July 2019 | Mismatched Buttons (A Monthly Journal)
At the end of June, I predicted that July would be my month of pants, and it largely was! Although not in quite the way I expected it to be…
My original plan for July was to sew some Persephone Pants by Anna Allen, some Sasha Trousers and—if I could manage it—some more Ginger Jeans (both by Closet Case Patterns). To get through this ridiculous, self-imposed to-do list, I was also going to reinstate my daily sewing practice from 50 Days Till Me Made May.
However, things took a twist when my lovely husband’s most favouritist shorts in the whole wide world virtually disintegrated at the bum, requiring a SEWING SUPER-HERO TO THE RESCUE!
But let us begin at the beginning of the month with my Persephone Pants…
Persephone, Goddess
This seems to be the pattern of 2018, 2019 and of all time! I had seen so, so many glorious versions pop up on Instagram that, although I was hesitant about this silhouette on me, eventually I succumbed to curiosity and FOMO, and bought the Persephone Sailor Pants by Anna Allen.
My first note about this pattern is that the seam allowances aren’t generous and it is a reasonably snug fit through the body. It’s a 1cm allowance pretty much throughout, which means there’s not a great deal of room for adjustments on the fly. So, although I didn’t toile, it is something I’d recommend, especially through the crotch and bum. At the very least, it might be worth adding more seam allowance to the crotch and bum, so that you have that extra space for those adjustments.
I made a size 14, which by some luck was a pretty good fit. I made some adjustments to scoop the crotch curve a little to fit me better, and also to make the centre back a bit looser, but I was rather hindered by the small seam allowance. In future, I will definitely make these seams much more generous. I had to remove quite a bit through the top of the centre back (regular reader, you guessed it: sway back), but this was easy enough with the combination of darts and centre back seam to play with.
The waistband as drafted was fine through the front and around the sides, but when it came to my centre back, it stood proud up from the top of my bum like a toy soldier. My rudimentary solution was to cut an angled wodge out of the centre back, which curved it in with my spine, and keep going on my merry way, but in future, I think I need to investigate using curved waistbands.
One of the things I’m most proud of with my Persephones is how damned good I got my waistband looking, both inside and out. Not gonna lie, it took quite a bit of work, but the results speak for themselves. I sewed, as directed, the outside of the waistband to the top of the pants. I then used the pressed edge of the waistband to line up the folded edge along the seamline, hand basted it down, and then did my rows of topstitching before removing the hand basting.
I always feel like the inside of my waistbands are the giveaway that I make my clothes because they’re always a little janky (for comparison, check out the internal waistband of my Gingers!) but using this slightly slower method, I have the waistband I want to see when I sit down to pee! (TMI?)
My Persephones are made from 10oz duck cotton canvas bought from Blackbird Fabric. At first I was a little unsure about having pants made from this colour: I have some weird face-value aversion to brown pants because I get the phrase ‘poo-pants’ stuck in my head. But once I got over that little slice of stupidity, I realised how fantastic a colour it is. It works in so well with all the muted tones in my wardrobe, and the fabric is wearing in, fading a little and softening up beautifully.
And the verdict? It took me a while to feel fully comfortable in this wide-legged silhouette, but now I am completely in love. I’m writing this in October, and in the past months the frequency of wear has gone from maybe once a week, to now wearing them multiple times a week, so often, in fact, I’m a little embarrassed about my students realising I basically wear them to every lecture!
Like Persephone herself, I see an ongoing seasonal renewal of these pants as I make them again and again.
This Just In Shorts!
If you’ve been following my blog, you might have read my post Can we please talk about the terms selfish/selfless sewing?, which was inspired in part by seeing so many posts from sewists feeling guilty about only sewing for themselves, and in part inspired by the fact I was elbow-deep in trying to reverse-engineer my husband’s absolutely-most-favourite-shorts-in-the-whole-world-nay-universe! This will be a brief recap of the method I used for this reverse-engineering, and some notes-to-self about what I’d do differently next time.
The scene: Justin was due to leave for Canada for a mountain biking trip in not-many-days-at-all … when the bum of his shorts gave way. I’d patched them several times before, but there was no return from these tears. But I’d suspected this day would come eventually, so way back in 2018 when I saw that The Fabric Store had dead-stock of the same fabric his Morpork shorts were made up with, I snaffled some up toot-sweet, ready for just such a moment. My method of reverse-engineering the shorts from which to make a pattern was pretty ad-hoc, but here goes anyway. As much as possible I carefully unpicked all the parts so that I could get a sense of the order of construction, starting with the waistband and ending with pockets side-seam.
After I had all the parts I traced them, which is easier than it sounds. Once someone has worn a garment over a long period of time, the pieces are no longer flat, as we find them when we have fresh-cut pattern pieces from a flat piece of fabric. The fibres have stretched and molded themselves to that person’s body. As I laid each gently-molded, subtly-curved piece out, I realised this wasn’t going to be as simple as I’d planned.
However, given I was on a tight deadline to make these replacement shorts, toiling wasn’t an option. It was a matter of looking at how the pattern pieces compared to another men’s pants pattern, making the seam-allowances generous and hoping for the best!
I cut the fabric cross-grain (as the original shorts were cut), and used the instructions from the Elbe Textiles’ Freemantle Pants as a method, and sewed as quickly as I could… And they’re not too bad! They’re not perfect, but for a rush-job with no toiling, they’re just fine. The biggest adjustment to make is to make the back rise longer, which should be easy enough! Over summer I’m going to toile them properly, to try make a This Just In Shorts pattern for keeps! Sewing, without a doubt, is a super power!
In spite of the slight fit issues, Justin wears them frequently, which I am truly thrilled about. And now, to the results! (Will you look at this modelling?! The tolerances of these shorts were well-tested in these poses! <3 )
Green Rosebud Beret
Since I started knitting in 2012, I think I have made at least five of these Rosebud Berets by Jared Flood (for Brooklyn Tweed), both for myself and for other people. It’s definitely my knitting TNT. It’s been a few years, though, since I made one, and with the shifting of the colour palette in my wardrobe towards warmer, mustier, dustier tones, I have been in need of an update. The pattern comes in two shapes: a tam and a longer, slouchier fit. My pick is the tam, or beret, size. It has a wonderful, huge, statement cable, which is simple to execute, but produces major bang for buck.
This gorgeous yarn is from the mystical, dye-pot genius that is Union Fibre. I usually keep quite good records of my fibres, both yarn and fabric, but this time it seems like I’ve mislaid the tag for this particular skein. Going by memory, though, this is an aran weight in the Hot Toddy colourway.
And I love this beret! It’s a design I know I like to wear, and the yarn is lovely and soft to wear. It fits seamlessly into my wardrobe, and I know that it won’t be my last Rosebud. Highly recommend this pattern/yarn combination!
Let the Frocktails Making … BEGIN!
The end of July also heralded in proper Frocktails frock-planning. As making my Frocktails outfit occupied much of August, I won’t dwell too much on it here, except to give the rough outline: I knew I wanted to wear a dress, I knew I wanted to have a coordinating coat, and I knew I wanted to wear red.
Although my plans for the dress were still ebbing and flowing at this point, I decided, and began to make, a big, snuggly, warm hug-of-a-coat, the Artemis Coat by I Am Patterns. In the depths of my stash, I had some lush red-brown coating from Blackbird Fabrics, and in my brain I had the beginnings of a plan…
So, for now, I’m just going to put these toile photos here…
Daily Stitching for July
Like I said at the top, my plan to get through the ridiculous sewing list I’d set myself was to reinstate my daily sewing practice. This broadened out to be a daily stitching practice so I could include knitting and weaving alongside my sewing. I’m pleased that I did most days in July, but it petered out fairly quickly in August. Although I want to have a daily practice, though, sometimes the rigour is just too much. So I’ve decided to give myself over to a more flowing crafting practice, and that’s just fine. But, please enjoy below a gallery of all my July Stitches.
And that’s it! Thank you for reading this far! I’m certainly looking forward to catching up on my current back-log of blog-posts, so keep a weather-eye out for more posts in short-order. Till next time!
