Recent reading through blogs and browsing sewing patterns led me to Sew Liberated Matcha top. I really liked the neckline of this top and even contemplated buying the pattern but there was quite a bit about the rest of the pattern I didn't like - the lack of any shaping/ extra gathers at the back, the sleeves. So I though't I'd have a go at trying to make my own.
I started with my moulage pattern. For the front piece I traced it off as is, then modified it for ease. First I left about 3/8 - 1/2" of the armhole dart for ease and rotated the remainder up to the shoulder dart. I lowered the armhole 1/2" and added about 5/8" all the way down the side seam. I ignored the waist dart but left in the bust dart to do the main body shaping. I removed 1.5" around the neckline and made that into a separate neckband/collar piece and then finally rotated the shoulder dart (including arm hole dart) to a point halfway around the front neckline to be gathered into the neckband/collar.
For the back piece. I removed the shoulder dart by bringing in the end of the shoulder point. Lowered the underarm point 1/2" and added 5/8" to the entire side seam, then redrew the back arm hole between the two modified points. I ignored all shaping by the back dart and center back, placing the pattern on the fold. Finally I again removed a 1.5" collar/neckband.
This should result in a nice flowing top, gathered into a flat neckband/collar.
Now to test it out. I had a small amount of a rayon fabric left over from making my daughter a pair of pants and decided to use that for my muslin. I didn't have enough fabric for a full length muslin so I cut the pattern off below the waist, about 5" from the bottom.
I made the shirt up...and it didn't sit nicely. I kept sliding backwards off my shoulders. I have that problem with a lot of my clothes so I decided it twas time to fix it. To do this I cut a full circle out of a stiff batik fabric with a cutout in the center and a slit up center front. I placed this around my neck and using a sharpie I marked out my neckline. I trimmed the fabric back to my marked line and tried it on again, continuing until I had a nice fit around my neck. I then pinched out shoulder seams exactly where my shoulder shoulder line was and sewed those up and did the same at center front and center back until I had a nice flat piece of fabric sitting around my neck. I cut it apart along each seam line and compared the shoulder slope/location with my moulage and found there was quite a difference. I know when I made the moulage that bit was fitted more to my dummy than it was to me, so I went ahead and modified my moulage to match. Basically it was a rounded back adjustment.
Finally I went ahead and made the changes to my new pattern as well. Thankfully most of the changes were within the collar and I had enough fabric to re-cut that and then I was able to take the necessary changes to the existing front and back pieces of fabric. I sewed up the new collar, interfacing both sides with a lightweight interfacing and decided just where I wanted my collar to stop. To get the front neckline I cut a slit down the center front fold to the depth that I wanted and then made a simple facing turning the facing inside, then turning under the edge and top stitching it down. This edge was then gathered back into the neckband creating a nice V.
Now to figure out the sleeves. I tried drafting a pattern but wasn't getting very far so instead I decided to drape it directly onto me. I cut out a piece of my remaining fabric into the rough shape of a sleeve and then went about pinning it into my existing armhole. doing my best to get the sleeve to lie flat and remove all gaping. I then trimmed my piece down and made a pattern out of it. making a second sleeve as well and setting them in. I now had a nice shirt but it was very cropped, to finish off the bottom I took the remainder of my fabric, folded it in half width wise and created a wide band for the bottom of the shirt.
So the conclusion. The neckline gathers are not as pronounced as I had hoped - I probably need to add in a center front seam and do some more slashing to the pattern to make the gathering more pronounced, but I'm not sure that I will I quite like it as is - subtle.
I'm also finding that it does still slide off the back of my neck - you can see it a bit in my pictures here, but I'm not sure what else to do about that?
I do think it needs a bit more shaping though - its airy and breezy and cool and feels beautiful to wear, but does look a bit baggy and shapeless.
I think it looks good and like it fits well. I wouldn’t have thought it looked shapeless at all. I have that same problem with a dress I made sliding back that you mentioned, but I haven’t figured out how to fix it. My husband suggested weighting the hem. :)
ReplyDelete