Category: Community Blog

Planning:

I have been searching for the perfect nursing sundress, as I live in a tropical country that is hot and humid (the feels like temperature was recently 46C). I’m also picky as I wanted it to be a woven dress with straps that will cover a bra and not too tightly fitted but also not a sack. Nursing clothes are often lumped in with maternity and frequently patterns are made for knit fabric so the pickings were slim.

After another fruitless session of browsing through patterns and Instagram posts, I remembered that I already own the something that might be an option with some modifications — the Truly Victorian (TV) Chemise and Drawers (TV102). 

Now, I’ve owned this pattern for so long, that what I have is still the hand-drawn drafting on paper (and it uses a different sizing system than the current version) but I did confirm with the designer that although it’s gone through a few redrafts (and is now available as a PDF) that it is substantially the same and I didn’t need to get the new version.

A few things to know about TV patterns — as they are based on historical garments, they are usually drafted for a higher and smaller armhole than modern patterns and the chemise is made to be tightened with a drawstring so you can wear it both on and off the shoulder underneath a corset. This is important for how I’m altering it.

Sizing wise, I used my high bust (HB) measurement as my starting point. My HB is ~29” (73.5 cm) and the M (as the sizing on my copy goes) is 30” for full bust (FB). My full bust (FB) is almost 35” (88.5 cm) with a very significant asymmetry due to nursing; this leaves me with an almost 6” difference between high and full bust.

I am someone who needs to use their straight HB measurement to decide on a size to ensure it matches my frame. Many people find that HB+2” works better (see previous Sew Busty posts). 

Before I even get to the full bust alterations (FBA) needed, I need to take some of the width out of the back because I don’t want the dress falling off while nursing and I have a very narrow back width. (This comes up on nearly every pattern and also up the last time I made the chemise and other TV patterns). After measuring myself and the pattern, I reduced the width at center back by 1”; although I thought I might need another 1/2” taken out; I can just add a seam to center back if needed.

I also traced off the pattern and graded it from M under the arms to L from the notch to the hem so it’s not form fitting at my hips, as I am slightly pear-shaped. I wanted to keep it slightly A-line rather than clingy.

The front is where we get to the tricky part of alterations as I have a very high set bust and apex; the bottom of my bust is almost in-line with the top of my armpit.

Traditional FBAs don’t give need the extra room where I need it as they assume the extra space is needed lower, so I often need what another Busty Sewing community member calls a “high FBA” — which involves drawing a line through my apex point horizontally, cutting off the pattern and hinging to the armscythe and then spreading. This gives the room where I need it.

In this case I made a 2 1/4” FBA for a total of 4.5” which is less than the ~6” difference between my FB and HB but this pattern already has a lot of extra ease.

I then trued and redrew the armhole and center front. The straps are also now set in further so I don’t have to do a separate narrow shoulder adjustment. The center front is now wider and “too big” but this is where the ease I will need to pull down to nurse will come from. 

Finishing the chemise is also another place I needed to make small changes. The pattern originally calls for you to overlock and then apply lace with ribbon over the top. I have decided to do a partial self lining to finish (down to the notch) which means I need to add the 1/2” seam allowance for the lining to the neckline. In order to snug up the front neckline, I will run ribbon through the a topstitched channel at the neckline and out eyelet holes at CF. I am not adding to the armholes as they are good as is. I am also adding pockets to the side seams and marked the pattern for that and am using a pocket piece from a different pattern. I plan to use this method of bag lining the facing to avoid stitch lines from running over each other.

Actuality:

All of my preplanning paid off with very minor changes. I ended up having to take out 1” of each side of the back with a pleat as it was too wide still when I moved my arms. The front is slightly too low which is perfect as that will eventually be gathered to allow for nursing.

I did have issues with the bag lining. Even though I stay-stitched my fabric, it must have stretched as the facing and fashion fabric weren’t lining up perfectly and I ended up having to fudge the results. The straps were also really too narrow to bag line properly and some of the fashion fabric layer is distorted — but this dress has a gathered neckline which hides the distortion unless you are very close.

I also ended up adding in faux tie straps (from this free pattern and tutorial) which serve two purposes: to hold bra straps and to add detail at the shoulders.

The gathering of the neckline is done by way of a drawstring that is secured to the strap at the shoulder and comes out of an eyelet on the facing.

A trick I came across recently for hemming a dress or shirt that has a curve is to run along the edge with a serger with the differential feed turned all the way up. This slightly gathers the edge and lets you turn and hem easily without it getting wonky. I tried it out and it worked very well! I didn’t get any puckers or weird spots in the hem.

Finally, everything was serged to finish as this was a very shred-y fabric. 

Final Dress Thoughts:

This was a successful experiment and I already have ideas for making more dresses. Finding woven nursing dresses that don’t require zippers or other hardware to nurse in is difficult. It’s even more difficult when you need to have bra coverage and are busty. Altering the Truly Victorian pattern also meant that I started out with a base that already has a smaller armhole – key to preventing gapping when I have a high-set bust and narrow shoulders. I tried some things that were less than successful (the bag lining for the narrow straps) but was able to work around that to have a wearable dress.

Sea_born_abound has been sewing for over 30 year, originally learning when she was a child from her mother and grandmother. She started taking it up seriously as a hobby and relaxation tool as a young adult when nothing fit properly.

If you told me when I was 17 that in 13 years I would weigh 50 pounds more but post pictures of myself in a bathing suit that I made on Instagram, you would first have to explain what Instagram is, but after that conversation was over, I would be shocked.  Like many 17 year olds in the past twenty years, I had distorted eating habits and body dysmorphia.  None of this is uncommon.  But sewing has given me a new perspective on myself and of my body that has changed drastically since I was 17.  

One of the biggest changes I’ve noticed is how taking my measurements doesn’t mean anything to me.  It is a completely neutral act.  Is my under bust measurement 1” bigger than it was the last time I measured?  Yes, but all it means is I need to size up.  So what?  Sometimes it doesn’t even mean that I need to size up!  I’m not sure if I am only speaking for myself here, but I feel like sewing has desensitized how I feel about women’s clothing sizes.  

We always talk about how your ready-made size does not reflect your sewing pattern size, and while that is fine, we need to recognize that sewing sizes in general are very arbitrary.  This is even more apparent when we start using different pattern designers outside the Big 4.  I am a size 12 for the True Bias Lander shorts, but I am also an 8 for one of Gertie’s Patreon patterns. 

The numbers don’t mean anything, and sewing allows us to understand that these numbers really are almost random, and just tell us which lines to cut out. 

I think my husband said it best when I told him I was a size 12 for a pattern and he said, “12 what?  There’s no units, that size means nothing.”  Leave it to the scientists to put things into perspective.

My final takeaway is that clothes should fit ME, I don’t need to fit into my clothes.  Once I realized this, my world changed. 

Sewing gives us the power to make something fit exactly how we want it to.  We are free to make any adjustments we want to a pattern so it fits us perfectly.  That power made me feel amazing, and to this day I am the most confident when I wear clothes that I made that fit me, not wearing something I “fit into”.  

Sewing my own clothes (and therapy, as well, can’t forget that) has freed me from this idea that I had to measure to a certain number, or I had to fit into a certain size to be happy.  What makes me happy now is creating something that is just for me, no one else, and knowing that I put time and effort into it to make it fit me exactly how I am.  

Carly (she/her) can be found on Instagram (@sewingyourwildoats) or at her blog with the same name, sewingyourwildoats.com, where she mostly shows tutorials on how to add pockets to patterns!

How many of us got into sewing because we didn’t fit in “off the rack” clothing? I know I did. 

It started with a middle school trip to the opera, we had to wear really nice clothing to attend. I don’t know if we were truly poor but money was always tight and clothing in the department stores either didn’t fit me in the kids section or was more money than we could spend in the adult’s. The tween/junior’s section was no help either, I was a B cup sometimes C cup chest with matching booty, baby teen of the late 80’s.

Fast forward to my 40’s, sewing has always been there for me when I didn’t find things I wanted in store or just wanted to express my truest self. I have skirts made of thrifted curtains, a wedding gown of store bought tencel linen with thrifted vintage lace bustle, bras out of old peignoirs. 

Fabric and fibers are in lots of places, once you start to understand the construction, source materials are everywhere.

It hasn’t always been sewing successes. Early on, as a high schooler, I submitted garments for our local county fair. I made a self drafted Romeo and Juliet costume. I didn’t know anything about wearing ease back then but I remember cutting the bodice out on the floor of our living room with a paper bag as my pattern. Thankfully my best friend was the right size to fit it for the fashion show. Mistakes still happen, just recently a pair of jeans that my sewing retreat group and I worked on didn’t fit me right but fit my husband quite well.

As my sewing skills continue to grow and be tested, I can’t help but notice how intertwined self esteem and body image are. I still have a hard time with my mistakes, or when the fit isn’t just right. Now, instead of thinking I need to change my body, I know I can change a seam. So much easier.

I can now only imagine how hard that must have been to navigate for my mom, having always been a straight size but also sewed clothing she wanted. I am frequently infuriated by the clothing industry on behalf of my teen and elementary schooler. I want better for them, so body image bs will not continue with me. It made me do some digging, so here’s some of the science of it. Just like sizes are just data points, our brains are doing brain’y things.

Body image is both a mental picture of your own body and how you see yourself in the mirror.

Body image is a four part concept in our gray matter:

• Perception
• Affective
• Cognitive
• Behavioral

Perception is how you think you look but might not match reality. Affective is how you feel about your body in relation to how it looks. Cognitive is the beliefs and thoughts you hold about your body. Behavioral is what actions you take in relation to body image. All of these can have positives and negatives, and the way to counter the negative is mindfulness. 

Mindfulness can look like walks to enjoy the scents and visuals of a place, self acceptance talk, the way we talk to ourselves in our heads (“my glutes are so strong, they help hold me up or help me sit down”) and being in the moment. 

Children as young as 3 can have body image issues.

Body image is both a mental picture of your own body and how you see yourself in the mirror, self esteem is how you value and respect yourself as a person and can affect how you take care of yourself. This is why I feel it’s important to recognize and get rid of our inherent biases, children as young as 3 can have body image issues.

I continue to sew these days because I love garments made out of natural fibers. Silk, denim, cotton lawn, lightweight knit merino wool all these fibers not only wear well in the climate where I live but they keep me from overheating. I don’t avoid all man-made fabrics but through sewing I have found fibers that help me feel good in my body when sometimes it’s hard.

Sewing is for everyone, every body, every gender (I don’t think sewing has a gender but historically it has been marketed to those who do underpaid and unpaid domestic labor, mostly minorities and women) but body image has been used as a selling point in so many ways that it’s always going to be something to examine with garment making.

Just like with making a seam, when we know better we can do better. I choose to keep stitching and improving, won’t you join me?

Lauren Durr (she/her) is a Los Angeles based creative educator and entrepreneur. She helps students young and vintage, cut through body image BS by making, altering or editing garments for the body they have right now. You can find her on instagram @laurenmakesitwork.

Well, here I am on the up turn of a long and dreadful lack of inspiration. Have you ever just felt,…. blah?

Lacking motivation, deprioritizing the things that make you happy?

That is the head space I have been living in for months, and it simply felt like it had no end in sight.
So, how do you get out of this perpetual state? I find most of the time I must fake it. Find even the
smallest sliver of joy and run with it. The way I most often do this is to start small. Find a very simple but beautiful pattern and just make something. It’s a start.

Often when I force myself to start with a small project it can reinvigorate me and create that spark. We all just need a little spark sometimes, right?

To see if I could bring my joy back, I decided I would make one dress. Seemed simple enough, baby steps. Let me tell you it worked!

I chose the Arum Dress Pattern from Deer and Doe. This dress has called to me for some time. There is something to be said for a classic piece with a flattering silhouette. The Arum Dress is a woven pattern that features a dolman sleeve, back princess seams and two different length options. I find that dolman style patterns flatter those that are larger up top. After reviewing the measurement chart, I was surprised to find that I measured a straight size 44. No adjustments needed. I find this to be a rare occurrence for me as a 32 G.

To hone in on what I was trying to accomplish I made it exactly the way it was intended.

For my first Arum I used the Wine Paths print rayon that I picked up from Phee Fabrics. It has a nice stripe pattern that I knew would flatter my figure. I chose to position the stripes so they would run vertical on my finished piece. I knew this would also alleviate some frustration in the stripe matching process. My choices paid off, it was perfect!

After making the first dress I thought, could this be made in bases outside of the recommendations?

This thought led me down a positive path and it made me want to test my theory.

This time I made the dress in a wonderful Art Gallery Lemon print cotton spandex blend. I knew
choosing this fabric would pose some challenges, particularly because this pattern has a neck facing instead of bands. It made me wonder, should I convert the neck facing to a more traditional knit band?

After some thought I knew it was not the look that I wanted, I really wanted the same clean look as my previous dress. I figured it couldn’t hurt to do the facing exactly as I had done before, what’s there to lose? For this I needed patience and oh, so many pins. To my disbelief it came together like butter.

My confidence now restored and gears turning I pondered, can I make it work in rayon spandex too? My third dress was a rayon spandex rib knit, in a bright sunny yellow. I knew this fabric choice was risky as it has an abundance of movement but again, I pushed through. Sticking to a very similar process as the dress prior. Pinning and pinning some more. I really had no faith this would work, but it worked again.

With my sewjo now fully intact, I decided to make just one more.

For the last dress I went with a more muted but classic choice, using a lovely lightweight denim, a fabric closer to the original recommendations. Knowing I had previously put myself to the test with more finicky fabrics this one came together smoother than I imagined. From beginning to end, it only took 1 hour! It was exactly what I needed to come full circle.

Now fully invigorated, I can’t help but feel inspiration all around me.

Taking a small step approach works! It can work for something as complex as depression, all the way down to simpler day to day frustrations. You can take something simple and turn it into a wealth of inspiration. I know starting something at all can seem too big a task at times, but it is these simple actions that create momentum. Baby steps start us down the path to finding ourselves. Simply knowing that hobbies can be the outlet you need to find your joy and bring back that spark is sometimes all it takes!

Happy sewing and may your sewjo be forever in your favor!

Kerri is a sewist with about 5 years of experience. She is a mom of 3, a lover of fashion and all things vintage. She puts her heart and soul into everything she does and that is why she is so in love sewing: She can make things that are uniquely her! Find all of Kerri’s makes on Instagram @sewsewwonderful

I think we have all been there, we have a stack of patterns and a cupboard full of fabrics and so many plans for things to make with them. When our precious sewing time finally comes around after work is done for the day, and the house is clean, and the family are fed, and the kids are in bed, and we are paralysed by indecision.  What do we want to work on? We end up spending half of the precious allotted time just deciding which project to start.

This is why I take a pre-planned capsule wardrobe approach to my sewing. Hi, my name is Laura and I make plans. All the time, in every aspect of my life. I even plan in spontaneity! 

Why does capsule planning work for me?

I love sewing, in particular, having control over the way I dress. But left to my own devices I would have 900 pairs of jeans and nothing else in my wardrobe. They are my favourite thing to make but we all know that a pair of jeans is not an appropriate outfit on it’s own. There are also occasions when jeans might not be my first pick to wear, for example when the temperature outside is above 20 degrees Celsius (68 degrees Fahrenheit). So I need to make some other things too.

By planning a capsule collection, I can make sure I have pieces in my wardrobe that will definitely go together and can be worn interchangeably. I wear almost exclusively separates anyway because that is my personal comfort zone, so having tops and bottoms and toppers (think jackets, cardigans, overshirts etc.) that work together takes all the guess work out of getting dressed.

Some of my capsule collections have been designed with a particular activity in mind, such as summer holiday capsule or work wear capsule. Some have just been designed centring around a particular colour or print I want to include in my wardrobe.

What is a capsule wardrobe?

The answer to this is really whatever you make it. There are several established capsule wardrobe templates that you could use. For example:

• a mini capsule, which I first heard about from Whitney (TomKat Stitchery on youtube)- 3 tops, 2 bottoms and 1 topper.
• the 3×3 grid capsule – 3 tops, 3 bottoms and 3 toppers
• the perfect 10 – 4 tops, 2 bottoms, a dress, a sweater and 2 layering pieces (jacket or cardigan).

If all of those feel like a lot to start with you could start with one bottom piece (trousers or a skirt) and two tops that will go with it. This is a capsule wardrobe in its most simple form.

For some people thinking more than one project ahead is too much, so what about a rolling wardrobe model? Start with one wardrobe piece, for example a dress in a print you love. The next thing you make will go with that item, for example a cropped jacket in a complimentary colour. The next item will go with the 2^nd item but doesn’t necessarily go with the first, so in this example maybe a skirt in the same fabric as your jacket? and so on…. This method allows you to work spontaneously but will still mean you have a cohesive closet to pull from with items that go together. (If this interests you check out this pattern review thread where they are looking at this concept.)

Top tips for planning your capsule wardrobe

1. Plan around existing pieces in your wardrobe – Do you have an item in your wardrobe that you love but it doesn’t get much wear because you don’t have much that really goes with it? Why not make it some friends? Remember that not everything in your capsule has to be me made. Why not buy a really great classic skirt and make three tops to go with it?
2. Think about what you love wearing – maybe you need another one of that item in rotation? This might be a good jumping off point for planning a capsule.
3. Plan around a theme – workwear, loungewear, formal wear, all wovens / knits, activewear, work to weekend, holiday wardrobe (etc. etc. you get the idea). No matter what your life looks like there is a capsule for you.
4. If you are including prints choose one multicoloured print as a starting point, then pull in co-ordinating colours. Personally, I do not feel that comfortable with print mixing so I usually go for prints on the tops in my capsules and plains on the bottoms and toppers. That way I know everything will work together. BUT if you love print mixing then go for it! Just try and keep everything in a cohesive colour scheme.
5. What comes first the pattern or the fabric? – I have done capsules both ways and both work so it really depends on your process and what you want to achieve with the capsule. Personally, I find I buy more new stuff if I start with patterns because I won’t often have the perfect fabric in the perfect colour in my stash. If I start with fabrics, I can usually find a suitable pattern that I already own.
6. Know your neutrals and incorporate them into your capsule – this will help you make pieces that fit into your wardrobe as a whole. Remember that neutrals don’t have to be black brown, white, grey etc. Hot pink and neon green can also be neutrals, they are just colours you return to over and over. Mine are currently olive green, brown, ivory and navy
7. Consider accessories – If you knit or crochet or do some other fibre art why not consider hats, shawls, gloves etc for your capsule. Shoes, bags and jewelry also change the way an outfit can look. Think simple white tee for a day at the beach but put on a statement necklace for an evening out.
8. Step back – once you have an initial plan step back and look at it with an evaluating eye. Does this look like something you will actually reach for? If not, why not? Does the overall collection look too wild/ colourful/ boring etc? If you don’t like the way certain styles look together, make sure you aren’t including them. The example I always use for myself is cropped tops with low rise trousers. Your examples might be different. It is about understanding your own style preferences and honouring them.
9. Plan in a spontaneous make – If you are the type of person who thrives on falling in love with something and just diving right in, but you also want to try your hand at capsule sewing, why not plan in some spontaneity? There is nothing that says because you have planned these 6 or 9 items that you must make them one after the other. Maybe make one thing from your planned list and then allow yourself to choose a project at random. Then go back to your planned list.

Capsule wardrobes for busty sewists

When Lindsey from Sew Busty asked me if I would write a community blog post about capsule wardrobe planning one of the questions she asked me was “how does being busty effect your wardrobe planning?” I have thought a lot about this in the weeks since I agreed to write this post. For me I am always aiming for items that I will wear and love. So perhaps the real question here is “how does being busty effect what you wear?” The answer is, it does affect it but not in the way you might think.

We have always been told that busty people should wear V necks and wrap dresses because less fabric on the chest will make you look smaller. In contrast I might be considered a modest dresser (for personal comfort reasons rather than religious ones). I choose high necklines because I have never felt particularly comfortable showing cleavage and like to be able to move naturally without worrying about showing more than I want to.

As a result, I don’t think my capsules are constrained by what will “suit” my body shape but more by my own personal style rules. Understanding your own comfort levels when it comes to clothing is key to creating a capsule collection, or even just individual items, that you will love and wear. Shapes, motifs, colours, silhouette, fibres, substrates and finishing details all feed into this. Sometimes the only way to really understand if something is really right for you is to try it. Experimentation is key and doesn’t stop. What you like and are comfortable with can change for different situations, different times of year, and develop over time. Just because I don’t choose to wear skirts now doesn’t mean I never have or never will.

I hope I have shown you how planning a capsule wardrobe can be exciting and help channel your creativity into core wardrobe pieces that will really earn their keep. If you decide to do your own capsule wardrobe please tag me on Instagram @sewnandshown I would love to see your planning.

Vintage isn’t for everyone. I know this. But somehow or other I have fallen in love with the fashions of the 1930s-1950s, and it makes me really happy to wear these kinds of styles. For those of you who aren’t into my style of vintage, don’t worry – this blog post is really just about making a princess seam tailored suit jacket.

I volunteer at Bletchley Park, which, in case you don’t know, was the base from which the Allied code breakers worked in World War Two. When I’m there, I really like to wear my 1940s style clothes and imagine working there in 1941. I think this is where my desire for a 1940s style suit came from, and since I have long given up looking for true vintage pieces that fit me, I knew I was going to need to design, draft and make it myself. 

For me, that starts with a little biro drawing in my notebook. Nothing fancy, just enough to show the seams and style lines. I knew I wanted princess seams, because I’m not a huge fan of darts on my bust (37” high bust, 41” full bust and very short torso), and also earlier this year I made a cropped version of the Princess Coat from Charm Patterns and I quite liked it. I knew I could use the princess seams from this pattern as a basis, but wanted to change the collar, the length of the jacket overall and the back would need vents to accommodate my butt.

I pulled out my traced pieces from the Princess Coat and laid over my tracing paper, and started tracing the bits I’d keep and changing everything else. I didn’t change the armscye any so I also used the same 2-piece tailored sleeve. I also referred to other patterns I had already drafted to help me with the collar.

Then I made a mock-up/toile/muslin – test version, whatever you call it. The collar was way too big for my liking, so I went and re-drafted it and made a second test garment, which is pictured above. Still having doubts about the collar size, I popped a blouse on with it and suddenly it all seemed to make sense. Now I was happy with it, I finalised all my pattern pieces and drafted the facings. Time to cut into my project fabric! 

I started by making the bound buttonholes on my jacket front. I learned how to do these when I made the Princess Coat earlier in the year and they give a really nice finish to a tailored garment.

Buttonholes complete, it was on to the princess seams. Now I’m sure we all, anyone who sews for people with a large high bust/full bust difference, know exactly what I’m talking about – your side front panel has a huge bulge in it and the centre front is, at best, straight, and at worse, curved in the opposite direction. So when we put these right sides together to sew, it can get tricky, right?? 

This is my side front and centre front for this jacket. I struggled and struggled last year trying to perfect sewing princess seams with this kind of curve. I Googled and Googled and tried and tried and nothing worked. I would get puckers, the raw edges wouldn’t line up, one piece would end up shorter than the other. If you have experienced any (or all!) of these problems, the good news is I finally found a way to do it! Yes, even on that curve.

Now, I can’t really take any credit here because the method I use is the one recommended by Charm Patterns for the Princess Coat. The silly thing is, I figured that if I couldn’t sew a princess seam, I had no business getting the Princess Coat pattern or watching the “how to” video on YouTube. Oh, how wrong I was. I don’t remember how or why but I ended up watching said “sew a retro cropped jacket” video on YouTube. But the technique for princess seams which is explained in this video, in detail, is the answer to your large bust curve princess seam sewing prayers! I mean, go check out that video if you fancy it.

Here’s how: stay stitch your centre front at 1/8” shy of your full seam allowance (so ½” on a garment with a 5/8” seam allowance like this), then clip into that stay stitched seam allowance at ½” intervals, being careful not to snip your stitching. Then lay your side front right side up on the table in front of you, and lay the stay-stitched and clipped centre front down on top of it, right sides together. Match and pin the notches first, and then you will, like magic, be able to match the raw edges of the two pieces with the opposing curves by spreading the clips on the centre front to match the side front. Use as many pins as you need! Then you can just sew the seam like normal at your required seam allowance.

Then you need to notch the seam allowance on the side front piece. Cut out small triangles at ½” intervals, making sure the points of these triangles are between the clips on the other side. You don’t really want your clips and triangles meeting at the seam! Then you can press the seam open, using a tailor’s ham. 

Ta da! Obviously this is going to leave lots of flappy bits of seam allowance, which I think is why people prefer darts, since really princess seamed garments are going to need a lining to cover all this.

With my front and back princess seams sewn, I moved on with the rest of the construction. Shoulder seams, side seams. Collar, facings. It was starting to look like a jacket at this point, and I was excited to sew and set in the sleeves. I used a bias strip of my fabric to ease the sleeve cap (another Charm Patterns trick) and I love how easy it is and how it gives just the right finish for tailored garments.

I could really see the project starting to take shape at this point. Although I will say, it does not look great on the hanger. It took me a while to realise that this is because I’ve just spent all this time sewing a garment with a lot of room in the bust and sadly my coat hangers are less well endowed! Anyway, on to hand catch-stitching the jacket hems. I know not everyone is a fan of hand stitching, but it does have its place in projects like this. 

Time to start over! What?? Well that’s how I feel when I have to start making the lining. I can’t be the only one. I repeated the necessary steps to construct the lining, using the same princess seam sewing technique as on the outer. On the home straight now, I attached the lining to the jacket, and then hand finished the lining hems, the bound buttonhole openings in the front facing, and finally sewed on the buttons. Finished jacket!

I mentioned at the start that I wanted a suit, so here I am wearing the jacket with the matching pencil skirt I made. I love my suit, and am very pleased with how the jacket compares to my original biro drawing. 

Carly is self-taught and has been sewing since 2018. Her favourite thing about sewing is making whatever you want to fit however you want. Carly wears vintage style daily and this has helped to push her to design and sew her own as it is difficult to find true vintage garments for busty bodies.