Sunday, April 15, 2018

The more spots the better






I've had this shirt for ages, and wore it a lot for a while.  It's what my friend calls a 'home jobbie' - someone (other than me) made this shirt quite carefully and used a good quality polyester (?) fabric.  Only she was shorter and wider than me, and it never felt quite right. 













So I put it aside for years waiting on a solution.  The trouble with navy is that it's quite hard to match - this one has quite a lot of black, and then, there's the polka dots.  And then one day at a sewing class someone brought in fabric to swap and there it was!  I like the fact the dots are a different size, I think it looks more intentional.  Finally, I could add the extra length!  First I took it in at the princess seams front and back, because it was wide and boxy - I went a little too far though, and ended up reverting the back seams to their original position.  A little boxy can be a good thing - the shoulders looked weird when it was too tailored.






But it still wasn't quite right.  It looked unbalanced - and so the sleeves got a band of dots as well.  Then I changed the buttons as I added an extra buttonhole right at the bottom.  Seeing I didn't have a matching button I removed them all and made them all different - so that looks intentional too.  Plus, I love odd buttons.

 
Happy sewing!
 


2 comments:

whatthesew said...

You definitely see home sewn items over represented in second hand shops. Its hard to get home sewn right - we know. Everything we make is a prototype and is unlikely to be perfect first time. Whenever I see these type of garments I am always tempted to buy, I want to rescue someone else's hard work, and like yours, as a bonus they are often made of better quality fabric.
I think what you've done with this shirt is excellent, you took your time, even in the thinking process, and made an effort to get it right. Eventually the answer, the form of the bigger dotted fabric, will come.

I Can Work With That said...

I really like the 2 dotted fabrics together. Very cute and it made the whole shirt so much more interesting.
Chickie