Jacket and a pair of pants

Accounting for two other garments from Burda magazine: a pair of pants and a jacket.
The jacket is from the June 2018 issue, number 104.

Finished project - coat

Think that I said it already: I have quite a few projects that never have been published on this blog. Sometimes this bothers me, as my blog is also a personal story of my sewing journey. When I see blog posts that I have written, say 8-10 years ago it sometimes strikes me that I have forgotten about a project or see a project that was loved, but worn out in the meantime. I like this keeping track of my projects, so I decided to try to publish more of my projects, even if it's something that it's not very interesting to others.
In this post photos of my coat, of which I published construction photos here and some random photos of a few projects made in the past few months.

Tracing and marking a pair of pants from December Burda

Hmm, could the title be longer? This post is exactly about what the title says. I started making a pair of pants from the Burda december issue and in this post will show you how I use a pattern from the magazine.
A short aside: a comment was made yesterday on my post on the missing cutting layouts that Burda will bring them back in the March issue (see here (text in German), thanks Beate for sharing this information and Burda for listening to their readers!).

This is the pair of pants I'm making, omitting the flap in the waist. It's pattern number 102 from the December 2018 issue and available as pdf from the Burda site: Link to the pattern.

A very easy pattern, 4 pattern pieces and made in a stretch fabric. It's more close fitting/slim fit than I would normally make. I intend to wear it with a longer cardigan,

Knip mode dress–October 2017

There is a reason my jacket is not finished yet. I’m too easily distracted sometimes. I’ve been sewing dresses. One of them is a dress from the Knip Mode October issue.

A relatively easy dress to sew. The back darts of the line drawing are not in the pattern. My full review is on Patternreview.

In different light the colour looks almost purple on my screen. It’s a warm, dark red in real life.
In these pictures you see that the pleats of the skirt are done first, then the bodice is attached and the pleats of the bodice partially cover the waist seam.

Sewing, not blogging

It’s been a few weeks again. I’ve been sewing, but have not taken the time to write blog posts. Apart from time, it has also to do with a feeling that there’s nothing new to tell. I’m sewing basic things, some I’ve sewn often before. Like this blouse:

The pattern is from Ottobre, with a few changes for fit (mainly hip area). Over the years I’ve sewn several variations, from plain white (always useful) to very colourful ones, like this new one. I bought the fabric recently and it’s a lovely quality cotton. A lot like Liberty cotton, but Liberty prints aren’t my style. I liked this fabric because of the irregular print and the many colours. A lot of combinations are possible. A teal skirt in exact the right shade is on my to do list. A summer top that’s a nice variation from my default black/white theme.

Which brings me to the next top, made from a viscose (rayon) fabric that’s been in my closet for a while.

This is the Knip Mode pattern (April 2017 issue) that I showed in my previous post. Nice result though the neckline is a bit wide on my narrow shoulders. I’m pleased with the look of the darts in the neckline. I will probably wear this top quite a bit during summer but will not use it for the silk fabric that I considered using with this pattern. It’s a quick make with no surprises. The neckline has a wide facing, which is easier to sew than a strip of bias binding.

There are a few other garments “in production”. More on those later.

Sewing update

I’ve been busy with a lot of things, sewing was a bit on the background in the past two weeks. There’s a large painting project in my house that I started that takes quite a bit of time (2 staircases and 11 doors, discovered the white really needs two coatings to be solid, even though the original colour was just a pink white). More fun, but also time consuming in the next few months, we’ve started an allotment garden. The plot is not very far from our house, only a few minutes by bicycle, which is nice. I won’t write much about it here, but am thinking about how to record our experience with growing vegetables and fruit. If you’ve any suggestions on that, let me know.

The dress is in hibernation mode and might remain there for a while. It’s been a lovely excercise in pattern drafting, unfortunately not giving the result I wanted. It’s a real winter dress though (at least the fabric is) and though there’s still some snow left from this weekend, the sun that is now shining in my room is a promise of spring. The new buds are waiting too.

 

In the time that I took for sewing I wanted easy projects. It was not lingerie this time, I made two tops and a knitting bag. The tops were really easy and did not take more than an evening each to make.

A classic and basic Ottobre t-shirt (issue 2, 2006) from a wool/viscose knit. Lovely to wear.

Another Ottobre top, from the 5/2015 issue. The fabric is thicker, more a sweater than a t-shirt. I used my coverstitch with the looper side on top for topstitching. Also a project for the “use your magazines more” challenge.

To conclude this update a “knitting bag”. That’s what I’m going to use it for. I restricted myself to using only fabric and notions I already had and I had to be a bit creative.

The pattern is the Retreat bag from Emmaline bags. Bunny made some fantastic versions of it that inspired me to buy the frame and try it too. (I ordered the frame from U-handbag, not affiliated). This large version is really large and perfectly suitable for a knitting bag. Handles might have been good, but I didn’t think of them when I made this. The page with the pattern now shows a wonderful youTube video with construction including handles. I’ll probably have to order more frames, my daughter wants one as well and it would be a lovely gift to make too.

Knip mode dress

The last of the three unfinished objects is a dress I started in the last week of December. In the same spirit as the Burda challenge Marianne from Foxgloves and Thimbles started a Knip Mode challenge to sew more from her Knip mode magazines. I don’t have as many of those as I have of Burda magazines, having had a sort of love/hate relation with the magazine. I loved them around 2009/2010 when they had some really good and original designs. Since then I’ve occassionally bought the magazine as mostly their styles did not attract my attention but I must say they are improving. I must even confess that browsing through the issues I have there are quite a few patterns I want to try and I took up the challenge (again without fixed rules) and will try to sew at least 6 items from other magazines than Burda.

This dress is not very original, but it suited me for the fabric I had. It’s a mix-and-match pattern with several skirt and collar/neckline variations. I used a different skirt variation then the one in the line drawing.

After washing this fabric it was not as beautiful as it was on the bolt and I left it in my closet for quite a while. Rummaging through my fabrics I saw it and thought it was a shame not to use it after all. It was pretty straightforward sewing, no surprises. I used a size 38 for the back neckline and 42 at bust level. It’s easy to merge between sizes and a “fba” like this mostly works for me in a knit like this.

I did sew a zipper in the side seam, as I was afraid I could not get into the dress, the waist having no extra width.

I like the top part of the dress, but not so sure on the skirt. I shortened it because the original length was way too long and made it matronly. Shorter is definitely better, but perhaps a pencil skirt style is better on me.