made of beautiful lace, it feels like there is room for us all in there to celebrate the idea of challenging ourselves, with fabric, design, and trends. Kelli and Heather Lou turned the #sewfrosting hashtag, which has apparently been around for a while,  into a bit of a contest with some prizes and deals to compete for if you create your garment before the end of November, but let’s be honest- the real prize here is adding something exciting, new and unique to your wardrobe!

My original idea of frosting was inspired (of course!) by this dress I found on Pinterest. I love love love the plunging neckline and armholes that manage to bare some skin but not look too revealing, and although my drafting skills are amatuer at best, I thought I could manage to recreate this look without too much trouble. Unfortunately I was wrong- I got all of the style lines right when I draped this on my dress form, but I couldn’t figure out how to get the sides of the bodice to not gape out around my bust. Initially I thought that perhaps my bust was fuller than the model’s in the photo and therefore this was not the perfect bodice for me, but then I realized that I might have been approaching the shape all wrong- maybe it wasn’t created from darts as I assumed, but created from panels, kind of like a strapless bodice. So I pulled out my trusty TnT strapless dress bodice from Gertie’s Ultimate Book of Dresses and I started the process of hacking the pieces to match the shape of the Pinterest inspo dress…but then I got impatient. I decided I wanted to spend more time on something that I knew was going to come out successfully rather than something that was going to require a lot of experimenting and testing to get right. And this made even more sense because I wanted my submission to get in before the deadline and I didn’t want to run out of time!

Before I aborted my original plan I knew exactly what fabric I wanted to make my #sewfrosting in and thankfully the fabric translated easily into my new plan. The fabric is a beautiful, geometric jacquard purchased from The Fabric Store in LA many months ago, and it’s been sitting in my stash just waiting for the perfect opportunity to be used. This fabric is medium weight with a lot of body, and I knew I wanted to show it off by sewing it into something with a big shape.

My first idea was a strapless bodice with a big wide poofy skirt, but because I am obsessed with jumpsuits right now, I kept coming back to the idea of trading the big skirt for some big pants. Immediately the Winslow Culottes by Helen’s Closet came to mind because of the pleating at the front and back and wide legs- that garment actually looks like a skirt when you’re standing still and it seemed like a really interesting pairing to match with my bodice, but I worried that the body of the fabric wouldn’t marry well with the style lines.

What if it gave out too much poof, or not enough poof, or just ended up looking dowdy? I tried to take my uncut fabric and fold it around my body to give me a good idea of how the end result would look but it was practically impossible to tell, so I took a leap of faith and just went for it- worst case scenario was that it wouldn’t look good at all and I would have to cut shapes out of the pants pieces to create a skirt (which wouldn’t be too hard to do since the pant legs are so wide). With a little urging from sewcial media I went forward with my plan and ultimately it came out beautifully! I wouldn’t change a single thing!

Okay, that’s a lie- I totally would change the fabric of the lining that I used, lol. I cut out my pieces from my fashion fabric, then cut out the same pieces from hair canvas to give the bodice additional stability, and then I cut out another set of pieces from some black silk organza in my stash to make the lining (I opted to create channels for my boning by sewing them onto the lining and hair canvas instead of using separate channeling). I didn’t really have any other fabric in my stash to make the lining out of that would match the color scheme of the fabric and I thought the organza would provide yet another layer of stability for the bodice, so this seemed like a great idea at the time.

Unfortunately I didn’t take into account how scratchy the hair canvas in the middle of the bodice would end up being- it was so itchy that it poked through the organza and immediately started irritating my skin when I first tried the garment on. BIG FAIL! It was so bad that I knew I would have to make some sort of adjustment or the garment would be unwearable, but taking the whole thing apart was out of the question- the bodice was literally ENTIRELY complete: under stitched, hand stitched closed at the waistline and everything! I didn’t have the time or patience to dismantle the whole thing since I had a bunch of birthday gifts to sew for claire, and I also was just NOT FEELING DOING ALL THAT WORK.

So I had to come up with a quicker fix that would work almost as well as replacing the entire layer of organza lining. I opened the bodice back up from the waistline seam and I decided to fill in the spaces between the boning with another layer of silk (this time a white silk habotoi from my stash) to serve as a buffer between the hair canvas and organza lining. It was tricky, imprecise, and took some very delicate maneuvering- I cut out the rough shape of the space needed to be filled from my habotoi silk, carefully slid it into the area underneath the lining, then stitched around the edges of the organza and hair canvas to keep the silk in place. There was one triangular space at each of the top sides where the opening was simply too tiny to stuff the silk into, but I was able to effectively cover the hair canvas everywhere else in the bodice. I wasn’t sure how well it was going to work, but thankfully it did the trick, and the two spots that aren’t covered with the habotoi seem to be too small to be of major concern. I tried the garment on and my skin didn’t start turning red and getting itchy- success!

Other than that snafu with the bodice, everything else came together beautifully. The Winslow Culottes pattern is a STUNNING match for this fabric- I love how the pleats puff out from the waistline and how perfect the length is, and I did some very careful and successful pattern matching on the pieces, too. I changed the shape of the pockets on these pants as I wish I had done on my original pair. They are designed to have a teardrop pocket that hangs from the side seam, but I prefer my side seam pockets to be drafted to the waistline and sewn down into the waist seam which keeps them in place and makes sure they dont wiggle around, get bunched up, and bulk up the silhouette of my hips. I re-drafted this pocket by raising the height to match the waist of the front pants piece and it came out beautifully.

One thing I find hilarious about this make is the fact that used the same black organza for the pockets as I did for the lining- organza is strong and soft, so it seemed like a reasonable thing to do, but I didn’t take into account that this would give me transparent pockets, which you can get a tiny peekaboo at when I pull them open on the sides. This was a happy accident- I LOVE a little peek of skin in an unexpected place! I just need to make sure that my underwear match the fabric a little bit more, lol!

 

All in all I am thrilled at how this garment came out and I am so happy with the journey I went on to get here. I had such different ideas for how I wanted this piece to look at the beginning of the project, but I came out with something entirely unique and very me. This isn’t to say that I won’t give my original Pinterest dress another try at some point in the future, but I am really happy with where I ended up and I probably wouldn’t have created this strapless jumpsuit without starting from where I did. The marriage of fabric and pattern here are so exquisite and this is one of those garments that I haven’t really seen around before- it’s a dynamic shape in a bold print, and I feel so special in it… kind of like a dollop of frosting! Mission accomplished! Thanks for the inspiration, Kelli and Heather Lou!

P.S. Photos by Claire Savage (thanks, honey!)

Hacked and Wrapped Peppermint Jumpsuit Take 2

/3 Comments/in , , /by

It’s Thanksgiving and I have a LOT to be grateful for, y’all! Thanksgiving has always been a tricky holiday for me, which I think I have discussed before on this blog at some point. It’s one of those cultural traditions that I just accepted when I was growing up without giving it much thought, but as I got older and started questioning so much of the history that I was taught in the Alabama school system I attended, I began to realize how complicated it is to uphold traditions that are dear to us while also being aware and even critical about where they come from and what they represent. On the whole, spending a day with family (chosen or otherwise) to break bread (gluten free or otherwise) and celebrate all you are thankful is an absolutely honorable and lovely thing to do. But it is so closely tied with excess and consumption (both of food and black friday deals), and so often separated from the horrors of all the indigenous life lost in the name of this holiday, that it can be really frustrating to know how to celebrate it appropriately. Of course I don’t have an answer for how to do it, and even if I did, that would assume there was a “right” way. All I can do on this day is try and make enough room for all the contradictions that exist within and around me- being thankful for my wonderful, supportive relationships with friends and family, for my loving, encouraging wife, for my health, for my body and all it is capable of, for therapy, for the roof over my head, for the food being cooked in the oven at this very moment, for my brother’s recovery from illness, while also saving space for the fact that so much of what I am thankful for is rooted in privilege- financial privilege, class privilege, able-bodied privilege, gender privilege, geographical privilege and more.

It’s interesting to imagine what all I would be thankful for if there weren’t so many inequities among us all.

Today I am also thankful for the firefighters (both incarcerated and not) for all the hard work they do to keep us safe. I am thankful for the sewing community- the support, encouragement and laughter generated from almost every interaction I have with some of you brightens my days and continues to inspire me. And I am thankful for being an ambassador to The Fabric Store, which keeps challenging my sewing practice, elevating my makes, and ensuring that my stash is stocked with so many divine textiles. Which leads us to our regularly scheduled blog post…

Normally I don’t put several versions of the same make on the blog, because I don’t often have all that much to say about a variation on a pattern, other than “I must really love this thing to keep making it” and “ooooh, look at this pretty fabric”! But the Peppermint jumpsuit that I hacked (thanks to inspo from some other amazing sewing bloggers) got so much attention that I figured it was smart to talk about it on the blog again, especially since I knew I wanted to make it in a slightly dressier fabric compared to my casual, summertime striped linen version.

I really do love seeing how much a pattern can be transformed when you pair it with different textiles and prints. Cotton and linen tend to have a crisper feel against the skin and a more relaxed vibe when sewn up in designs like pants and jumpsuits, but a softer, drapier, more luxurious fabric can make the same design look red carpet ready, and I was excited to see how elevated this fun (and free!) Peppermint/In the Folds jumpsuit hack would look in this gorgeous crepe rayon I got from The Fabric Store. The color I used for this make is lapis (french blue) but they have several stunning hues in this fabric and I have a couple other cuts in my stash that I have yet to dig into- I’ve just been waiting for inspiration to hit! The fabric is silky and flowy but the crepe gives it a nice surface texture that I love, which also makes it shimmer a bit in the light. It’s not transparent but it is lightweight, so I think it works best for a garment that has some ease or some pleating/gathering/folding which allows the fabric to move and dance and catch the light.

Since I had already made the hack once before, this garment was pretty straightforward to create, but I did adjust the legs a bit; the original drafting of the Peppermint Jumpsuit has a significant amount of ease in the legs (particularly around the thighs), which can be seen in all the folds created around the midsection of the garment, which is cinched in by the belt. I made the legs a bit narrower in my first hack with the striped linen fabric, but I brought the seams in even more (on the outer leg) for this crepe rayon version. They tend to bulge out a bit at the sides and look like clown pants, perhaps because of all the other adjusting I did to the top half of the pattern, so tapering them in on the sides gave a much cleaner, more classic silhouette. Everything else was pretty much the same- I created french seams on all the main seams since rayon tends to fray a lot and I prefer clean finished insides for this kind of fabric. Surprisingly I didn’t need to sew in bra strap tabs (I don’t know what the real name for this is, but it’s when you sew snaps onto a little cut of ribbon and place it inside the shoulder seam to keep your bra straps connected to the garment when either one of them likes to slide down) like I did on my striped linen version- I would think that a slinkier fabric like rayon would want to slide down much more than linen would, but the opposite turned out to be true!

One question I got asked a lot about this hack was whether or not you could create bias strips to enclose the raw edges of the neckline/wrap, and there is a way you can do it, but it will involve adjusting the way the front wrap gets attached to the crotch seam, and possibly a redrafting of that area- I think you would need to add seam allowance to the top of the crotch seam edge so that you can flip the bias-edged wrap under and connect it to the seam that way. But I haven’t tried it on this pattern and I’m only working it out in my head so that could be totally wrong, lol. I actually prefer creating a facing for the neckline that gets sewn to the jumpsuit and then under stitched because it provides a lot more stability to that area, which is cut on the bias and has a tendency to stretch out like mad. In fact, I learned after making this second version that it is essential to stay stitch the entire front and back necklines of your pattern pieces as soon as you cut them because they will want to morph out of shape as soon as you start moving the fabric around.

To create my facings, I just traced the edges of my front and back necklines on transparent pattern paper, and then I widened the shapes so that they were about 4-inches all the way around. I interfaced all the pieces, sewed the back halves together, then sewed the back piece to the front pieces at the shoulder seams. Next, I sewed the whole facing piece onto the jumpsuit, pausing at the area where the belt is attached so that I could sew it in the way I like (I prefer my wrap front to maintain it’s triangle shape at the edge, which means I can’t sew it to the belt like normal and just flip it to the right side- but if you don’t want to go through the trouble of all that, you could sew the edge flat instead of pointed).

And that’s all she wrote! I love the way this jumpsuit fits and feels (although this fabric gets a little wrinkly!) and I think I might add a little vintage romper slip (to match the fact that this is a jumpsuit) to my list of future makes because I wouldn’t mind having one more layer of fabric under this thing. I love the color, I love the effect, and I love how I look in it- I can’t wait to wear this for an #auditionlewk when I go in for Recently Divorced Mom In A Small Town Trying To Get Her Groove Back While Going Back to School to Become A Beautician 😉

Happy Thanksgiving if you celebrate it, and Happy ThanksLiving if you don’t!

 

 

 

 

Boiler Suit Pattern Testing

/8 Comments/in , /by

I’ve never pattern tested before because I like to limit my “deadline sewing” as much as possible. Sewing with the pressure of a due date takes the fun out of the craft for me, so, with the exception of being an ambassador for The Fabric Store and sewing up holiday gifts for others, I just don’t do it very often. However, sometimes my trycuriosity gets the better of me and I will say yes to things I haven’t done before so I can at least have the experience under my belt and know whether I like something or not based on knowledge instead of assumptions. When Alice & Co. reached out to me on IG and asked if I was interested in testing their new Intrepid Boiler jumpsuit pattern (how did they know I was on a major jumpsuit kick???), my instinct was to say no, but then I saw an image of the design. It was essentially the Madewell one-piece that inspired this jumpsuit, the one I saw Heather Lou in, fell in love with, and then consequently tumbled down a jumpsuit rabbithole in an attempt to recreate it! If you read that blog post you’ll know that I diverged from my original inspo and, while I love where I landed, it’s different from the utilitarian, no-frills jumpsuit that first caught my eye.

Well, surprisingly, the Boiler Jumpsuit ended up being the answer I needed all along! And now I am glad I didn’t waste too much time trying to cobble together a pattern for it because this one is surely better than what I would have been able to hack. This jumpsuit was a relatively simple make, although there are of course some changes that have been made since the tester versions went out. I think the majority of the changes address design details as opposed to fit details, and my jumpsuit fit really well right off the bat.

The tester pattern was comprised of sleeves, a yoke, front/ back bodice, pant legs and pockets, and the waistlines of the bodice and pant legs have extra seam allowance included so that you can baste the pieces together and decide how much or how little room you need for comfortable bending and moving around. You know how some indie pants patterns give an inch of seam allowance at the side seams so that you can adjust as needed throughout the hips and leg area? Well this pattern allows you do that when connecting the top and bottom of the jumpsuit and it is super helpful to have included. Since the general fit of the jumpsuit is loose, the length through the torso and waist was the only area I needed to adjust, and the extra seam allowance makes this very straightforward and efficient.

I was surprised to see that there were no side, slant or patch pockets included in the tester design, and I had no idea how much I was going to miss them til the whole garment was completed and I tried it on and realized that my hands were aching to be jammed into something (that’s what she said); the jumpsuit is just so functional looking and utilitarian that to wear it without pockets felt wrong- where will I put my tools? My candy cigarettes? My lovenotes?? So I went back and added patch pockets to the front legs of mine after it was already finished, only because they were simpler and quicker than taking the legs and waistband apart and drafting a whole pocket. I think the patch pockets work fine on this (I used the pattern pieces from my Madewell hack) but a regular side seam pocket would be great, too.

Unfortunately I can’t speak much on how well the instructions are written because the ones for the tester version were sparse in a couple of places and they said they added more information but I’m not quite sure what they look like; I used the burrito method when attaching my yoke to the bodice pieces (they used a different method in the instructions) and unfortunately they left out the zipper installation instructions for the tester pattern (which they said will also be included in the finalized pattern). The zipper is where my only real issue with this pattern came into play. There was literally nothing about how to attach the zipper to the front pieces, so when I came to that part of the construction I decided to forgo the zipper altogether. The front zipper was my least favorite part of the jumpsuit design, only because, at least for the tester version, there was no hidden placket or flap to conceal it, so it was just a big zipper going from crotch to neck. As I’ve said, I love how practical this garment is, but I felt like the zipper made it look a bit too simple or costumey- for me it was just missing some element of sophistication. I decided at the last minute to draft some front facings to each bodice piece so that I could fold them in and use snaps to close the garment up instead of the zipper.

I wish I had taken better notes on how to achieve this look because, although Alice & Co. loved my finished jumpsuit and told us testers that they were going to include some button/snap placket options to include with the zipper, I just found out that they thought the placket was “too complicated” to include in the pattern and they decided not to add the option after all. I beg to differ on this point since I was able to figure the placket out on my own and I am by no means a designer- I think that with the proper instructions, a beginning sewist could just as easily create a beautiful placket as they could a front zipper, there are just more steps. I must admit, I was disappointed to find that they were leaving the placket option out of the pattern because they seemed so excited about it at first and it felt like my most significant contribution as a pattern tester. But then this morning they sent me an email saying that they might offer the plackets as a hack to be released in the coming weeks, so I will keep my fingers crossed that they offer that option up to future makers of the pattern.

I can’t remember exactly what I did to create my front button plackets but it wasn’t very scientific anyways. I modeled it after another jumpsuit I made (hasn’t made it to the blog yet) which has a front button placket. Essentially I drafted two facings for each side of the bodice that extended from the crotch to the neckline which were about 4 inches wide, interfaced them, sewed them to the bodice front edges, then I understitched them. Because these pieces were not drafted and taken into account from the beginning of the make, they aren’t lined up perfectly in the center of the jumpsuit, and the overlap of the bodice fronts is pretty narrow- there is only like an inch or so of overlapping fabric underneath the snaps, but it was still plenty of room for me to attach them. If I had known I wanted to add these plackets from the beginning of the make, I would have extended the front bodice edges out a couple of inches so that they overlapped instead of met at the center (a zipper means each edge will meet together roughly in the center, with the zipper taking up a little bit of space, but for a placket, the pieces are drafted to be wider so that they can overlap, if that makes sense- you need the right and left front bodice edges to sit on top of each other so that a button or snap can be attached to both pieces of fabric and connected).

On the bottom of the crotch, after snipping into the seam line to allow the facings to be tacked down to one side, I topstitched the edge of the placket onto the front of the pants to keep it in place. I also extended the collar just a bit to accommodate the adjusted neckline. Lastly, I extended the waist band pieces further towards the front center of the jumpsuit and I inserted a length of elastic inside it and sewed it down on the fronts and side seams. I knew I would never style this jumpsuit with a belt the way that the pattern photo showed, but I also knew I didn’t want the waist to be totally loose around my body, since there is a a lot of ease drafted into the pattern. I left the elastic pretty loose so it doesn’t hug my waist but it cinches in enough to make me feel like I am not wearing a tent. Aside from shortening the lengths of the sleeves and pants legs to fit my petite frame, those are the major adjustments I made to the pattern.

All in all, I really love how this jumpsuit came out and I think it’s a dead ringer for the original Madewell jumpsuit (above) that I fell in love with, except this one actually fits me. My favorite thing about the design of this garment (besides the great drafting) is the collar- it’s a very simple one-piece collar, nothing particularly special about it, but I think it works so well on these coveralls, and I wish I had made my dusty rose jumpsuit with this collar instead- next time!

Although I absolutely want to make one of these jumpsuits in a lightweight yellow twill like the Madewell inspo one, I like how this striped linen (gifted to me by Mimi G…and by “gifted” I mean she let me rifle through her shelves of giveaway fabric one day lol) works with this pattern- I knew I was toeing the line to have it look like a prisoner’s uniform with the vertical stripes and subdued color, but it doesn’t look nearly as drab as all that. It’s really fun and easy to wear and I have had NOTHING but compliments on this thing every time I wear it. I have dressed it down with my memade sneakers (as seen in these photos) and I have also worn it with clogs which made it feel slightly more dolled up- there are a lots of cool ways to style this garment and I am excited to discover more of them (I’ve always wanted to wear something like this with a t shirt underneath and the top half off with the sleeves tied around my waist! It’s like Car Mechanic Realness!)

As for whether or not I will ever pattern test again? Who knows! Maybe if it’s for a design I am super excited about, like this one, or a pattern company I love. Alice & Co. was friendly and gracious throughout the process, and despite my disappointment about them not offering more options for the final version, I think the jumpsuit is a great pattern and will be fun for beginning and intermediate sewists alike. The real question is… has my my thirst for jumpsuits finally been quenched?!

Striped Wrap Jumpsuit

/12 Comments/in , /by

This project is brought to you by a domino-effect of inspiration via instagram (which is my FAVORITE kind)! I initially saw Katie’s (of What Katie Sews) absolutely fantastic wrap jumpsuit that she posted about on her blog here and fell in love. I love the shape! I love the fabric! I love the design! Wrap jumpsuits aren’t really a big thing right now, but they should be- I have been on a jumpsuit kick the past couple of months that is unreal (you’ll see the fruits of that obsession here on the blog soon), so every time I see a new version of one I get super excited. I have never before seen a design quite like Katie’s jumpsuit, though, and according to her blog post she got her idea from a garment made by Threadsnips.

Catherine sewed up a very cool vintage jumpsuit pattern that wrapped around the waist with ties and suggested that other sewist’s could recreate this design fairly easily by using a simple jumpsuit pattern and altering a couple of the lines of the pattern pieces, which is what Katie did to great success. Katie used a Butterick pattern she had in her stash for adapting hers, but I didn’t have anything in my arsenal that would work well for this hack so I took Catherine’s advice and just used the free In the Folds jumpsuit pattern from Peppermint Magazine. I am not gonna meticulously share all the details of what I did to adjust the pattern since both Katie and Catherine did the hard work of it already, WITH pictures (bless y’all!), so check out their blog posts to get the very simple details of exactly how to hack the pattern.

I will share the general details of what I did though! First I adjusted the shoulder seam of the jumpsuit pattern because I knew I wanted a little hint of a sleeve and not something totally sleeveless, as the In the Folds jumpsuit is drafted. I basically moved the width of the dart of the front of the jumpsuit to change the angle of the shoulder seam so that it was raised higher, and I added several inches to the length of the seam to make it jut out from my arm. I drew in the pattern line for the rest of the sleeve (I basically just mimicked the line of Katie’s Butterick jumpsuit sleeve) and connected it to the side seam of the body of the jumpsuit, copying the same lines for the back piece. I adjusted the side seams of the jumpsuit pattern to make it a little closer fitting since some of the images I saw of the pattern in a google search seemed like it had an awful lot of ease in the waist and hip area.

After sewing up a muslin in some old bedsheets and improperly adjusting the length (I overestimated how much shorter the jumpsuit should be in the bodice and ended up making it WAY too short, so I added all but about a quarter inch of the length back when I moved on to my fashion fabric), I used a gorgeous cut of linen from The Fabric Store for my wearable garment. I have been SO into stripes lately (particularly stripe play!) and thankfully TFS has stocked a ton of really beautiful pieces to choose from. Plus, Los Angeles weather means I can get away with wearing this wonderfully breezy fabric for quite a while longer.

Initially I wanted to play around with the direction of the stripes (like one half of the jumpsuit in horizontal and the other in vertical), but my yardage wasn’t quite wide enough to accomodate proper pattern placement, so I stuck with the vertical stripes all the way around the garment and I’m actually really happy it turned out this way. The stripes of this yardage are already pretty dynamic, so adding even more drama to it might have put it into clown territory? I mean, I still love the idea of the directional stripes for a jumpsuit like this, but maybe if the stripes are all one color/size/pattern it will have a more subdued overall look. I’m sure my original vision is still somewhere in my future!

Anyways, after I sewed up my linen, I drafted facings for 1. the front neckline all the way down through the added triangular piece of the wrap to the crotch seam, 2. the back neckline, and 3. the sleeves. My original plan was to just use bias binding for the edges but I didn’t have very much striped fabric leftover and I also realized I should have something a bit more stable for the neckline since it is such a long seam line (also, after sewing this garment up, I know that for next time I need to STAY STITCH THOSE FRONT NECKLINE EDGES, because that fabric stretched waaaay out in the process of sewing everything else up). I used some white scrap linen I had for the facings and I interfaced them all, sliding the ends of the ties between the fabric and facing on each triangular edge before edgestitching them closed.

After drafting and sewing up the facings, the actual construction of the garment was SO FAST AND EASY. I left a hole opposite the edge of one side of my wrap for the waist tie to get pulled through, under stitched all my facings, I edgestitched the wrap onto the opposite pant leg a few inches past the crotch line to keep it closed. Since the front opens up to a wrap style, the back zipper is unnecessary, but it also means that the front wrap wants to splay open a bit, so I added a snap at front center to keep the wrap closed and I also added some bra strap snaps at the shoulder seams- I think there is a more technical term for this, but basically I created a loop inside the garment for the bra straps to be hooked onto which helps keep the shoulder seams in place.

I am CRAZY about this jumpsuit: it’s comfortable, summery, fun, and I have never seen anything quite like it in a store before. I am dying to make it in a solid, slightly more supple fabric for the fall- maybe like a crepe rayon or even a printed satin-y silk. I might try to add some pockets to my next one, and I might also try and adjust the angle of the neckline so the garment won’t want to fall open as much (hopefully negating the need for the bra strap snaps!). And longer waist ties for more drama! But all in all, this make was exceptionally quick and satisfying to make, and it’s technically not summer anymore but I should be able to get a few good wears out of this before the weather gets too cool. I am so very thankful for other sewists sharing their hacks, tips and makes with the community, (thanks, Katie and Catherine!) and thankful to Claire for taking these bright, pretty pictures!

(outtake)

Molyneux for Vogue

/6 Comments/in , /by

https://www.instagram.com/p/BmpE1HvAoz0/?taken-by=jasikaistrycurious

I got this Molyneux for Vogue Paris Originals pattern for myself a couple years ago when I went on a vintage pattern rampage on etsy. I was drawn to the strappy back of this dress, but I think I was even more drawn to the illustration on the front which makes the dress look a little like a jumpsuit. It was an unconscious connection I think, but truth be told, I wasn’t all that inspired by the dress as-is, I was inspired by the idea of what the dress could be.

 

I recently went on a little purge of my pattern file cabinet and got rid of a few handfuls of patterns- mostly printed Colette designs from my first couple years of sewing, before I knew that their block was so ill-fitting on my body, a few Big 4 patterns that I made and absolutely hated (who can ever forget THIS mess of a dress?) and some vintage patterns that either weren’t in my size or just not to my taste. I get gifted lots of vintage patterns by people who don’t sew, which is AWESOME, but they aren’t always my style and I am just coming to the realization now that I don’t have to keep them just because they were given with love. Coincidentally this realization has happened right as I await a big box of patterns sent to me by an incredibly generous instagrammer who has amassed a collection of vintage patterns in my size- she bought them over the years because she loves the illustrations, and decided she would rather hand them off to someone who can actually make and wear them. I AM VERY LUCKY! But of course I also needed to make room for them! Anyways, as I was rifling through my stash, I came across this Molyneux beauty and felt re-inspired to put it in my queue. Aside from the misleading illustration that makes the design look like a jumpsuit, I noticed that I was also drawn to the crosshatch marks the illustrator used to create a vague print design on the fabric. It looks a little like plaid, or maybe just a textural tweed, and suddenly I couldn’t imagine trying to make this pattern in anything else.

As I attempt to ride out the rest of the year without buying any more fabric (not too difficult a task after having purchased so many cuts in preparation for The Fabric Store in LA closing its’ doors this summer), I am making good use of my stash and only choosing patterns for my queue that can be paired with what I already have…and it just so happens that I had a scant 2 yards of this gorgeous dark blue plaid that would make a great replica of the illustration on this Vogue envelope. The plaid, which reminds me of graph paper, seems to be a cotton blend of sorts. Initially I thought it was just a plain cotton but once I cut into it I noticed those tiny, nearly invisible threads clinging to my rotary cutter, so I thought it had a little polyester in it. Now that I have worn this jumpsuit around and I see that it barely wrinkles at all, I’m positive that’s the fibre content. I generally stay away from polyester fibers because they aren’t a very environmentally friendly material and polyester also tends to make me sweat like a mother, but since my armpits aren’t covered by the fabric, they are able to easily breathe,, and I sure do appreciate being able to sit down for a long while and stand back up without hundreds of pleats and folds criss-crossing my lap (I also like to use cotton/poly/spandex blends for stretch denim).

Because I didn’t have much fabric to play around with, I wasn’t able to do any amazing pattern matching with this plaid, but thankfully it’s not super obvious because the plaid is actually pretty plain. The design of the original Molyneux garment is very simple: one long dress front cut on the fold, two back dress pieces, some facings, and the tie. I decided to chop the dress pattern pieces off at the waist (adding in seam allowance) to make the bodice and then use the Jenny Overalls and Trousers pattern by Closet Case for the bottoms. Closet Case is my go-to pattern company for pants that fit well and need only minor adjustments for my shape (if any), and although I hadn’t made this pattern yet for myself, I felt confident that they would work well.

I omitted the side zipper on the pants to match up with the back zipper required for the bodice, and I used the view of the Jenny pants with pockets. I also added about an inch of length to the front and back pieces of the pants to make it work with the hack. The Jenny pants design is drafted with a waistband,  but since I wasn’t using one, I needed to make sure the waistline of the pants was high enough to accommodate that missing pattern piece. After grading between sizes at the waist and hip, the pants fit pretty much right off the bat with just a tiny bit of adjusting at the waist, so next I went to work on my bodice.

I didn’t make a muslin for the bodice because I like to live on the edge, and I almost played myself! After constructing the entire bodice, facings and all, I excitedly tried it on and was disappointed to see that the bust area was HUGE on me. It sagged out so much at the side seams around the collarbones that you could see clear through from one side of the garment to the other, haha! The fix for this was easy, I just needed to add a bust dart dart to pull in that extra fabric, but that meant I had to undo the facings on the top side seams, cut them shorter, and then re-attach them to the underarm facings. It dragged out the construction, taking way longer than it needed to, but I am of course happy that I took the time to fix that area- without the added darts, the whole bodice would have looked sloppy and ill fitting. The construction of the facings and tie/straps were a little…strange. Vintage patterns are known to have strange instructions, but some of the technical tools and materials that were available back then are really outdated now, so I got thrown off a few times. Specifically the area where the strap/tie connects to the neckline of the bodice is bizarre, and the instructions require you to attach a strip of “binding” (I think that’s what they called it?) to the neckline over the gathered seam stitching before sewing the strap on. The strap opens up to encase the raw edge of the seam when it’s sewn onto the neckline, so I’m not sure why there needed to be an extra piece of fabric sewn there- maybe just to keep that area stable? Either way, it’s weird to follow instructions when you aren’t sure what you’re following them for, but I did it and it looks fine.

Instead of sewing darts onto the front piece of the bodice, I took inspiration from my $34 dress and just used pleats. I figured they would visually flow better with the gathered neckline, be more comfortable, and also give me a little room to play with in case I needed to adjust the waistline of the bodice once I sewed everything up to try it on. I was correct on all counts! This bodice makes me look kind of busty since it’s so full, but I’m in to it, and the pleats at the waistline are a lovely match for the neckline. Amazingly the back bodice pieces fit almost perfectly with the length of the back pants pieces, so all I had to do was mark where my zipper should go and sew it up.

Despite skipping a muslin and hacking two patterns together that I had never even made for myself before, this jumpsuit came together really quickly- it was completed in less than two days. I absolutely love the fit- it feels casual with the airy bodice paired with the wide cropped legs, but it also looks really chic and put together, and it seems like a pretty great transitional piece to move from summer (which doesn’t end here in LA any time soon) to fall. I think this piece will look really cute with a jean jacket or long coatigan and some booties. As I discussed in a previous post, I have found myself shying away from florals and bright colors lately and leaning towards a slightly conservative, neutral palette in shades I love (pastels) or interesting but subtle prints, like this cool plaid. When I bought this fabric I planned on making an Archer for the cooler months- nothing very exciting or new, but I just liked the print so much that I had to get it and couldn’t think of anything more interesting to pair it with. I love that I pushed myself a bit out of my comfort zone and went with a design that is totally unexpected for this print- less fear, more try!

MiMi G for Simplicity Jumpsuit in Purple

/5 Comments/in /by

My first idea for this jumpsuit was pretty ambitious- I had just purchased two earthy tones of satin twill from The Fabric Store in copper and pink, and I thought they would make a really dynamic version of this Mimi G Style for Simplicity 8426 pattern, which had been on my list of to-makes since the moment it was revealed on Mimi’s IG. I loved the design so much because it looked gorgeous in a head-to-toe solid but it also allowed room for playing around with texture and color blocking. Although silk is notoriously tricky to work with, I didn’t have too much trouble sewing this pattern in it- at this point in my sewing career I know what I am getting into when I work with finicky fabrics so I can plan accordingly. The issue was that the bodice ended up just being too flimsy in the soft, drapey silk!

https://www.instagram.com/p/BgCic4rhowr/?taken-by=jasikaistrycurious

Off the bolt the fabric was incredibly smooth and supple and it had a surprising amount of body to it- it held its’ shape pretty well for something so soft and silky. But once I pre-washed it, it got much drapier and didn’t hold the shape of the bodice nearly as well as I hoped it would. I got really close to the end of the project and then abandoned ship because it was looking wrinkly and pitiful and dull. Full disclosure, I should have at least muslined the bodice top before I cut into my beautiful silk, but even if I had I wouldn’t have liked the way the silk looked with the bodice of this pattern. But surprisingly the pants look pretty great in the silk! They have a lux pajamas vibe to them, and even though the fabric for the bodice was sacrificed in the process, all is not lost- I plan on adding a black velvet strapless bodice to the pants which will provide a lot more structure to the garment but will also keep that vintage flair to the look that I was aiming for with my head-to-toe silk version.

 

 

OK, so that version didn’t work, but this sturdy purple one definitely did! I got this jewel toned crepe (I think it’s polyester) from The Fabric Store, and it’s got all the body and stability that my silk didn’t have, which is a perfect pairing with this jumpsuit.

Mimi G’s patterns are the only versions of Big 4 I have found that don’t require sizing down several sizes so I graded from a 10 in the bodice to a 12 in the hips which matched my measurements and it was great- I always have to take in the waist and back of pretty much every pattern I make, but everything else was drafted as a good fit for me, with the exception of the back yoke. Again, I didn’t make a muslin of the bodice first because I tissue fit it and it seemed perfect. It was only after finishing the entire garment and trying to it on that I saw how poorly the back yoke fit. It’s a pretty strange adjustment that I need to make- essentially I need to take in the seam where the back yoke hits the top of the back bodice on either side of the zipper, about 3/8 inch, and then grade out to nothing at the side seams. I should be able to make this adjustment without having to take the entire bodice apart so I feel confident that I can get it done fairly quickly, but still, what a bizzare fix! I have never had a garment that needed horizontal pinching at my upper back before!

Aside from that area, which Claire says is barely noticeable, everything else fits great. The pants are gathered at the waistline and very roomy (I actually would have been fine without grading to the next size up since there is so much room down there) which means that the slant pockets look terrific and don’t bulge out on me. I LOVE that this garment has pockets. They don’t take away from the silhouette at all but they do give me a place to put my hands and my chapstick, yay! I had a lot of trouble with my back zipper at the waistline because the fabric is pretty squishy and therefore thick at the zipper closure. It kept getting stuck either right above or below the “belt”, which I knew would be a problem when I tried to go to the bathroom and couldn’t get myself in or out, so I had to widen my line of stitch in this area to allow for more space around the zipper teeth. This means that you can see the zipper tape a bit more clearly than when it was sewn more tightly, but hey, I can handle a glimpse of dark purple zipper tape if it means I wont pee on myself trying to get out of this thing.

The construction for this was a little different than I anticipated- I am used to completing the pants and bodice separately, then stitching at the waist line, inserting the zipper, and slip stitching the lining closed around the zipper. The method the pattern used was fairly similar, but the lining of the bodice isn’t put in until after the zipper is inserted. I have no idea if it was better or worse than the other methods I have am used to but it was fun to change up the routine a bit!

I love the way the “belt” is drafted onto this pattern, it provides some visual interest without being a separate detachable piece, and it’s not tacked down on the top so it gives a bit of depth to the look. I blind stitched the hems of the legs closed instead of sewing them with my machine because, again, this fabric is pretty thick and has a tendency to show lines of stitching very well.

As much as I love jumpsuits, I don’t make them very often because I am always overwhelmed by how much additional fitting I will likely have to do for them, so you can imagine that this pattern was a pure joy. It required minimal adjustments, and the wide legs, though stylistically not for everyone, give you a lot of flexibility and comfort with the relaxed fit. I am usually pretty iffy on wide legs like these but the pairing with the bodice is just perfection- a streamlined, close-fitting top with these gigantic pant legs is just so fun and chic, even on my short frame. I am becoming a bigger and bigger fan of the Mimi G Style patterns for Simplicity- I’ve only made a few (separate from the Sew Sew Def catalogue) but so far each pattern has been such joy to make and to wear and I love having another line of designs to add to my No-Fail List.

As much as I love this garment, I do feel like it’s still a bit on the safe side, and I will probably try it again with some more exciting elements on the top. I love Mimi’s leather version shown on the pattern envelope, and I have a few gorgeous leathers in my stash that would make a great pairing with this design, so stay tuned for Dynamic Jumpsuit Take 3!

Having weird technical difficulties with these photos for some reason, which is why my face is blurry in all of them, but I figure as long as the garment is in focus, who cares about the face LOL. Thanks as always to Claire for helping me capture the clothing!

Ode to Oona

/6 Comments/in , /by

https://www.instagram.com/p/BD1mBH4RF5O/?taken-by=jasikaistrycurious

One of my favorite online fabric stores, LAFinch Fabrics, has this sneaky habit of filling your orders with extra doo-dads, including but not limited to a fistful of swatches from their inventory, tied up in a little bow. I love this for obvious reasons; being able to touch a piece of fabric gives me so much more of an idea of how it will sew up as opposed to just seeing it on a screen. And that’s how I ended up with this multi-colored animal inspired rayon, a fabric I would never, NEVER have bought after simply seeing a photo of it. I’m staunchly against animal prints in my own wardrobe, but not because I have any moral or aesthetic issues against them. For me, it’s like the color red-  I think it looks great on every single person except me. I’m just not a RED personality, you know? Bright orange? Sure. But not red. And in this same vein, I am not really an animal print person either. So when I saw a rectangle of this bold rayon peeking out of my fistful of new swatches, I didn’t give it a second glance. That is, not until my fingers gently grazed the material while fishing around for one of the other pieces in the stack. OH MY GOD. Is this for real?, I thought. So supple! So soft! So stable, yet flowy! It felt kind of creamy, if cream could be a fabric. It was absolutely dreamy. But the print simply wasn’t my favorite. I liked the colors. I like the graphic aspect of it. But purple and blue tinted (zebra? tiger? leopard?) print?! Come on! That’s not me! It took me a week of hemming and hawing before I finally asked myself “what would Oona do?”

Oona (aka Marcy), the sewing community’s favorite advocate for brightly printed/boldly colored/funkily designed textiles; Oona, who doesn’t shy away from dazzle or flash; Oona, who wouldn’t think twice about snatching up a fabric like this because she probably doesn’t impose arbitrary boundaries for herself on what she should or should not wear. I think everyone in the online sewing community has been inspired by Oona’s makes at some point in their lives, because even if she is wearing something you wouldn’t have considered making for yourself, her beauty and style are undeniable, and apparently limitless. So there, I had my answer. Oona would say yes, so I was going to give it a try, too.

patterns

My yes came shortly before my birthday, and although I had no plans to make myself anything to celebrate my new year, when it arrived in the mail (with a whole new fistful of swatches to drool over, of course), I was suddenly inspired to use it for something special. I had two days before my birthday and no idea what to make with this beautiful fabric, which is generally not the best equation for me and a successful make, but I forged ahead anyways. Eventually I settled on a hack of my favorite vintage jumpsuit pattern, vintage Simplicity 5503, and the Southport Dress by True Bias. Both patterns are (mostly) TnTs for me; I have made each pattern twice, hacking the neckline into one of Gertie’s designs for one of the jumpsuits and sticking to the original design for the others. I was excited to put these two looks together- I love the casual look and comfortable feeling of the jumpsuit’s flexible waist and roomy legs, and I love the relaxed yet streamlined design of the bodice of the dress.

gertie_neckline

vintage simplicity jumpsuit in one of my fav fabrics I have ever seen from The Fabric Store (the print is various sizes of flocks of birds!)

southport

Southport Dress by True Bias, which gets worn A LOT.

For my mash up, I nixed the elastic band in favor of the Southport’s drawstring detail, and I used snaps instead of buttons for the bodice.

close2

Since there were no waistline darts to accommodate, it required only a little bit of fudging to make the width of the jumpsuit’s bottom match up to the dress’s top, and I ended up shortening the bodice in the back about 2 inches to take in some of the fabric that was pooling at my lower back (this was not an adjustment I ever needed to make for the Southport dress in the past, so it was definitely a result of using pants for the bottom instead of a skirt).

flat

All in all an easy make, and it was done in plenty of time for my birthday, even though I didn’t end up wearing it on the actual day- I was in (memade) sweatpants eating pie and hanging out with my two BFFs to ring in my new year, and I am NOT complaining!

dance

Now that the make is done and I have had some time to ruminate a bit on all my last-minute decision making, I have come to some conclusions. Number one: this fabric was wasted on this jumpsuit. I think it looks fantastic, and honestly, whenever I wear it I feel like Blanche from the Golden Girls, but I think that using this fabric for anything other than a swooshy, drapey, flowy garment was just silly. It deserves to be a dress, something with simple lines and a full skirt so that I could have maximized all the properties that drew me to it in the first place. This pattern hack was meant for something with a little more stability and weight to it, and those properties aren’t the things that make this textile so incredible.

stand1

Which brings me to number two: I am SO glad that I listened to my inner Oona and I bought this fabric! At first I kept thinking, it’s just not very me, but the truth is that if I am wearing it and liking it, then that’s as me as it gets. The me of today might not be the exact same me of last year or even yesterday, but that’s why so many of us sew, right? To express whatever version of ourselves that seems to be chirping the loudest at the time. Sometimes we go through phases where we are really into knits, or prints, or pastels, or skirts, or skin tight, or super loose. But those phases don’t make us any less of ourselves- rather, they are proof that we are undefinable, ever evolving, capable of variance. When I look through my closet, it kind of feels like I am flipping through the pages of a diary; I know where I was, what was going on and how I was feeling with every single memade garment inside. And when I come across this jumpsuit, even though it’s the only animal print hanging amongst it’s brothers and sisters, it looks perfectly at home. It reminds me that my style can change, that even if I take risks, the things I make are still a good representation of who I am.

disco

Thanks to all the Oonas out there continuing to provide inspiration!