Emergency hobby progress report

Sometimes getting sewing time is not very easy.
In these circumstances other hobbies come to the fore. Particularly portable hobbies that will  fit in the handbag whilst a work in progress.









 
I am missing sewing

Leather Jacket display BWOF 10-2009-126

Thank you for the kind comments regarding my unfinished SWAP. Due to the vigilance and  excellent memories of my sewing compatriots, I realised that despite my lack of sewing, I have vital blogging to finish - I had not written a boastful finished object post about my leather jacket! What an oversight.
I felt that my main reason for lack of posting was that I had written so much about the jacket in construction post one and construction post two, that you would all be sick of hearing about it, but after the rush photo job this afternoon before the light faded completely, now feel that no mere point and shoot job can do my leather jacket justice. I will post about it anyway, but assure you that it looks better in real life - and when I haven't been at work all day.

I think I will mostly wear the jacket open, for both climate and sartorial reasons.


I like the cuff zips, but wish the photo was of the other one, which is neater. Fortunately I have almost forgotten the trickiness of the topstitching.

The jacket has a lot of movement room for such a stiff construction material, and close fit.

My favourite part is the secret embroidered pocket and silk lining.

I am very glad that I gave into my strange impulse to make this jacket in high summer. I now have an excellent winter jacket as the cool weather starts, timed nicely with the later phase of "Isewedititis", where I have considerable trouble remembering the many imperfections from my construction.
I wonder where I have put that red suede?

SWAP slackness - the reveal

The Stitchers Guild SWAP (Sewing with a Plan) is a great idea, with a new twist each year. I didn't finish it this year, but am displaying my partial attempt. Photos were due yesterday, so I missed the boat completely, having not finished my planned sewing by last week, and failing to reconsider my options by including a previously sewn garment for number 11.
The rules, paraphrased - sew 11 garments from 7 categories, 4 categories must be used twice. Aim - tried and true pattern development and garments that appear to belong in the same wardrobe.
I made 10 garments, from 7 categories, and am missing the silk dress of doom that has been sitting on my dress form Geraldine since February 29, and suitable photos of my hiking trousers.


Leather Jacket, silk charmeuse lined Burda Style10-2009-126
Cotton Lace skirt with silk charmeuse underlining Burda Style 02-2011-107
Rayon knit t shirt with ruffle  cotton voile trim adapted from Burda Style 07-2010 2 layer t shirt

same skirt and top with merino gauze knit cardigan coat


Vogue 8728 lightweight silk poplin dress
Merino gauze knit cardigan coat Burda Style 03-2012-122


Rayon t shirt again
Merino knit cardigan coat again
with Denim trouser jeans with detail embroidery  BWOF 04-2009-118

Silk jersey t shirt  adapted from Burda Style 07-2010 2 layer t shirt
Silk-linen tweed skirt, lined with silk charmeuse, Burda Style 02-2011-107

same skirt with bib front blouse, cotton woven, from BWOF 01-2008-107/8

closer view of shirt so that bib frontedness is noticeable

Convertible hiking trousers from woven wicking polyester with starting point BWOF 04-2009-118
Silk jersey t shirt again adapted from Burda Style 07-2010 2 layer t shirt
Gortex rain jacket and son not part of the SWAP

 

Dress of doom

As a stand alone wardrobe, this is severely lacking in tops and blouses. However, as a sewing plan to develop a set of useful and co-ordinating patterns this was quite successful. As I already had a TNT t shirt, straight skirt and trouser pattern, I chose to concentrate on detail work for the skirts, embellishment for one of the t shirts and  for the jeans, expanding garment options for the convertible trousers, and to concentrate my fitting and new-to-me construction efforts for the leather jacket. I enjoyed using some of the luxurious fabrics that had been languishing in my stash, and feel that I have made garments that I will wear frequently in my everyday life.

Silk/Linen Tweed skirt, Burda Style 02-2011 faced waistline

Once or twice a year, I buy a fabric bundle from Michael's for not very many $ per yard, plus about 25% per yard for postage, much less expensively than I can buy similar fabric in Australia. The fabric is always very high quality, and as I am very bad at moving out of my rut, I am sure that some of the more interesting textures and colours (which are not chosen by the recipient) are very good for me - even if I have to dye them... This fabric, however, spoke directly to my conservative heart.
Silk, sigh, Linen, aah, tweed, how delicious, deadly dull neutrals, just my cup of tea, but how bad am I with my carbon debits ?, this poor fabric has travelled from Scotland, to Boston, U.S.A to Queensland, Australia for a very small price indeed. I don't think this started out as a small price fabric. Being a complete sucker for  interested in fabric selvage labelling I looked up Holland & Sherry. I could not find my fabric in the permanent collections, nor in the seasonal collections for the past 3 years, but I love it anyway, ancient and out-of-fashion as it may be. Despite its antcedents, I washed this fabric in my machine on the delicate setting (admittedly after a sample survived hand washing), knowing that dry-clean only instructions are patently ridiculous for clothing to be worn in a sub-tropical climate. The fabric not only survived the experience without shrinking, but was even more luscious and softer in texture once through the machine.  I have made a very boring, classic pegged skirt from this beautiful and hardy fabric.


 Here we go again with my adjusted TNT Burda Style 02-2011-103/6/7. I used the Claire Shaeffer faced waistline again, this time in the 'with lining' version. Having used  this technique twice in a row, I am feeling fairly confident in my acquisition of this waistline finish.
The stay tape and interfacing are in between the lining (sandwashed silk charmeuse from Greenfields) and the outer fabric.
The grosgrain waistline facing is attached inside the lined skirt. Again I have used Kenneth King's lapped off set zipper from Cool Couture, and added a back kick pleat to the skirt.
 I have bound the hem with the lining fabric, to decrease bulk, and taken a photo of it prior to ironing, (sorry) as the light was fading rapidly. Hand sewing takes me far longer than I expect.
The edges of the pleat have been bound with the charmeuse,and I pinked the lining hem edge prior to attaching tea dyed lace to the edge by machine zig zag.
 I am extremely pleased with my boring skirt, and imagine that I will wear it all-the-time for years. Something so dull will takes ages before it is noticeably out of date.

Miss Fisher's silk pyjama trousers

When there is an open invitation to a party in a different time zone, turning up at the right time can be a bit awkward. I gather from Karen's post that everyone will be up late chatting and eating popcorn, so I am hoping that any time before midnight GMT will mean that I don't miss out.
 I have been re-reading Kerry Greenwood's Miss Fisher series, whilst watching the ABC series with my daughters, so considering that there is a literary sub-theme to this party, have made Miss Fisher worthy pjyamas.
 
 I enjoy these books for their escapist plots, the triumph of good over evil, just right for bed-time reading, and the delightful characters, with the added bonus of detailed descriptions of 1920's clothing. In the television series, the costuming is fabulous. However, I am very glad that I own the original print issue of the books, as I much prefer the Art Deco illustrations to the new covers.
 My homage to Miss Fisher are silk-satin pyjama trousers ( fabric bought mere weeks ago from The Remnant Warehouse), cut from my standard trouser pattern, but straight up from the hips at the side seams, without darts.
Due to the shaping at the centre seam, this cut makes the trousers too narrow to be pull on, so I have added a gusset at the fly. This construction means that the pyjamas are comfortable, but only slightly gathered at the waist (with my elastic attached to shiny-side-in bias tubes as ties), which is much more flattering for someone with my waist to hip ratio than normal pyjama trousers.
 
 The trousers are constructed with french seams throughout, with a little machine embroidery over the gusset seams, bias binding at the bottom of the gusset, and running stitch by hand at the top of the waist band for a neat edge when the trouser drawstring gathers the waist. The remainder of my Miss Fisher outfit are the gown and nightgown/pyjama top from must-be-out-of -print-by-now New Look 6929. This is a very comfortable outfit, and looks much better than my flannies!

 

Lace and silk skirt Burda Style 02-2011-107, faced waistline technique

Today is a public holiday in Australia and New Zealand, remembering the disastrous Gallipoli campaign starting at 3.30am 25/4/1915 (which is why we have a dawn service), and both past and current members of the armed services. I find ANZAC day both important and depressing.It reminds me that most of my concerns are trivial and that I am very fortunate. I do not intend to be disrespectful in writing about the pleasures and tribulations of my hobby today, I think most people need to distract themselves from events and issues they cannot change, and sewing is one of my primary distractions.

 Having risen well before dawn this morning, I have some very early morning photographs to show you (outfit accessorized with large bags under the eyes), and am keen to return to considering light and frivolous matters such as personal adornment and hobby sewing, particularly as I have most of the day left for these matters.

 During the week, when I showed an enormous pile of mending to my mojo,it whimpered and tried to hide under the bed, so I went stash petting decided to virtuously tidy my fabric storage area in order to fit in my recent mojo building purchases. Fortuously, some mushroom pink silk from E&M Greenfield just happened to end up next to a piece of greyish/beige cotton lace that I bought whilst with Elizabeth, Hen and Ruthie on our Goldhawk Rd shopping expedition. I had originally bought this lace thinking of an unlined lace jacket, but clearly it wanted to be a skirt, underlined with the pink silk. It is amazing how fabric has a mind of its own.

 
 I used my workhorse pattern BurdaStyle 02-2011-107 (adjusted) despite its front darts and 4 back seams. Although lace is better used in a pattern with little shaping and seaming, my figure does not agree with this sort of pattern.

I was not entirely confident about sewing the lace. I pre-washed it, and it needed blocking to restore the shape. In addition, there was a great deal of ravelling at the cut ends, and the selvage was not suitable for the hem edge. You might think that this sort of fabric misbehaviour challenge would be flattening to the mojo, but instead it seemed to spark ideas. I do not understand my mojo.

 To deal with the instability of the lace, and to conceal the seams , I decided to treat the lace and the sand washed silk charmeuse as a single layer in construction. I lay out each fabric on cutting mats, and cut out with a rotary cutter, giving generous seam allowances to allow for bulky seams and fitting( 2.5cm) and a 3.75 centre back seam allowance to allow for an off set lapped zip and a back kickpleat.
 I hand basted the centre back stitching line and the darts. I overlocked the edges of each piece, then machine basted the garment for fitting.

 I used the off set lapped zip instructions from Kenneth King's book, Cool Couture, which although straightforward and giving a nice result, unfortunately assume there is a waistband at the top. Having no waistband, and some issues with my previous waist finishing explorations with this skirt, I looked up skirts in Claire Sheffer's book Couture Sewing Techniques book. She describes 3 common waistband finishes. The one that appealed most to me for this skirt was what she describes as a faced waistline, "favoured by Chanel".

 I did not find the instructions entirely clear, more a general description assuming quite a bit of knowledge. The first step, fitting the skirt closely to the waist is fine. I did not see though, how I could apply a stay tape to the waistline of the skirt, as instructed, without the stitching showing through the outside - unlike the other steps, no stitch advice was given for this step.
 Instead, I applied the stay tape (selvage from quilting cotton) to the "raw" top overlocked waist edge,by machine, which is probably incorrect, but worked for me. I interfaced the waistline as instructed, guessing a width of about 2.5cm would be appropriate, as there are no guidelines in the book. I used Pro Weft Supreme interfacing from Fashion Sewing supplies, as this is an excellent firm interfacing, with sufficient texture for the next step, catchstitching the seam allowance to the interfacing, to be carried out without needing to take the stitch through to the outer fabric.
Following these steps, (during which I folded the seam allowance over the zip tape and hand sewed in place) a grosgrain ribbon, steamed or clipped to shape, is applied over the top of the interfacing and seam allowance, and fell stitched ( a new stitch to me) in place at the top only.
 

 I also attached the bottom of the grosgrain (I used 7/8 inch grosgrain,no indications re width

are given in the book)

 

There are no instructions for finishing the grosgrain ribbon band, but a sketch showing buttonloops. I used hooks and eyes set up like a bra back fastening, as I was happy that I would be able to fasten this in the small of my back by feel, rather than having to request assistance in dressing.
 I had also applied a thread loop and button externally at the top of the zip, as I like the zip placket to sit flat in all circumstances, but due to the excellent firmness given to the waistband by this multi-layer finish, I do not think it is really necessary. I particularly like this waist finish, and will be using it again. The grosgrain seems to lightly grip the tucked in top garment in addition to keeping the waist firm.
 After all this success with the waist, I had still not decided how to hem this piece. Lace finishing techniques all seem to assume that cut lace does not ravel, which is not the case for this fabric (maybe it is home dec lace?, and I did not want an overlocked edge at the hem, as this looked cheap and sloppy in my sample.
 My eventual solution was to separate the lace and silk underlay for about 5cm at the bottom of the skirt, and to bind the hem with a straight grain strip of the underlay silk charmeuse. I tried bias, but it rippled. I machine stitched the right sides of the garment and charmeuse together at the hem line, then turned under the charmeuse and hand stitched the folded edge of the charmeuse to the stitching line. The lace had stretched a little during the machine stitching of the hem and I took small pleats in the charmeuse binding at each seamline to preserve the slight pegging of the design. I was not entirely successful in preserving the pegging, but have ended up with a straight skirt that is not unpleasing.
 I hand stitched the vertical skirt seams of the lace and silk skirts and made a hand rolled hem of the inner silk skirt.
 

 I am pretty sure that this skirt will work well in my wardrobe.
Edited to fix the spacing, thanks to Mary Nanna for the instructions! 

Exercises in supporting or depressing the sewing mojo - trouser jeans

Thank you for your kind comments about my blogging absence. Thank you also for the kind words about my mojo, but unfortunately, it seems a fragile and feeble thing at the moment, rather than returning in good shape as would be preferable.
Here are some mojo killing depressing jeans that I finished prior to the trip.

I am not a jeans devotee ,but have to admit that they are a useful item of clothing for someone who tends to dress in order not to stand out in any way, and only wants to take carry on baggage.

I do not really want to talk about these jeans, they were dull and un-co-operative to sew due to the stiffness of the fabric combined with the vagaries of my figure, which tends more the shape admired in the 1880's than one that looks its best in jeans. The pattern is my adapted TNT trouser pattern from Burda 04-2009. I embroidered one leg, then got sick of it.

They look better than RTW jeans.

I am sewing a skirt next

Lets move on to mojo stimulating activity.
Here is my $22 worth of things from Hunter Valley junk shops. (My husband loves junk shops)

The singer binding foot and pattern tracing wheel are from Morpeth, where I did not buy an incomplete Singer buttonholer for $30, but the foot was only $1 - Did they know what it was? I am planning a bit of electrolysis this weekend to see if I can make these tools a little more useful.

The buttons and lace were from a lovely Old Wares shop in Branxton. This was well worth the visit, with a lot of vintage clothes, vintage fabric lengths, buttons and trims. The prices were what you would expect for someone trying to make a living from selling these things, except for the cotton lace in very good condition for 50c per metre which the lady said was a mistake, but sold to me for that price anyway. I hope she made a profit on my husband's purchases!

I have been on a fabric diet since mid January, which I could possibly blame for mojo depression, but had always planned to finish the diet during my trip to Sydney, as my daughter and I planned an exciting expedition to buy fabric for her self-designed high school graduation formal dress.
This dress is a very big deal to my daughter, particularly as the Yr 12 graduation dinners are highly interesting events to our country town, with all the attendees photographed red carpet style and all the photographs being published in a special issue of the local paper.
After being unable to find a suitable-to-my-daughter shade of green silk fabric in any of 9 internet shops I thought this would be a loooong day.
My plan was to start at Alexandria, then move on to the fabric district in Surrey Hills where there are 3 shops from which to choose - Greenfields, The Fabric Store and Tessuti.
This was my first visit to The Remnant Warehouse, both Gail and Sharon recommended it to me, and I am very grateful, as it is a terrific shop.

I found it easy to access via public transport, as it is only a few blocks from the train station.
(Train station is Green Square, not Alexandria,just to be confusing)
Fortunately for me, the shop is located right next door to an enormous tool shop, for the entertainment of accomanying husbands, no doubt. We thought this person was safely off kayaking for the day with his brother, but this fell through at the last minute. Much as I enjoy my husband's company, he is not my favourite companion for fabric shopping.
The Remnant Warehouse has two shops, one for dancewear, costumes and swimwear, and one for dress and quilting fabrics.

Here is my score from the swimwear shop, which I accidently entered first - 2 nylon/lycra pre cut 1 metre lengths at $9.95 per m, and the one my daughter fell in love with cut from a roll at $19.95 per metre. See all the lovely doo-dads useful clasps and things-I-might-want-one-day. It was probably just as well that I was on a strict time limit in this shop, there were some very interesting remnant and trim boxes.

Next door, there was a good display of dress fabrics, about half of the shop was quilting fabrics. There were silks in a reasonable range of weaves, weights and colours, scattered amongst other fabrics, but clearly labelled. Amazingly, my daughter found the exact colour she was after, in a medium heavy duchess silk.

I thought it was a real bargain at $16.95 per metre - so I bought myself some in red as well. It took us about 20 minutes.
The service was excellent and well informed - also beyond the call of duty. I had a few 3kg flat rate post bags with me, not being keen to carry fabric about all day, (and being quite keen to buy too much fabric to fit in my carry on), and packed one of these at the fabric counter. The shop is in an industrial area and I had not seen any post boxes, but before I could even ask where the closest one was, the saleslady offered to take my parcel to the business post centre, which not only saved me lugging it about, but had my parcel delivered interstate and rurally in only 2 days for no extra cost (normally $7 extra for this speed).
The only problem with this wild success was that I had no change of convincing anyone to visit the Surrey Hills shops with me ;(.
We walked across the Sydney Harbour Bridge instead.