Cowl neck top

A pattern I’m very, very happy with. I copied this pattern a few weeks ago from my friend Valerie. It’s a pattern from an English (?) magazine from about 10 years ago if I remember it right. Can’t remember the name of the magazine and it’s not that important too, as it’s not available any more. I just traced Valeries pattern.
I prefer this cowl to the one of the Patrones top I made recently because this one is a little higher, which  makes it work-appropriate.
The pattern has a facing that extends to the armhole, so that the whole front armhole needs no separate finishing. I was on my own for the order of construction and the second time I did it a bit different than the first time. As I think I will use this pattern more often I write the steps here for my own reference, but you could use the same technique on another cowl neck pattern with a facing like this or a facing added like this.

The finished pictures are not so good, the left version was taken from the laundry bin to get a picture (DD did not have the patience to wait for me to iron it), the right one was taken in a mirror.
I should not be cutting late at night. That’s what I did with the fuchsia top: I forgot to add an inch to the bottom and the fabric was cut in the wrong direction. I didn’t see the grainline on this fabric. Artificial light and aging eyes!



Construction:
Finish the armscye and neck of the back. Make sure you don’t add to the width, the finished width should be on the stitching line.
 
I used strips of fabric and topstitched on the edge.

Fold the facing of the cowl neck to the front, wrong right sides together. And in this picture you can see what the facing looks like.
Stitch the seams of the armholes (the yellow line on the left)
 
I’ve added a piece of two-sided fusible material  (like steam a seam, only cut this from a wide piece). Attach this to the facing side!! I did it wrong, this is my referency mainly!) This way you don’t need understitching or topstitching at the front, you could leave this step out). When finished you pull the paper off and press it.
 
Insert the shoulder of the back part into the front and front facing, right sides together, pin and stitch the seam

At the side,  pin the back to the front, with the facing turned away.
 

Flip the facing over the side seam
 
I’ve stitched a few stitches with my regular sewing maching to secure the layers. Then I serged the side seam.

Clip the corners from the back at shoulders and side seam. Trim the seams.
  

Turn the top, the only thing left to do is hem it. 
Inside of sideseam:
 
Outside of side seam
 
Inside of shoulder seam.
 
Outside of shoulder seam.
 

That’s 3 posts in 3 days, long time ago I did that I think. I’m off to think of what to sew next. Not the Burda top yet, though to answer Caroly’n’s question: yes, the picture with the flowered skirt is the version I’ll be making, at least a skirt with a print or structure. A skirt with flowers is not (yet) what I see as “me”.

Wow, Burda August

Fall is here is the main title on the cover! It’s fall here for months already, summer never really arrived, rain and grey, cold days is all we had. But that’s beyond the point.

If you’ve been reading my blog for some time you know I have been very disappointed in BurdaStyle in the past two years, I stopped moaning about the magazine, but mostly also stopped buying it with one or two exception because I liked 1 pattern in the magazine. This morning in the supermarket I saw the new August Burda and it was for the first time in years that the cover spoke “buy me”.

I made sure the top was in the issue as a pattern (having bought magazines in the past based on the cover picture only to find out later that the item that piqued my interest was a rtw item).

This is an issue to like (of course, personal opinion). Fitted and/or shaped garments are back! I love quite a few patterns. The peplum top is certainly on the to do list now. Line drawings of a few favorites (there are more to like

 

Screenshots copyright by BurdaStyle.

The peplum top in black on a printed skirt.

 

 

I hope this is the new direction BurdaStyle magazine takes. What a great issue.

Skirt - finished pictures

Took some time but here are the pictures of the finished black and white skirt. I used a Vogue pattern (8781)for the pencil skirt. It has a high waist, any pattern like this would be suitable for the skirt I made, and it would be good in a pencil skirt with waistband too.


The technique for the blocks of fabric was published in this video by Trudy from HotPatterns. As I mentioned in my earlier post on this skirt, I was on my own (with help from Valerie and Sheila) deciding the measurements of the strips of white and black fabric to use, as I didn’t use her pattern. The blocks are larger in the end than the one Trudy shows, but that’s not important, I like the skirt. Deceptively skinny (the name of the Hot Patterns pattern)? Well, I’m not the one to judge. A lifelong awareness of 2-3 sizes difference between hip and waist measurement makes that you only see the wide part .
As to the red block I digitally entered in the previous post, it was too late to add such a block, I should have done that earlier. Perhaps someone else will take up on the idea?
To me this was venturing out of my comfort zone and I liked it. Should definitely do it more often, more plans in my head than time available, but one of the plans for the next few months is to draft myself a pattern based on the book “Patternmaking for fashion design” by Helen Joseph Armstrong that I recently bought. Not short term though. It’s a wonderful book which inspires me to venture into pattern drafting again.

Burda archive

I missed the Burda archives since they changed the sites to Burdastyle.
Accidentally I found the archives still exist on the French site and contain the archives from mid 2007 till today! Here's the link.
For as long as it's valid.

Does this happen to you?

 

The title is referring to not being able to find a pattern. I bought a little piece of fabric I want to make the sorbetto top of. I’ve made the pattern twice before, have tweaked the fit to my liking and now I can NOT find the pattern, nowhere. Seems to have disappeared. Has this happened to you? Frustrating. I know I made a size 10, but have to reprint and tape the sheets together again, which I don’t like. Worst is that I did some change to get rid of armhole gaping. Well, I thought I would whip it up tonight, but will not happen.

I got quite a bit done this week, the skirt has only some handstitching left (why does it always takes longer when I reach that point to finish a garment?). Pictures on me to follow later this week. Without red block, it was too late to get that into the pattern. I would have had to make it all over again. I like it enough just in the black and white.

And yesterday I made a cowl neck top that I’m actually wearing today already. I’ll show you that one also in another post. For now I leave you with an impression of pictures from the latest bra. Working together with Pauline 2 weeks ago got me all inspired again. I simply LOVE this fabric/lace combination.

 

Inspired by Valerie

When I was with my sewing friend Valerie two weeks ago (that long already?) she asked whether I had seen the video in which Trudy from Hotpatterns showed a black and white skirt. Valerie thought it was something I would like. I hadn’t seen the video, and she was right: when I had seen it I immediately knew that I wanted to make the skirt. Indeed I even bought some black linen a day later (having white already).

To be very honest I didn’t buy the pattern. It’s the Deco Vibe Deceptively Skinny Patchwork Skirt, the link to the video is from that page as well. Trudy shows how to make the front panel, and it being a pencil skirt, I took the pattern that I used for the Dries van Nooten knock off earlier this year: a high waist pencil skirt.

 

I started with drawing the idea on a piece of paper before cutting into fabric.

 

Then I made a first sample. Not having the pattern I was of course on my own to decide on measurements. The first one was a bit too narrow in the black we thought. So I made another sample, which I couldn’t find now to take a picture. Cell phone pictures btw, my good camera is on holiday ;)

 

The result for this moment, the skirt is basicly constructed and it fits. After comparison now, the first sample is more like the HotPatterns one after all and my side panels are wider. But… I like it so far.

There were ideas about having 1 red block into the front or making a lace insert. With Pauline I discussed the possibility of adding separating zippers on the front so that you could have different front panels and extend the wearing possibilities. I did not do this after all, because of the high costs of those zippers and I was afraid of it becoming too stiff in the waist. Nice idea to think about though.

After some editing: the idea of the red block:

A tutorial and some info on patterns/notions

While Pauline was here this weekend she started filming the steps of making a bra for her own reference (and I’ve already had the pleasure of seeing a preview of her second one). Unfortunately she had some problems with the phone she worked with after the second movie. In the first one the sound is not so good, so I like to share this one: a “tutorial” on topstitching the cup of a bra with an edgestitch foot. I wanted to make some changes but my skills were not (yet) up to that. Strange to hear myself and talking in English as well. Hope that it helps a few of you who venture or have ventured into bra-making.

 

Barbara asked for reference to bra patterns and regularly I have the question of where I do get my fabric and notions. So here’s an overview of stores I’ve used. Being European based and with a store like Kantje-boord at reasonable driving distance I’m not familiar with any non-European vendors. Feel free to add information in the comments.

 

For the German sites: if you are looking for patterns, the word in German is “Schnittmuster”.

Link to site	Patterns
Kantje boord  For non-Dutch speakers mainly eye-candy, as the site is in Dutch only.	no
Merckwaerdigh, ebay store Dutch, patterns in English en German too. I’ve made a few of her patterns with good result	yes (her own)
Danglez Dutch, site in English too I made one of her bra’s, was a good pattern	yes (her own)
Sannalin Dutch, site in English too. Patterns and elastic for men, I’ve ordered a pattern for my son, but not yet made it	yes (her own)
Elingeria German, site in English as well	yes (several brands)
Wien 2002  Austria, site in German	yes (several brands)
Sewy (German site) I have not ordered from them directly, their patterns used to be sold by Elingeria, but they sell them no longer,. The Sewy Rebecca bra, with little changes for my own fit, is my favorite pattern)	yes Sewy patterns