My weekend in sewing

And what a fab weekend it was! On Friday I went along to the Handmade Fair at Hampton Court - this is on my side of London, so an easy one for me to get to. I was delighted to hook up with Jenny from Cashmerette and her lovely mum almost as soon as I walked through the door and we were joined a bit later by Rachel from House of Pinheiro. Look at the ridiculous differences in height - remind me to take a box to stand on next time! 

These girls are ACE!

I really should have booked into a workshop or gone to see a demonstration, instead I spent most of my time eating, drinking tea and chatting, I have no regrets. I still managed to pick up some lovely pieces of fabric from the fabulous shopping village. All of them are very summery and totally inappropriate for winter sewing - I'm sensible like that!

The top piece is a length of vintage gingham from Simply Vintage Designs. This stand was a complete treasure trove and I spent ages rummaging around.

The other two fabrics are vintage chambrays from the Fabric Godmother which I can't wait to sew into cool, summery shirts. Despite drooling over her fabrics for years, I'd never actually met Josie from Fabric Godmother in person, so it was lovely to have a quick chat with her.

I might have to make a direct copy of her Linden sweatshirt!

Absolutely GORGEOUS wools

My pledge for next year is to arrive super early and have a thorough look round the stands before I get distracted! It's probably just as well I didn't have more time this year as there were some seriously talented makers exhibiting. 

The fun didn't stop there though. On Sunday I legged it over to Islington with Winnie from Scruffy Badger Time to attend a one day Trouser Fitting course at Ray Stitch. Ah I'd been looking forward to this course for ages and it didn't disappoint. It was based on the same principles as the pattern cutting weekend I blogged about here, where we made bodice and skirt blocks based on our measurements. Our teacher - Alice Prier - is extremely knowledgeable about pattern cutting and was a great advert for the course in her perfectly fitted trousers! She'd also brought along several pairs of her own trousers to show different ways of finishing waistbands etc. This gave me lots of ideas for trouser construction, my favourite being the hidden elastic waistband! 

Everybody concentrating hard...

…and smiling, yay they look like trousers!

The aim of the course is to create a basic trouser block that can then be used on its own and/or as a starting point to adapt other trouser patterns. After taking measurements, working out our front and back pattern pieces and sewing them in calico, in no time at all we each had a pair of trousers to try on. 

Alice, adjusting the fit on Zoey's toile

I don't have any photos of my own toile (I'm useless, sorry!), but I can tell you that the fit wasn't too bad at all for a first attempt. I had to take a wedge out of the back thigh as there was a bit of excess fabric, and add an extra wedge to the top of my back piece to accommodate the curves around my 'ahem' arse area. The trouser block was for quite a straight leg so I also made amendments to the pattern for a narrower fit as that's the style I think works best on me. I'll be making my first trousers using my new block very soon and I promise to take lots of photos this time. 

Trousers really aren't that difficult to construct, it's getting the fit right that's the tricky bit. If you're keen to make trousers then I'd definitely recommend this course next time it's running. I thoroughly enjoyed it and am filled with confidence for future trouser making. Thank you Alice!  x

Lady Skater - Japanese style

I made this Lady Skater dress at Christmas, but totally forgot to blog about it until I saw Jenny's gorgeous top made from the same fabric recently. As it happens, the timing is pretty fortuitous, as it's much more of a spring dress than a winter one.

The fabric I used is the most beautiful double-layered, polka dot double knit (try saying that when you've had a few!) It's from Etsy shop Miss Matatabi. The two layers are fused together at regular intervals like double gauze and it does actually feel a bit like a knit version of double gauze: very soft to the touch and super cosy. I must point out that Miss Matatabi is the most dangerous fabric shop in the world! I clicked over there just now to get a link for the fabric and saw this - an Aran-look knit fabric!! How could I possibly resist?! Answer: I couldn't, so that will be winging its way over to me from Japan soon. 

Anyway, back to the dress… I did my usual bad trick of changing bits of the pattern in order to make them fit onto the fabric available. Luckily for me, knit fabric is very forgiving! The changes I made that were different from my last version were as follows:

-  Cut a size 4 all over (last time I cut a size 5 bodice and size 4 skirt)

-  Reduced width of shoulders slightly 

-  Shortened bodice by 1 inch

-  Took 3 ½ inches from the bottom skirt curve in order to fit onto the fabric

-  Cut sleeves as a lengthened version of the cap sleeve

I was happy with the fit of my first version, but actually the changes I made this time have resulted in a much better fit all round. I'm especially pleased with the shoulders as they were definitely a bit wide. Reducing the curve of the skirt has made it more of a quarter circle than a half circle which I also prefer.

It was super easy to construct - I sewed the whole thing on my overlocker and used a double needle for the neck and sleeve bands and the hem. 

The fabric is reversible so I felt obliged to try and show off the contrast somewhere on the dress. I went with contrasting neckband and sleeve bands. But… with hindsight, I wish I hadn't made the neckband contrasting as it does give a bit of a juvenile feel. It's annoying, but not enough to make me stop wearing it!

Contrast neckband and sleeve bands

View from the inside showing the reversible fabric

What I like about this pattern is that there's a separate bodice and skirt, so the finished dress looks rather like a neat, fitted Emery or Peony dress. The added bonus is that the lack of darts and the fact that it's made from knit fabric means you can whip this beauty up in no time. Even though it's made from a knit fabric, it's actually quite light and swishy to wear, so it's going to get a second lease of life as a spring dress!  Happy Tuesday. x

Cressida Skirt - the jury's out

Let's talk about circle skirts, or half circles or three-quarter circles or however much of a circle you want your circle skirt to be. Fact: I've never made a circle skirt. I've made a couple of dresses that included circle skirts (half and full) and was pleased with the results, but I'm convinced this was because the skirt was attached to the dress, which makes a world of difference. I do like the look of circle skirts, I like pinning pictures of them on Pinterest and reading about them and there are some sewing bloggers who just seem to carry them off with aplomb (Cashmerette made a fab plaid one and Lazy Seamstress has made trillions).  I just don't think they suit me.

This is a very roundabout way of introducing you to the Cressida Skirt which I recently pattern tested for Jennifer Lauren Vintage. As you may have guessed, Cressida is a half circle skirt with button placket, waistband and in-seam pockets. There are two design variations: one with a double breasted button placket and one with cute belt loops. When Jennifer asked if I was interested in testing, I almost declined because of the shape, it was the interesting design details that piqued my interest.  So I dived in, choosing a bright green cotton twill from Goldhawk Road to make it with for good measure.

The instructions for the Cressida skirt are clear and well explained, with lots of additional information and diagrams for tricky areas. I also like the way Jen groups the pattern pieces for each version separately, so you only need to print out the pages you need.  In terms of fit, there were a few tweaks that have now been made to the waistband following tester feedback, However, the finished waistband still has very little ease (only ½"), which is great if you like a tight fit round the waist, but not so good if you need a bit of room for pie eating. I cut a size 10, which was optimistic to say the least and, as it turns out, a grave error. The result was an uncomfortably snug waist, and an hour spent unpicking the entire waistband (after it had been top stitched...) and re-drafting a new one, I should add that this was all my own fault, I should have been truthful rather than vain with the size. My advice therefore is to look at the finished measurements and be realistic when deciding which size to sew, or add a bit of width if you're not sure.

Apart from the waistband saga, the skirt sewed together easily and was a relatively straight forward make. There's a fair bit of top stitching on the skirt waistband, button placket and belt loops, which I didn't mind at all - I'm a sucker for a nice bit of top stitching and I love how it looks. I would also re-iterate what Mary emphasised in her review here, which is to stay-stitch the waist of your skirt immediately after cutting to prevent the curved waistline stretching.

Avert your eyes from that top buttonhole...

So, what do I think about the finished Cressida skirt? Well, it's not every day I have the patience to unpick a waistband AND sew on 11 buttons, which is a measure of how much I wanted this skirt to work for me. The sad truth is, I'm not sure it does. I can't quite pinpoint what it is, maybe I'm not used to having so much width around my hips or maybe it's just sheer volume of fabric? Whatever it is, I don't like how it looks on me and if you're not happy yourself with the look of a garment, then you're not going to wear it. Which is such a shame because I really do think it's a lovely skirt and I adore the bright green fabric.

I have to point out that the colour in these photos isn't anywhere near as bright as the actual fabric - it's actually a bright, pea green. In fact it's the exact same colour as a pair of culottes I had when I was about 11. I can't remember if they were my mum's culottes that she cut down, or an old skirt of hers that she converted (if you're reading this mummy, can you phone me and let me know please?!) Whatever their origin, I loved them, and was hoping I'd feel the same way about my Cressida skirt. It's not looking too hopeful so far, but never say never eh? I was very ambiguous about my Kelly skirt when I first made it and now I wear it all the time!

As with all these things, this is merely my own personal opinion. If you do like the cut of its jib and can totally rock a half circle skirt, then the Cressida PDF skirt pattern is available to purchase here.

Have a good weekend! x

The Cressida pattern was given to me free of charge for pattern testing. All views my own.