Tag Archives: Daily Outfit

Thoughts on hem lengths; linings and slips

18/09/2013 6:54 am \ 28 Comments \
One of my wardrobe renovations performed lately was to shorten this skirt by a good several inches; a super quickie reno, but one that nevertheless completely transformed this skirt for me from something that almost caused me to shudder whenever I happened to catch sight of myself in a shop window reflection, to something that I have been wearing with a lot more pleasure and more confidence in how it fits nicely in with my style now.  Although I made it to wear this winter, it didn’t really “go” stylistically with any of the tops and cardigans, heck not even any of the shoes and boots that are the mainstays of my current winter wardrobe.  When I trialled pinning it up a few inches; hey presto, problem instantly solved.
I do have this theory that when it comes to skirts we all have a personal Ideal Hem Length; that is good for YOU, and it could be a bad idea to mess around with it too much.  For me, I think I prefer winter skirts to be EITHER about 10cm (4″) above the knee, OR quite long at midi-length, like roughly 20cm (8″) above the ankle.  These are lengths that just look better with all my tops, all my shoes and that suit my personal style.  Obviously I reserve the right to change my mind about that one, at any moment, according to any and all fleeting fashion whims.
Good thing I can sew for myself, hmmm?  ðŸ˜‰

I had already finished the lower raw edge with violet bias binding, so to unpick and re-stitch it up a coupla inches higher was an ultra quick renovation…  and the extra length is still there, should my wardrobe tastes migrate to embrace the aesthetics of different hem length.

now that’s a nice deep hem!

And now to another topic, slightly related…

Kathleen wrote a comment bringing up the topic of skirts; specifically, to line or not to line? That is the question! which I thought worthy of further exposition.

In the photo above I am actually wearing a full slip underneath my outfit, not that you can see it, which is the point really!

I line the majority of my skirts but not all of them, and it is always something to consider, how do you choose which gets lined and which does not?
I’m sure we’re all familiar with the horrible experience of your unlined skirt slowly and inexorably riding up your stockinged legs, as if driven by some strange evil impulse of its own… which is why a lining is a good idea.  But for many of us in hot climates a lining can be a pesky thing that clings hideously to your sweaty legs for most of the year.  So what do you do if you want a bit more versatility, for your skirts to see more active duty, to be an all-seasons item as it were?

The answer is of course, a separate slip or petticoat.

I chose to make this skirt without a lining because I wanted it to be transitional thing, to wear on both winter-y days and warmer bare-legged days too.  And on cold days when tights are on, as above, I have a few slips, or petticoats that I can wear underneath, that do the same duty as a lining.  In the outfit above, I am wearing a pale blue silk petticoat, chosen because the colour went with the rest of my outfit, not that you are supposed to see it! but still, just in case  ðŸ™‚ I like my colours to “go”.  So when re-hemming the skirt I was careful to hem it to a length that I could still wear my petticoats underneath it.

It’s always really good to have several petticoats or slips on hand from which to choose.  I have eight full slips or petticoats in total, half of which could pass as little summer dresses if worn with extras: this pale blue one, a pale pink one, a beige one (easily my most useful one), a cream broderie anglaise one and a black one, shown long here but I have since re-hemmed it quite a bit shorter, and also three long and full-skirted ones, in yellow, pink and a white Metalicus one.  I don’t have any half-slips… but then until I started listing them for this post I didn’t realise just how many petticoats I actually had and maybe I have an abundance already!
So, in summary: To Line, or to Slip? that is the (paraphrased) question…

Later edit: for those looking for a pattern; the lovely and clever Sherry of pattern scissors cloth (I miss her!) designed and uploaded the Ruby slip, a pattern for a simple bias cut slip with the option for a lace bodice, and also generously provided extensive and super helpful instructions.  Available for free download here  

Details:
Top; Vogue 1115, blue denim details and my review of this pattern here
Skirt; Vogue 8363 heavily modified, green cotton corduroy, more details here and my review of this pattern here
Petticoat; Burda 8071, pale blue silk, details here
Tights; self-drafted, blue denim-look jersey, details here
Shoes, Francesco Morichetti, from Zomp shoes
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Beachy polka dots dress

13/09/2013 12:30 pm \ 78 Comments \


So, we had some purr-fectly dee-lightful weather last Monday, allowing me to wear, and take some piccies of, my dress. The product of my giant beachy polka dots fabric, screen-printed by moi.  Um, I’m completely satisfied with how it turned out.  And I can think of nothing further to add.  Not like me, I know  ðŸ˜‰

OK, just a few things.  
I used the pattern for dress F from the Stylish Dress Book by Yushiko Tsukiori, chosen because I wanted an almost featureless tunic dress, with no darts and minimal shaping to interfere with my print, but still had a certain je ne sais quoi.  This design, with a short neckline split and two piece open sleeves with a discreet but pretty little ribbon to tie them closed, was exactly what I wanted.  I cut out all the pieces before printing and sized my print to fit the pieces.

A stylistically simple design, like my stylistically simple print.  I added the obligatory-to-me pockets, ahem; deep inseam ones.  These are cut from the same sand-coloured cotton/linen fabric as the dress, but unprinted obviously.  The same goes for the bias-cut sleeve ties, and bias neckline finish and the neck facing.  There are advantages to printing your own; you can leave it off all the “invisible” bits of your dress, and that is a vast improvement… nothing to show through!

It’s been a thoroughly satisfying project in that the result truly matches my vision.  I’m going to really enjoy wearing it.  
The creativity demon inside has been sated… for now  ðŸ™‚
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Autumn leaves sundress

07/09/2013 3:26 pm \ 46 Comments \
I made a sundress using my autumn leaves fabric, screen-printed by me here.  Those who like wonky weird imperfect prints are going to like this, if you don’t, then avert your eyes!
The pattern is an adaption of dress T, from the Stylish Dress Book, the design Reana chose for me to make my sew bossy dress here, which now looks like this.  That one is such a great dress to wear; so comfy and easy to throw on it has quickly become one of my favourites  ðŸ™‚
For this new dress I didn’t have enough fabric to make up the pattern as is.  I left off the sleeves, and removed about 15cm in width from the centre fold of both the skirt front and back, so there is no gathering into the bodice … that’s a whole foot taken out of the skirt’s circumference overall!  and there was still plenty of room in the skirt for me to have inseam pockets.  I cut these from a much nicer, lightweight white swiss dot cotton.
The front neckline of the bodice has been scooped out a bit deeper than the pattern, and I split the front bodice and made a little placket, with buttons and buttonholes.  Just because, I dunno (shrug), something to focus on other than those weird and wonky leaves.  The front and back bodice each have a full facing, cut from a lightweight plain white cotton.

 Hehe… would you believe I’ve only just noticed, when I uploaded this picture? that one of the leaves on the front of the bodice is missing its stem??  Only just noticed!  LOL!  And while drawing them in I checked and checked…  I’ve fixed this up now, but didn’t bother to take another picture.

I’m a bit meh about this dress, partly because my print is … funny; and partly because the fabric itself is a pretty poor quality.  It is a bit stiff and almost calico-like in texture.  Now I’m kinda kicking myself I didn’t take the risk and buy a finer quality cotton in the first place, problem was, I had no confidence in myself and started out with the assumption I was going to stuff it up.   I will wear the dress, because it’s airy and cool and will be great to have in the wardrobe in the hottest days of summer when I just want to grab something casual, and I’m hoping it will soften up over time with wear and washing.  The thing is, I usually judge my self-mades by posing the question; would I buy this if I saw it in a store?  And realistically I would probably pass this over, laughing at its hideousness.  Oh well.  

A thought…  I can always use it as an apron, for future screen-printing sessions?!  Ha!

I did learn something pretty important in printing and making this dress…  Cut out the pattern pieces before printing! 
This approach is hugely superior to printing a length of fabric and then deciding what to make with it, like I did here.  Several reasons…

There is less wastage of fabric ink and your own effort, since you are not printing fabric that you won’t use. 

You can make sure that the print is properly covering the pattern piece as you are going along. 

You can if desired place the print just exactly how you want it to appear on the piece.  

It’s guaranteed that you will have enough fabric printed to make what you want, there’ll be no laying down the pattern pieces and being disappointed that you underestimated just how much you would need.
Another consideration… there will be no angst when cutting into your precious print since it is already cut out and ready to go!

And, learning from my own mistakes… yes, I have already sewn together my giant polka dot pieces too, and I’m pretty happy with that one…..  Stay tuned!  ðŸ™‚

Details:
Dress; based upon dress T from the Stylish Dress book by Yoshiko Tsukiori, screen-printed ivory cotton
Hat; Vogue 8844, ivory corduroy, details and my review of this pattern here
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New (not) khaki leggings

02/09/2013 1:41 am \ 34 Comments \
Hello  ðŸ™‚
I’m still renovating my wardrobe… and can I just say, beige leggings, hmmm.  (shudder) I’d taken a hearty dislike to mine over recent weeks.  But they still had some wear in them.  Wasteth not, wanteth not.  It was really just the colour that had become offensive to my eyes.   Corrective action was called for.  
To the dye pot!!! 
(spoken in the same tone as one says “to the bat cave!” of course!)
Before…
the transformative materials…
I used only a shake (that’s an official unit of measurement there) each of iDye in Brown and Chartreuse.  Probably a pinch at the most, plus heaps of salt.  Pinch, heaps;  some other highly technical terms.  Trust me, I’m an analytical chemist!

And now they are no longer hideous to my eyes, they have a new lease on life  ðŸ™‚
my tutorial on dyeing

Details:
Leggings; self-drafted of beige cotton knit, dyed khaki, originally posted here
Tshirt; self-drafted, grey knit stuff, details here
Dress; the gathered hole dress from Pattern Magic by Tomoko Nakamichi, charcoal suiting, details here

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Fluttery grey-green skirt

30/08/2013 1:27 am \ 37 Comments \

New skirt, yeah  ðŸ™‚
I
bought this lightweight blotchy grey-green cotton from Tessuti’s in Melbourne,
during my girly trip away with my Mum and Cassie last year… and always intended
to make just exactly this skirt.  The pattern is an old favourite Vogue 7880, a flatteringly longline skirt with beautifully staggered asymmetrical layers, and the option for a feminine handkerchief hemline.  It’s an interesting as well as lovely design because it looks different from every angle.  There was a stiff breeze on the beach when I
took these pictures, which is normally a pain for the sort of weirdo who tries to photograph their sewing creations out in the great outdoors… I mean who does that anyway?!  but actually turned out to be a good thing I think, because the wind
has assisted in showing off the different layers fluttering against each other, how
they actually appear when in motion, so to speak.  Thanks, wind, for blasting me to bits!  Very much appreciated!
The
fabric is a very lightweight cotton, a little crinkly, even slightly seersucker-y.  It has the shadows of the classic seersucker check
appearing in its background, overlaid with cloudy, watercolour like swirls of
grey, khaki, sage, olive… all my favourite sludgey colours in other words.   The bolt was clutched to my chest pretty early in the shopping expedition, if I recall correctly.  Mwahahaha.
This skirt pattern has three views and I’ve made lots of them over the years.  This newest version is sorta halfway
between views B and C, which have always been my two favourite
views.  I’m so glad I’ve hung on to
the pattern because it is interesting and lovely, and imo there’s just
nothing ticking either of those boxes in currently available skirt patterns at the moment.  Is it just me or are skirt patterns
pretty boring and unimaginative right now?  Obviously I have absolutely nothing against basic skirt
patterns, since after all I’ve made my own fair share of very plain little
skirts!… but we need some of the more pretty and/or out-there ones too, don’t
we?  And sadly there are just very
few interesting, exciting, gorgeous and/or challenging designs around.  If there are, then please tell me, where
are they?!
This
pattern has inner stay pieces, to which you attach the lower skirt pieces.  For several of my versions of this
skirt I’ve chosen sheer fabrics, because the floaty layers are really crying out to be
made in very light fabrics like chiffon; and so I generally lengthen the
stay to hit just above knee length, to make it more like a real proper
lining.  It’s pretty easy to mark
the old stitching line on the stay, to which you add the lower skirt pieces as
normal, and then you just hem the stay just like you would a lining.  The longer length hangs inside the
skirt, providing modesty when you have chosen sheer fabrics, or in case you do happen to be wearing
the skirt on a very windy day, ahem.
you can just barely make out the line of stitching halfway up the inner stay/lining, where the lower skirt pieces are attached…
It
has an invisible zip closure, and I finished the raw edges using the rolled hem
stitch on my overlocker.
Details:
Skirt; Vogue 7880, lightweight cotton with polyacetate stay/lining
Shirt; Burda 8497, white cotton, details here
Shoes, bensimon, from seed
btw, if you like playing “spot the dog”she just squeaked into two of the pictures here  ðŸ˜‰
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Virgo

25/08/2013 3:25 am \ 58 Comments \

… the
sign of the maiden.

I have made a maidenly new dress  ðŸ™‚
This delicate feathery ivory lace fabric was a very long term resident in my stash.  It’s a tricky customer; sooo cobwebby and so sparse that it has absolutely no structure or form whatsoever and it both stretches and collapses upon itself.  For years I’ve wondered what on earth I could do with it.  Finally I just decided a simple dress would do, and then tried to work out how its wayward flightiness could be tethered into some sort of “dress” arrangement.
Essentially it’s a shirt-dress.   The backbone of the dress is the collar, the shoulder and armscye seams, and the front button and arm bands: these are the only stable elements in the dress; and the lace fabric just hangs loosely from those structural components.  

The white lace is from Fabulous Fabrics years ago, and for the bands and collar I used a perfectly colour-matched
ivory swiss dotted cotton voile with sparsely scattered fluffy dots, bought at Potters Textiles
last year.  The buttons… ah, the
buttons!  They are lovely, antique
mother-of-pearl beauties that were given to me by ElleC… thank you so much
ElleC!  I used two of these buttons
previously in this blouse and now this new dress uses the remainder… and, yes! It
was really really hard to cut them
off their little card, but I decided that they are too lovely to sit in a
button tin forever and they deserve to be seen!  I think the marquise shape of the buttons is a purr-fect match for that same-shaped motif in the lace  ðŸ™‚

I had
finagled the number of buttonholes to use every single last one of the buttons
so I was pretty darn devastated when the shank of one broke as I was stitching
it on… noooooo! And a snowflake’s chance in hell of ever finding another one!
So it was oh-so carefully super-glued together before stitching on, however I was still worried about it so
I’ve super-glued it and its
buttonhole together and to the dress. 
Now the left sleeve can never
be unbuttoned and I expect I will be obsessively checking to see that that
button is still in place forever and ever after.  (sigh)

 I stabilized the shoulder seams with a
strip of the same ivory cotton, and the armscyes and side seams are encased with Seams Great, a gift from velosewer;  thanks Maria!  the Seams Great is a sheer and flimsy creamy-coloured tape and is virtually invisible from the right side of the garment.  

inside view

I experimented with a few different finishes for the lower edge of
the dress and all my results were just too hideous for words so the lower
hem is simply cut straight and left unfinished.  This does leave quite a nice ethereal lightness and floatiness to the
lower hem, and fortunately the fabric will not fray.

The pattern is Burdastyle magazine 05/2010 dress 111, which I have used once before to make a completely different style of dress!  Technically, this new version of this pattern has a few slight variations: the front bands are
narrowed to a finished width of 2.5cm; which is visually more in keeping with
the delicacy of the lace fabric. the sleeves are shortened and I sewed a very
narrow band as a one piece sleeve-band placket, pictured below. 
The front bodice was rotated to eliminate the bust dart because the fabric is so delicate sewing darts would have been difficult and they would have looked weird too.  I cut the
sides to be a straight and wide A-line from underarm to the lower hem.

Details:
Dress;
Burdastyle magazine 05/2010, 111 modified, ivory lace and ivory cotton, my review of this pattern here
Petticoat;
Burda 8071, powder blue silk, details here
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Wedgwood blue damask, reworked

19/08/2013 1:30 am \ 33 Comments \

With the fingers of spring tickling at the edges of our days, I’ve been renovating my wardrobe.  And came across this dress…

Although the dress had a sorta sporty feel to it and I think my style is vaguely sorta sporty? maybe? whatever the heck is my style anyway…. seriously I have no idea!  anyhow, somehow the dress felt wrong on me.  I wore it a few times, gave it a shot, but no.
But you know I’m not one to let lovely fabric go to waste and this fabric had been a gift from Sam.  So I unpicked the panels, saving all those zips.  And managed to patch together enough fabric for a new little skirt.  Which is great because a few skirts were jettisoned in the clean-out so it is only fitting that some new skirts could come in, yes?  Just keeping the balance!  ðŸ™‚
I used Vogue 1247 and lengthened it… surprise!  I know I have a few of these in my wardrobe already but what can I say? it’s just an absolute winner.  It’s so quick and easy to make, is exactly to my style tastes and you cn put it together with small bitsy pieces of fabric.  How many times have I made this pattern already?  I’m not sure, but lots.

Ok I’ve just counted.  Eight times I have made this pattern.  Eight.  That’s not even counting the two times I’ve spliced the pieces and made it up plain, without those distinctive waitress-y pockets.
Some of the beige double topstitched seaming of the original dress is still intact in the skirt, which is fine by me.  I like weird little quirks in my clothes, didn’t you know?

The pockets are lined with blue sprigged cotton, leftovers from my sew bossy dress in its pre-dyed colour, and the lining is the original pale latte coloured acetate lining of the dress, simply cut to the right length from the bottom and keeping the hemline intact.  Instead of sewing the darts in the lining I folded them in pleats instead, as is my wont.  This is not laziness, honest! the idea is that there is some wearing ease in pleats whereas as there is no wearing ease in sewn down darts.

Does this happen to you when snapping a picture of your sewing details?

I know you can’t see them in the photo… but I am totally wearing matching socks too.  Ha!  I love matching details, even those you can’t see!

Details:
Skirt; Vogue 1247 lined, blue damask, my review of this pattern here
Blouse; a mixture of different patterns, powder blue silk, details here
Socks; hand-knit by me to a 60’s pattern, details here
Boots; Enrico Antinori, from Zomp shoes

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Bruised blue top thingie

09/08/2013 3:34 am \ 35 Comments \

Hello  ðŸ™‚
I have made this once before… this is top “p” from Shape Shape, (previously referred to on my blog as Unique Clothes Any Way You Like) by Natsuno Hiraiwa.  It’s a clever little design, like a cross between a little blouse and a draped wrap.
I really liked my first version, in a particularly delectable shade of creamy milk chocolate.  I had hammered snaps on for the front closure, which turned out to be a ginormously dumb choice since sometime last year I ripped a hole in the front placket when pulling the snaps apart…. (moment of stunned disbelief at own stupidity) Note to self: strong metal snaps plus delicate fabrics, equals a bad idea!

Version number two has much more sensible buttonholes and shell buttons, and is made in a lightweight drape-y silk with a suede-y, rather grabby texture to it, bought from the Fabric Store in Melbourne during my girly trip away with Mum and Cassie last year.  All the seams are flat-felled and the bias hemline swaps over from folding one way to folding the other way halfway along each top/bottom.  This is probably the only thing you have to think about making this otherwise very simple thing.  Oh, and the fact that the fabric you choose has to look the same both sides.

It’s not the kind of top you would wear every day, just an unusual and arty little thing to pop on over a plain ensemble to jazz it up.  Well that’s what I’m hoping, anyway!

Details:
Top; top “p” from shape shape by Natsuno Hiraiwa, dk blue silk
Skirt and two Tshirts; all self-drafted, skirt here, grey long-sleeved here, beige half-sleeved unblogged? I think?
Tights; self-drafted, of denim-look knit, details here
Boots; Francesco Morichetti, from Zomp shoes

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