Pattern testing: Sewaholic Cambie dress muslin

Size 8 muslin (left) and size 6 dress (right)

As I mentioned I was a pattern tester for this dress. The Cambie dress has a sweetheart neckline with gathered cap sleeves and a full of A-line skirt. I love dresses and my favorite part of the design are the sleeves with a 'sleeveless' look. If you look at the picture of the back you can see why isn't it sliding off the shoulders. A clever solution. I believe this is another pattern that looks good on everyone, with every type of body shape.

As always I started by making a muslin. Since the skirt has two versions and I always choose the A-line skirts I decided to invest some extra muslin fabric and sew up the complete dress with the gathered skirt. I made size 8 since that is my Sewaholic size, though I used size 8 bust and size 6 waist measurements for my Lonsdale dress. As you can see the top turned out too big, but I instantly loved how the dress looked like! I felt like a little girl in a swirly skirt and spent the rest of the evening (pinned up) in my dress...while making a size 6 muslin for the top with the waistband to try out the fit. (It is visible that I used facings for the neckline of my muslin instead of a double layer)

I thought the gathered skirt would make me look bulky around the waist and hip, but it actually looks much better than I thought. I like it!
I simply went down one size and size 6 was a perfect match. I usually have to shorten the bodices but this one fits right out of the envelop. The length was just right, I used my blind hem foot for the eyelet fabric, for me the skirt shouldn't be shorter than this. As fort the fabric I wanted to try a swiss dot but wasn't be able to get it here in the Netherlands. Somehow this type of fabric just doesn't exist? The I've found this pretty eyelet with the big circles and now I feel sorry for buying just enough for this dress. I feel like I want to make at least 10 summer dresses out of eyelet fabric!

 

The dress wasn't hemmed here and I just pinned up the back. Isn't it pretty?

Renfrew top muslin

  

Well, all the plans for the weekend has changed. Instead continuing working on my Marfy dress I made anther muslin. I ordered the new Sewaholic pattern, the Renfrew top a couple of days ago and it arrived on friday!

The Renfrew top is a fitted knit top with banded hems and variations for the sleeves and neckline. I've seen a lot of pics around on sewing blogs and thought the fit was great. Also I love wearing V-neck tops with 3/4 sleeves and somehow, there aren't many out there to buy. This was the second pattern I ordered from Sewaholic Canada (there are no resellers in the Netherlands). Ordering the pattern was easy, and the delivery quick.

Of course I had to start with the construction of a muslin!
Since I haven't sewn knits for a long time I did not have knit fabrics in the house. But I did have a giant pile of crew shirts from my friend. I used an old, man's x-large sized crew-shirt which has been worn and washed for years and years. I thought long enough to make it a bit sturdy to qualify as a 'stable knit'. Since I don't have a serger I can't sew with really stretchy knits anyway.



 
Sizing is always tricky, so I pulled out my other Sewaholic pattern, the Lonsdale dress. I used size 8 for the bust tapering to size 6 in the waist and hips on that dress. I used the finished garment measurements and compared to the Renfew top finished measurements. Decided to go with size 8 at the top part (shoulders and bust) and tapered to size 4 at the waist and hips.

The V-neck neckband was a bit tricky, an interesting construction. It didn't turned out perfect, but will get better next time around.  I followed the instructions and used zigzag stitch around the neckline to secure the seam allowance and I think it looks good. (When I was young my grandma used to make almost all our clothes and she used to sew knits with zigzag stitches too.) Next time I might try to use a double needle, that way there would be two straight stitching lines instead a zigzag.

I think the results are not bad! I didn't have enough fabric to make the waistband, so I just folded the seam allowance back and stitched with a zigzag stitch. It is just a muslin, but surprisingly, the length of the top turned out just right! With a waistband would be a bit longer, but also perfect.
(I never wear my shirts tucked in) There is enough room under the arms, the top feels roomy enough but still nicely fitted.

  

  

Marfy dress - sleeve variation

The longer I looked at the pictures the more I thought there is something wrong... Guess what, it turned out it was the sleeve. Somehow, there is just too much of volume there, it draws all attention away from the pretty details of the bodice and the skirt:
  

I figured, I had to take out some of the volume to make it look better.
Here are the before and after pictures (going from the 1980's to the 1940's!):
   

How I did it?
It is a quite simple change. I didn't even removed the sleeve.
First of all, the type of sleeve I wanted is the classic 1940's type puffed but short, straight sleeve. I took out the Colette Ceylon dress pattern. It is another contemporary but definitely vintage style pattern. The sleeves are gathered at the shoulders but further plain. Exactly what I wanted for this dress too:



Comparing the patterns the sleeves they have a different sleeve cap, so I left that as it was.
I was interested in lower end of the sleeve. The Marfy pattern is made for a classic gathered sleeve, it widens towards the cuff. The Ceylon dress pattern is more fitted, narrower at the bottom.

1. I folded the wider bottom parts inwards, parallel with the side lines of the Colette pattern:



2. As you can see the bottom curve is just the opposite (inwards on the Ceylon pattern) so I took that over too. That's it!
I might make the sleeves slightly longer (an inch or so =2,5 cm) falling just above the elbow.
With this little modification my muslin is just perfect and the pattern pieces are adjusted too. Just have to find the right fabric to sew up this dress! My first idea was to use cotton fabric but I realized that it would look much better in a fabric with a better drape.

Creating a cloche pattern - part 1.

  

Let's start with a statement:
It is pure for my own pleasure that I attempt to make my own patterns. I don't use any existing pattern to do this, gather only visual inspiration from the internet. I am not a pattern maker and I'm not intended to sell any of my patterns and earn money that way!

Well, here is my current obsession, the 1920's cloche hat.
Cloche inspiration: There are lots of beautiful cloche pictures on the internet. There are two sorts of hats called a cloche: the one with the close-fitting round crown with mostly no brim and the more cylindric 'brimmed felt' type cloche (like in the illustration below). Both are reminiscent for the 1920's. For a nice collection of fashion drawings  click here.

What I like is the close-to-the-face shape of these hats and the embellishments. You didn't show your forehead in the twenties! The height of the hat was supposed to add height to the wearer's length too. Cloches were perfect to wear with the new hairstyle, the bob haircut. The brooch type embellishments like flowers or abstract, often art-deco-like shapes were made of fabric are used to cover up seam-lines. For myself because of my round face I'd choose the cylindric cloche instead of the round (helmet-like) one.



If you want to get in the mood, just look at these gorgeous creations!!! Pretty, handmade, almost art I would say. Since I don't work with felt I must take a look at cloches that are sewn. My inspiration are these, because these hats have a pretty cloche-shape and are sewn from unshaped woven fabrics.
I took one hat for further analyze: this one, because of the plain color and pretty shape. The structure is consisting of 3 parts: top, side, brim just like my winter hat.

Now, what are the (visible) differences in the structure?
Top: 
It is made up out of four triangles, but while my top is rather flat this one is more curved. This means I have to make my triangles bigger and more umbrella shaped. Also while my triangles match the seam-lines these are turned so they form an X rather than a + on top.
Side: 
I think the sides are quite similar, so no big changes to that for now. As I see it has only one seam-line, at the back.
Brim: 
The brim has the same width at the front and the sides and gets smaller towards the back. Again, just one seam-line at the back.

This was my first try: Too small, I added some extra fabric at the outer edges. This was quite easy.
It was harder to make the sides. I went with a two part design. I experimented with the shapes and ended with a slightly curved upper and lower part:


The top is visible here:


Number one attempt. It looked like some kind of rain-hat or fisherman hat. Hmmm...
  

Below is the 4th version with a wider top. (I haven photographed all the wasted, too small-too big versions, but let me tell you it took a lot of time to try on and adjust everything)
Here I thought the fit was right!  I only needed to shorten the sides:
 

On the first picture in the second row is clear that the new top is much wider than the first one (on the left):

 

And here is my finished design! Please ignore the notations written all over. I quickly made some embellishments just to make it look 'real':
 

 

There is still a lot left to do:

- mark all the seam-lines 

- take the muslin apart 

- trace all the pieces 

- add seam-allowances

- make another muslin from a thicker and sturdier fabric 

- check the fit again

To be continued!

Marfy patterns dress - muslin 2.

 

Here are the pictures of my perfected muslin. Looks very 1940's, doesn't it? And it looks exactly like the model drawing! The bodice is not super fitted, although this is not really clear when looking at the drawing.
For the pictures I've put on a small belt. So it is visible that the horizontal line between the bodice and the skirt part sits perfect on the waistline.
Here are the adjustments:

- Stitched down the pleats. The pleats look like the model drawing:


- Widened the upper part of the cuffs by 1 cm. The sleeve falls much better now:


- As for the back, I started with a swayback- adjustment.
There are different methods for this, I did the following:
Took out a horizontal piece, which I folded. This shortens the midline in the back and is tapered to nothing at the sides. The fit is better now. It is not totally fitted, since I want to wear the dress with a belt, so I need a bit of extra ease. You can observe a few vertical lines towards the sides, this is a sign that I have to take out a bit less fabric towards the sides:


  

And here is a before (left) after (right) comparison:
  

Now I need to transfer the changes to the paper pattern pieces. One thing that I need to do is to add the same amount of fabric at the bottom of the skirt as the amount I took out in the middle of the skirt back. On the right picture above is clear that the side seam moves towards the back! This needs to be corrected too.