Vintage Pledge Shoulder Tie Top

July is all about vintage at the moment as stitchers across the land get well and truly involved with the Vintage Pledge July Extravaganza. This has been organised by Vintage Pledge hosts, Marie and Kerry and includes daily guest bloggers, a month long #vpjuly daily photo prompt on Instagram and LOTS of prizes. You can read more about what they have in store throughout the month here.

I was delighted to be one of the guest bloggers and the summer top I made from a vintage pattern was featured on A Stitching Odyssey last week. I'm posting pictures and details on my blog again today, just in case you missed it!

The pattern I chose was Woman's Own 5003 - a mail order pattern from 1961. The pattern is for two different summer tops: a wrap top that can be made with or without sleeves or a boxy top with shoulder ties. By happy coincidence I bought the pattern from Vintage Pattern Pledge's Kerry when she was having a destash earlier this year!

Isn't the envelope illustration adorable?! It's one of the main reasons I bought the pattern. Both tops are quite timeless designs and I could easily see the two styles slotting seamlessly into my wardrobe. 

It took me an age to decide which of the two versions to sew as I was drawn to both, but in the end the decision was dictated by the fabric. I knew I wanted to use this beautiful Liberty lawn Lilac print that I picked up on a day out with Ashley earlier this year.

I absolutely love the colours, especially the contrast between the background red and the green leaves.  It was available in lots of different colours when I bought it, but only seems to be listed in grey/lilac now unfortunately. Actually I think Charlotte used the same fabric (in a different colourway) to make her dressing gown on the Great British Sewing Bee.

As we all know, Liberty lawn is ridiculously expensive, so I only bought a metre. It was only when I was inspecting the pattern that I realised a metre was never going to be enough to make the wrap/tie version, however skilfully I laid out those pieces. So the decision was made for me - the shoulder tie top it was.

This is a very straight forward top to sew: a simple sleeveless tank with bust darts, slightly shaped side seams and a cute, notched bottom edge. The blouse also has separate shoulder ties/bows.

The pattern was for a size 36 bust and the overall fit was pretty good. The only small changes I made were to lower the bust darts by an inch and add 1½" to the overall length. The instructions were brief, but perfectly clear and the whole top sewed together quickly. The necklines and armholes were given a lovely clean finish with an all-in-one facing - very satisfying! 

The shoulder ties are supposed to be threaded through buttonholes made in the shoulder facings. Sadly, my buttonholes foot isn't working at the moment, so I just knotted the bows around each shoulder instead - they seem to be working fine so far!

The blouse has more of a boxy shape than I'm used to, but I still really like it. My favourite part is the shoulder ties - they give an otherwise plain pattern a lovely vintage twist. I'd love to try the sleeveless wrap version too at some point. Overall it's a perfect little blouse for summer and is a great match with my sailor shorts!  

This blouse counts as the second part of my Vintage Pledge for 2016. My pledge was to sew two items from vintage patterns - one suitable for winter and one suitable for summer. The winter part was taken care of when I made my Topper coat, so this here blouse is the summer part!

Joining in with the #vpjuly daily photo prompts on Instagram has been enormous fun. The vintage themed photos posted so far have been truly inspirational and I've discovered some great new bloggers to follow. If you want to check out what I've been posting you can find me on Instagram here (@janemarland).

Have a wonderful week! x

Vintage Pledge 2016

As March is fast approaching, I thought I'd better officially sign up for this year's Vintage Pledge before the year runs away with me. The Vintage Pledge, now in its third year, is co-hosted by Marie at A Stitching Odyssey and Kerry at Kestrel Makes in a bid to encourage us to sew up some of our beautiful vintage patterns more regularly. Last year, I made a rather rashly thought out pledge to sew up a vintage halter neck top pattern, which I then had to abandon. But I did still end up sewing three garments from vintage patterns last year, so I don't consider it a failure. 

 For this year's pledge, I've chosen to be purposefully vague:

"I, Jane, pledge to sew up two vintage patterns in 2016 - one suitable for summer and one suitable for winter." 

I'm already hard at work on my topper, which takes care of the winter part of the pledge, I just need to decided on a summer pattern. Interestingly, all three patterns I sewed last year (here, here and here) were ones I'd used before, so it would be good to step outside my comfort zone. One thing I'm reasonably sure of is that it won't be a dress pattern. I already have at least two summer dresses in the pipeline for this year and in all honesty, I don't think I can accommodate many more. My total dress tally is probably far fewer than lots of other sewing bloggers, but it's still more than enough for me! So I'll be concentrating on separates pattern, with these three currently on my shortlist:

Vogue 8696 from 1955 - a sleeveless version of C would make a very chic bow blouse.

McCall's 4168 from 1957 - which has a lovely gathered waist and shoulder detail. 

The wild card is McCall 8061 from 1950. These 1950's shorts are almost identical to a red pair I own from Vivien of Holloway - with a high waistband and patch pockets to the front. The problem with my VofH shorts is the sizing: the waist to hip ratio is 12 inches, and in order to get a comfortable fit around the waist, the hips are ginormous. I ended up taking in the inner and outer seams to reduce the hips, which sort of works but they don't look great on. It would be good to make a pair that actually fitted properly!  

I'll let you know once I've made my mind up. Which pattern do you think I should make?!  x

Vintage Pattern Pledge - a slight rethink

It seems I may have to rethink my Vintage Pattern Pledge. I thought I was so clever pledging to sew just one vintage pattern this year. My mistake was specifying the exact pattern (a 1950's tie neck halter top) as I now don't want to sew it!

The halter neck reproduction pattern I chose is an absolute beaut with some lovely vintage details:  a gathered bustline and crossover back finished with bias binding round the edges. It seemed like a no-brainer at the time, the problem is that I hardly ever wear halter necks. That doesn't mean I dislike halter neck styles, I love them, absolutely love them.

All images from my Pinterest board

They're chic and classy and look so elegant if you have a slim, golden back. In reality, the neck ties end up giving me a headache, my back is NOT slim, elegant and golden, and finding an appropriate bra is always a pain. I've made just one halter neck garment - my Cherry Fabulous dress - which was a success, but I have to feel pretty confident (and brown!) to wear it.

As there's only a small window of time for wearing halter necks in the UK, it didn't seem like a sensible use of my sewing time to make something that would hardly ever be worn. So much as it pains me to do so, I've decided to be sensible and abandon the original pledge. I've already made two garments from vintage patterns this year (here and here) and I'm sure there'll be a couple more before the year is out. I'll leave the pledge open for now and see how many more I manage to notch up.

In the meantime, I can always dream….

Happy Wednesday! x

Simplicity 4238 strikes again

This is the fifth version of my favourite vintage pattern (Simplicity 4238) from 1953. It was my chosen pattern for the One Week, One Pattern (OWOP) challenge last year and I'm still not bored of it! There isn't much to add to the construction of this blouse that hasn't been said before as I've got it down to a fine art now! It's a classic, notched collar style with a great 1950's shape, which is down to the cleverly positioned darts and tucks (12 in all). The only pattern change I made was to lower the bust darts by about an inch. 

Let's talk about the fabric instead. I bought this goy-jus double gauze from dangerous-on-the-purse Etsy shop Miss Matatabi last year. Tragically, it's now sold out so I can't give you the link, but what I can tell you is that it's a mid-green polka dot double gauze with a secret lurking on the inside….a gingham reverse side yee-ha! 

Double gauze is a very soft fabric to work with and because of this, the blouse has a more casual feel than some of the others I've made. It probably wasn't the most sensible choice for this pattern as I think a bit of crispness is needed around the collar area. It turned out fine though and it's very wearable so I'm happy. 

Happy!

I didn't use interfacing as double gauze already consists of two layers. This wasn't a problem with the collar, but it was a problem with the buttonhole area. My buttonhole foot was playing up badly (surprise, surprise), so I had the horror of unpicking three half finished buttonholes. Luckily the button band is double thickness and the buttonholes were quite small as I used twitchy buttons, but it still took its toll on the fabric. Therefore my only advice for working with double gauze would be to interface any areas that need a bit of support. Oh yes, and use a fine needle too.

I used self fabric binding on the armholes which is a nice contrast to the internal gingham. In fact I love all the contrasts on the inside! The lightness of the double gauze makes this a fab little addition to my summer wardrobe. I think it will also be good to take on holiday - I can see it pairing up well with my sailor shorts! 

Yet again I seem to have accidentally added another finished item to this year's Vintage Sewing Pattern Pledge. I promise I'll get round to sewing up my actual pledged pattern one of these days. Happy Friday. x

Barkcloth skirt

Behold my barkcloth skirt! I wanted to make a relatively simple garment to show off the lovely retro fabric design as much as possible, so decided on a vintage pattern from the 1950's. The pattern is Simplicity 3983 which has just the one seam going up the back, so no worrying about pattern matching side seams. As you can see, I didn't make much of an effort to match the shaped pockets and front waistband either. I don't care though, it looks fine!

Having already made this skirt once before, I only made one pattern change, which was to shorten the length by an inch (I'd already taken a gigantic eight inches off the original pattern). I also made a few changes to the construction. I replaced the centred zip with an invisible one and added a faced waistband instead of a Petersham ribbon facing, which is how I finished the waistband on my first version. I also positioned the zip so that it runs through the waistband (like you find on the Delphine and Ginger skirt patterns). I know some people like a waistband starting above the zip, but I personally prefer them integrated. It's not authentically vintage but I like how it looks.

I added a white silk-cotton lining using this method, and used some scraps of cotton lawn for the pockets.

The barkcloth fabric is Ripple in Navy from The Village Haberdashery, part of the Time Warp collection by Jessica Jones. Here's what I would advise if you're thinking of working with barkcloth:

- The feel of barkcloth is quite rough against the skin, so if you're planning on using it for garment making, I'd advise underlining with a very light fabric or adding a separate lining.

- Barkcloth has quite a loose weave and is liable to stretch slightly when cut on the bias. This happened with my curved front pocket facings, but it actually turned out in my favour as they now allow a bit more room to get my hands in!  Just be careful to staystitch any curved edges and try not to over stretch when pressing.

- The fabric frays and unravels quite noticeably, so I ended up overlocking all raw edges quite early on in the proceedings.

Apart from that it didn't behave any differently from a linen or cotton. I used a regular needle in my machine and it sewed together beautifully. Even though I knew the fabric was brand spanking new, I still felt like I was working with a piece of 1950's barkcloth, it just looks vintage!

I'm delighted with the finished skirt - it's contemporary but the fabric gives it a vintage edge, which is my favourite combination! I've paired it with a jumper for these pictures because it's still cold and I'm a wuss, but I can totally see it working with this, this, this and even this!!

And because I used a vintage pattern, I'm counting this as my first contribution to this year's Vintage Sewing Pattern Pledge. I only pledged to sew up one pattern, but it's not this one, so consider this a bit of a Brucie Bonus!  x

Fabric was given to me free of charge for review. All views my own.

Sewing out of season

I don't know about you, but when the weather turns cold I tend to do two things on the wardrobe front. Firstly I sew a few functional, knit garments. Then I make a trip to Uniqlo and stock up on merino wool sweaters and cardigans. This fills any gaps that might have occurred after my ruthless autumn wardrobe culling, and I can finally feel warm again. Job done. As I've mentioned before though, I find blogging about functional clothing deeply boring and try not to do it too often. I only blogged about the White Russian sweatshirt because it was a new-to-me pattern. 

It gets to the point when you realise enough is enough. I've had my fill of cold weather sewing - I want to sew pretty tops and skirts, and work with lovely cottons and linens rather than knits. I want to make button up sleeveless tops and shirt dresses. So that's what I'm going to do. It may be a while before any of them actually get worn, but who cares?! Here's what's going to be on my sewing list over the next few weeks:

I've always wanted to try and draft my own version of the 1950's inspired shoulder tie dress that Casey made a few years ago.  I LOVE that particular shoulder detail and it will be a good opportunity to work with my bodice and skirt blocks. The shoulder ties are similar to the ones on this vintage pattern.

If you're interested in making a 1950's style sundress yourself, her excellent tutorials can be found here (part one) and here (part two).  I think I have just enough of the pretty Japanese lawn left over from my toned down bow blouse to make a dress.

Ever since pledging to make just the one pattern for the Vintage Sewing Pattern Pledge, I've suddenly got a burning desire to sew with vintage patterns. Talk about contrary! 

So as well as the vintage halter neck I pledged to make, I have plans to make another Simplicity 4238 using my double-sided double gauze (now there's a mouthful!) that I talked about here.

My navy gingham version is about to die on me and I need at least four versions in constant rotation through the summer or I start panicking! What can I say? I love that pattern so much!

And finally I'd like to get on with a spring shirtdress using my lovely Hemingway Designs fabric.

I have all these ideas racing around in my head and the fabric to make them with so I've decided to pull myself out of my sewing rut and just go for it. Can't wait, can't wait, can't WAIT! x

Vintage Sewing Pattern Pledge 2015

Marie from A Stitching Odyssey has just announced the return of the Vintage Sewing Pattern Pledge for a second year - hoorah! This year she'll be co-hosting it with Kerry from Kestrel Makes which  is awesome. I really like the way Kerry has identified her own vintage style niche (1970's/1980's). It's absolutely NOT an era I would ever like to revisit personally (I had to wear those fashions first time round!), but I'm enjoying seeing the garments she makes from vintage patterns of that time. It's well known that Marie is a big fan of vintage patterns from the 1930's to the 1960's, so by joining forces with Kerry they should have all the major decades covered! Thanks for organising it ladies, I can't wait for your inspiration posts.

The Vintage Sewing Pattern Pledge was one of the few online challenges I joined in with last year and even though I completed the challenge, I have mixed feelings about committing to any kind of numerical target this year. Just to be clear, I love vintage patterns, I'm fascinated by them and can easily lose entire afternoons reading the instructions and scrutinising envelope artwork. I've also sewn quite a few garments from them over the years (19 at the last count). I think my point is that I like to sew from vintage patterns on a whimsy rather than as part of a self imposed schedule. So this year, I'm keeping my challenge very simple. I've got my hands on one vintage pattern that I know for sure I'll sew this year. That's all I'm going to commit to and any extra vintage patterns that manage to get sewn this year will be bonuses! 

This is it - a 1950's tie neck halter top with gathered bust, that crosses at the back and fastens to the front. Why this particular pattern though? Probably because I've been looking for a pattern like this for years. I'm a great admirer of halter necks (as evidenced here) and I think I'll be able to get a good fit on this pattern because of the gathered bustline. The pattern is an ePattern - a reproduction of a vintage pattern in PDF form - that I purchased from Etsy shop Subversive Femme. Obviously I'd prefer to work from the original pattern, but vintage halter neck sewing patterns are like gold dust, so this is good enough for me - I can't wait to work on it once summer's here.

So, whilst I'm on the subject:

I, Jane Marland, will sew up my favourite halter neck vintage sewing pattern during 2015. 

I may even sew it in a polka dot fabric, just for a change! Has anybody else signed up for the challenge yet? I'd love to hear your plans. Happy Sunday! x

2014 - A Year in Sewing

Happy New Year! I'm rather pleased with my sewing output for 2014, there were a few stumbling blocks along the way (more on that later…), but by and large it was a great sewing year. My favourite make of the year has got to be my Dotted Chambray Bow Blouse.

You all know I love bow blouses, I love Mrs Slocombe, I love polka dots and I love chambray, so the amalgamation of all these things almost finished me off. It's not just my favourite make of the year, it's my favourite make OF ALL TIME! I always receive compliments when I wear it too, the bow seems to be particularly impressive for some reason! Coming in at a close equal second are two dresses I made in the summer: my Kate Spade-inspired Lemon dress….

and my Anna 6696.

They were both inspired by pictures I found on Pinterest (see here and here) and I feel ridiculously pleased that I was able to use the original inspiration pictures to make dresses that were very individual to me. They both fit really well, and although they're quite different in design, I feel they're a good indicator of my style. Plus the lemon dress is yellow - one of the few rogue pieces to step out of line from my strict red, white and blue colour dictatorship this year! 

The most useful item I sewed this year was my raincoat. I won't lie, it did give me grief during the making of it, but that was all forgotten as soon as I donned my vision in navy blue waterproof loveliness! This year I also discovered the joy of sewing my own basic items of clothing (mostly Bronte T shirts and Mabel skirts). As wonderful and useful as they are, I find them deeply boring to blog about, so if any further versions pop up, I'll just mention them in passing!

As mentioned earlier, I did have a couple of misses this year: despite my best intentions, the Cressida skirt I pattern tested for Jennifer Lauren Vintage just didn't work. My first Afternoon blouse has also been shown the door, purely down to the fact that it doesn't fit. It's a real shame as I love the red shirting fabric I made it from, but there's no getting away from the fact that I cut a size too small. That'll teach me eh! And finally, the darts on my vintage red dress defeated me in the end and it's now languishing, dart-less with side seams ripped open in frustration. Maybe I'll come back to it, if I can ever be arsed. 

I think this year was the year I finally learnt to say no to every single sewing challenge I heard about. It's still a bit of a struggle as my natural inclination is to immediately scream "me too, ME TOO" but life's just too short. I did participate in the Vintage Sewing Pattern Pledge run by Marie at A Stitching Odyssey but deliberately set myself a low target (to sew up three vintage patterns in 2014). The other reason I didn't commit to everything under the sun was because I found myself hosting a sewing challenge of my own - the return of One Week, One Pattern 2014!

Although it was a lot of work, I really did enjoy organising and participating in OWOP and was overwhelmed by how many people joined in and embraced the challenge themselves - thank you so much everyone! I loved giving my beloved 1950's Simplicity pattern its place in the spotlight for a week, if anything, it's made me even fonder of the pattern than I was before!

As for my sewing plans for 2015, I'm really keen to use the skills I learnt during my pattern cutting weekend to create a well fitting bodice. This kind of thing doesn't come naturally to me, but I would like to get my dart positioning right and conquer the bloody things once and for all. With this in mind, I've got plans to make a simple, collarless coat in the early part of the year. I do have a pattern in mind but I may have a go at self drafting (ahem!) I think it will probably end up as a combination of the two. Other than that I'm going to just sew where the mood takes me,  Exciting!

My favourite picture of the year: with Rachel and Winnie at Goldhawk Road

I've had so much pleasure from sewing this year and met up with some amazingly talented and generous people (both old and new). All I want for next year is more of the same! Thank you again for your support and friendship this year and Happy Sewing, wherever you are! x 

Vintage red dress

After a mini splurge at EmSewCrazy recently, this vintage beauty fell into my hands. It's Butterick 8629 from 1959 - a simple sheath dress with 'figure following lines' (love that description) and kimono sleeves. I was inspired to make a red version of view B after seeing Kathryn's beautiful red Annalotte dress. The bodice section on the Butterick pattern is a little like the By Hand London Anna pattern (minus the tucks), so this seemed to be a sign for me to blatantly copy her.

The pattern is a vintage size 16, which sometimes fits me, it all depends on the year. In this case the bust was fine (36) but the waist and hips needed a lot taking off. Working on this dress was the first chance I've had to use the skills I learnt at the Pattern Drafting weekend and it was a success of sorts! I laid my block on top of the pattern and shaped it to match up with the Butterick pattern. Straight away, I could see that my main adjustments would be to shorten the bodice by an inch, and to take a whopping seven inches off the length of the skirt section! I also changed the darts to match the darts on my bodice block, which wasn't quite so successful. In fact the bust darts are still wonky - I gave up after about 20 attempts to get them right - I'll have to come back to them in a few days time! It isn't perfect and I did need to make quite a few on-the-spot fitting adjustments after the initial muslin. but I'm quite pleased with it for a first attempt.

Once I was happy with the fit, the dress was 'Quick 'N Easy' to make, just like it says on the packet! The fabric I used is a crepe-backed satin kindly supplied by Minerva Crafts as part of their Blogger Network. Now I'd read lots of great reviews about this fabric, but annoyingly in this case, I ordered the wrong one. The fabric I ordered is from their general crepe-backed satin range, which is perfectly fine, but the fabric everybody has been raving about is their Prada self-lined crepe. DOH! Despite this, the fabric I used is ideal for a party dress, although the crepe side probably has more of a sheen to it than I was expecting. It also sheds fibres faster than the speed of light, so be prepared for lots of sweeping up if you use it! The most fortuitous thing about it though is that it has a slight stretch, which means I can just about get the dress on WITHOUT A ZIP!! Talk about a result! Getting it over the chest area is a bit of a tight squeeze, but the built-in satin lining actually aids this process.

I dispensed with facings and made self-binding instead, using the sating side so the binding matched up with the inside 'lining' of the dress. I actually cut the binding strips on the straight grain rather than the bias - the slight stretch of the fabric means it's still able to curve around the neckline but it doesn't stretch out too much, which was my worry. It seemed to work anyway!

Inside view: neckline finished with satin binding

This is a beaut of a vintage pattern - simple and elegant with that unmistakable late 1950's look I love. Once I've nailed the fit on those pesky darts, I can definitely see myself making it again.

My impression of the lady on the pattern envelope...

Talking of vintage patterns, this is my third and final make for my Vintage Sewing Pattern Pledge, hosted by Marie at A Stitching Odyssey. I pledged to sew three vintage patterns in 2014 and that's what I've done! The other two are my raincoat from 1973 and my white 1950's sleeveless blouse, so I now have a vintage trio for 2014 of red, white and blue. Purely unintentional I swear!

Have a good weekend! x

The kit was given to me free of charge as part of the Minerva Crafts Blogger Network. All views my own.

Yet another 1950's sleeveless blouse

If you like variety and change in your sewing blogs, then this post will probably have you banging your head against a wall. If you like predictability and things on repeat, then you've come to the right place. Yes, I've made yet another version of my go-to pattern for summer - vintage Simplicity 4238.

This version is plain white, which some may call boring, but I like to call perfect. Let me tell you, this top is so perfect I'm quite tempted to make another one exactly the same, just so I can rotate them in the wash! It's almost like a blouse version of a white T shirt, but with the lovely added fifties details that drew me to the pattern in the first place.

Construction-wise it was a cinch to sew - this is my fourth version (previous versions here, here and here), so I was able to whip through the instructions in no time.  The white fabric is cotton pique (Classic Textiles, Goldhawk Road) which has a very slight stretch and a crisp, waffle texture that I really like. It's a bit of a pain to launder, but worth it I think. It makes me think of tennis lessons and sailing - both imaginary of course, I've only had one tennis lesson in my life and I certainly wasn't wearing a crisp waffley white outfit…. The armholes are finished with white bias binding and I added some blue glass boat buttons that have been in my stash for ages. Sadly, the buttons must have been hand painted as they tragically lost their nautical mojo after one wash and you can barely see the boat details now. Never mind, I still like the navy contrast against the white.

Making this blouse has also made a little notch in my Vintage Pattern Sewing Pledge, hoorah. I'm now two vintage patterns down, one to go.  If you have your heart set on a sleeveless fifties blouse, then there seem to be lots of copies of this particular pattern on Etsy. Or this one looks pretty similar too.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, this blouse is the fourth version of Simplicity 4238 and my versions cover all bases:

Gingham...

Polka dots...

Floral...

Solid/plain…

This got me thinking - I have four versions of the same blouse, maybe I could rotate them day by day and wear variations of the same pattern for a whole week? Sound familiar?! Well, watch this space as I'm working out the finer details of a familiar challenge - all will be revealed in the next few weeks!!

In other news, the winner of the Love Sewing magazine giveaway is..... Lucy Howells!  Please email me your address Lucy and I'll get the magazine posted to you in the next few days. Thank you to everybody else who entered the giveaway.

Happy Thursday. x