This is a major catch-up post, so here's a TOC to guide you through it!
- A Style Arc Top - the Lani
- Sewing-Themed Tees
- Auditioning Pants
- Refashioning Tees into an Infinity Scarf
- Alabama Chanin Tour de Force
I finished this top a couple weeks ago. It would have been sooner, but I managed to misplace one of the sleeves—I didn't have enough fabric to re-cut the missing piece, but it finally turned up.
The Lani top from Style Arc features internal seaming, an asymmetric hem with mitered corners, a princess seam over one breast and a dart on the other, and 3/4 length sleeves. It is designed for a woven fabric and pulls over the head (it has no closures), so you immediately know that it is loosely fitted.
I decided to use a drapey rayon batik in a lovely swampy green color that I purchased this year at Puyallup. A friend gifted me with a green-and-black striped fabric that she purchased in New York in the same colors, and I used it to pipe the seams.
I had to make a few alterations to the pattern:
- Increased the bust dart.
- Removed width from the hips.
- Added shaping to the waist.
- Narrowed the shoulder by 3/8".
I think I've mentioned before how I love Uniqlo tee shirts. I went into Uniqlo recently to look for a white tee to wear with my Britex linen pants and I stumbled on a cache of sewing-themed tops. How had I missed these before?! They are on clearance—I scooped up three tees and two sweatshirts.
Check out my spoils!
I don't know how long they will last, but you can check out the "Merchant & Mills" garments on their site.
I recently made three pairs of pants. Yes, three pairs! I was testing out patterns for the linen pants I recently blogged. When I say "testing", I mean that I pared down each pattern to a front, a back, and a waistband. Easy peasy.
Here's a quick round up.
Wow, I need to wear it with a top that "goes" better!
(Originally purchased at Fabrix.)
While all three patterns worked, I ended up using Vogue 8909 for the Britex pants.
Refashioning Tees into an Infinity Scarf
I wanted to make a thank you gift for Jana, a developer from Prague who helped out at a recent work event. Jana is a fan of Dart and enjoys wearing Dart swag, so I took a Dart t-shirt (Hanes Beefy Tee Men's, size large) and another Google t-shirt in Dart's royal blue color (Women's Sport-T in XL), and I cut them up to fashion a Koos scarf.
Jana is rather tall, so I wanted to make the Koos scarf on the longer side. I pieced it as follows:
The resulting scarf... well, it's Dart-y!
(We also gave Jana some locally made gourmet chocolate. ;) )
I recently saw Dorothy K, and she was wearing a fabulous project that she had just completed. As she hasn't been posting reviews on Pattern Review, I asked her if I could post some pics, and she graciously agreed.
This is Dorothy's very first Alabama Chanin piece. (She loves to dive into the deep end, Dorothy does.) She stenciled the fabric with Anna's Garden Stencil.
She used one of her TNT dress patterns, an OOP Stretch and Sew—1500, I believe. The bolero pattern came from the Alabama Chanin book.
I asked Dorothy how long this project took and she estimated that it was about 6 months of sewing 2-3 hours a day, most every day. And she loved it. She already planning her next Alabama Chanin outfit.
In the spirit of providing even more inspiration, here is a fabulous quilt that Dorothy made about a year ago. The second photo shows the colorful backing.
Dorothy shared another fabulous garment, but I couldn't get a pic to do it justice. If that ever happens, and it's ok with her, I'll post that, too!
