Two new pairs of pants

I've made two new pairs of pants to get me through the cold seasons.  I made both of these using the same pattern that I use for all my pants.  It started life as McCalls 9517 and has been modified again and again as I tweak it for fit and style.

The first pair is made from a navy cord material with a metallic silver floral design printed on it.

The fit of these pants is fairly loose as the fabric has little to no stretch and I was looking for comfort more than style.  I have made two pairs of pants out of similar cord material over the years, both a bit more fitted around the hips and both have ripped in the bum region so I'm hoping that by making this pair a bit looser they will last longer.

For this pair of pants I eliminated the front seam down the leg, but kept the back seam for better fitting.

I added slash pockets that extend right across to the center front seam for a bit of extra tummy control.  The legs have been slimmed down through the thighs and some of the flare taken out.

 I added back patch pockets to the back of this pair which was probably a bit of a waste of time since they're barely noticable in this pattern but at least they are useful.

The front pockets are cut quite low which makes them super comfortable for standing around with your hands in your pockets.

  I also added a small waistband through which I threaded 1" wide elastic.

I really like these pants, they're comfortable, they're pretty but they are quite hard to pair up with shirts in my wardrobe. I have to find the odd plain shirt as they are so busy themselves.

The second pair of pants I made is from a mystery material I picked up at the local discount fabric store.  It was listed as a wool fabric but feels very much like a flannel.  Either way it's a beautiful warm fabric that feels great (not at all scratchy).

I started with the exact same pattern for this pair of pants with just a few minor variations.  I was working with a very limited amount of fabric - I think there was just over 1 yard.  This means no waistband and no back patch pockets.  In fact I even had to piece one of the back leg pieces on each side and the pocket bags just have a small amount of the actual material  in the open area of the pocket.

To finish these pants I just zig zag stitched the elastic onto the top and turned it over once and restitched.

There was certainly not enough material to do any pattern match ing. As such there is one panel at the back that is totally out of line with the rest of the pants - but hey - its a design feature!

I wore these pants and then washed them a couple of times and I found a few issues.
This fabric does tend to bag out over the course of the day, plus it seems to have shrunk length wise when I've washed it. I did pre-wash it but it seems that wasn't enough.

Since between the bagginess and the shortened length the pants ended up looking a bit...well daggy. I decided to modify them a bit.  I figured they would probably work better now as a striaght leg pair of pants rather than flared.

I tried just running the side seams and in seams in, but no matter how I did it it they never seemed to fit right.  So I took out the waistband elastic and then cut down all the side seams, inseams and the back seam - I figured since they were too big the removed fabric wouldn't be an issue and I really didn't feel like doing all that unpicking.

I then recut all the pieces so that the legs are straight from about the knee down, and the front piece is slightly tapered in - I used the leggings pattern that I've been working on to figure out how much each of the pieces should be cut down by.

I then sewed it all back together.  It only just fits through the hips now - I had to let all seams out to 1/4" through the hips, but otherwise the pants fit much better now and I like this style in this length much better.

So hopefully I have salvaged these slightly daggy pants - but it's been an interesting exercise in how fabric choice can affect the look of a garment.  Two pants made from the same pattern in different fabrics - two very different results.