Clémence skirt

Greetings!

In my quest to add more basic pieces into my wardrobe, I made this simple black Clémence skirt from Tilly and the Buttons' book Love at First Stitch. It's a very basic gathered skirt with a simple waistband. I did add pockets to the skirt because pockets are awesome.

The fabric is the same wool and synthetics mystery fabric from my stash I used to make this skirt. The fabric is a bit thicker and is warm in the cold seasons but I've discovered during the few hot days this year that it's also surprisingly cool to wear.

I also chose to deviate from the instructions when it came to installing a zipper. I opted to use a visible decorative zipper instead of an invisible zip. To finish the seam allowances, I used my serger and I hand hemmed the skirt with invisible stitching.

Rayna Dress.

 Today I have a treat for you. When it comes to sewing for myself, I usually use patterns made by others as I don't feel like drafting a pattern for myself after I've dealt with drafting patterns for everyone else. Cobbler's children and all that. But when I was working on making my own wedding dress I decided to kill two birds with one stone and made me a bodice block that fits me. Since then I've used it a few times and this is one of the results. The Rayna Dress.

I had to attend a birthday party of a near and dear relative who turned 80 years old. I decided to make a simple dress with the fabrics I had in my stash. I had two rayon fabrics with sheer patterns and even though the pattern was slightly different, I figured it wouldn't make too much of a difference and would add an interesting twist. I also wanted to use this red cotton I had in my stash and decided to line the dress with it and add a contrasting waist piece.

I didn't want the seam allowances to be seen through the main fabric so I decided to use the red cotton as an underlining in the bodice. I finished the seams with the serger and used a bias tape to finish the neckline and armholes. 

I encased the bodice in the waist seam and sewed the two skirt layers simply onto the waist pieces, serged the seam and press it towards the waist. I also inserted an invisible zipper into the left side seam.

The hem of the main fabric is finished with the rolled hem setting on the serger. For extra oomph for the skirt, I finished the lining skirt with a horsehair tape and I love how much the skirt flares out. Makes me feel like a million bucks. Especially when paired with a killer pair of red shoes.

Pleated Tartan Skirt

Once upon a time I scored this nice wool and viscose blend fabric with colorful tartan pattern. The issue was what to do with it. I only had about 0,45 cm of it. One day I was looking at the Lace Waist Dress which was hanging in my closet and had the idea of using the skirt pattern pieces and making this fabric into a cute little skirt.

I cut the skirt as long as I possibly could and did no further fit changes than I did on the dress. However I drafted a waistband and cut it out from a plain black fabric from my stash. I inserted an invisible zipper in the center back seam and serged all the seams. I hemmed the skirt with invisible stitching by hand.

I love this skirt to pieces. And I'm pretty darn happy with the pattern matching. It was a pain(especially when it came to zipper insertion) but super rewarding in the end. Also after three wears the zipper broke(booo, bad zipper!) and the skirt travelled back to the UFO pile. However after a while I unpicked the zipper and inserted a new one and *knock on wood* three months later it's holding up just fine. Yay!

Spotty Bronte Top

This is my first encounter with the Bronte Top pattern. I bought it many moons when it was a part of Perfect Pattern Parcel and kind of forgot about it. However being on a pattern buying ban I've started to look more seriously at what I already have and stumbled upon many patterns I have in my computer but have not printed out.

For my version I cut out size 14 in the bust and 12 in the waist and hips. I used a cotton jersey fabric from my stash. I bought the fabric about two years ago from Abakhan where I dug it out of a remnant bin. The pattern sewed up quite fast and I like the final result. However I am not in love with it. Maybe because there's not contrasting or details that pop out and it's not 100% me. I don't know. I'll try some contrasting next time and see what I think.

If you're thinking this skirt looks familiar and are not sure where you've seen it, it's the skirt I made for the Ulyana Sergeenko Challenge. But I've now shortened it. I realized that there's no place for a maxi skirt in my life and I rarely wore it. But since shortening it, it has been in constant rotation.

Something Old & Something New - A Self drafted wedding dress

A bride approached me with an interesting dress conception. She had a blouse with lace front and cotton back+peplum. She wanted me to use that lace from the bodice for her wedding dress bodice front. And then she pulled out three more fabrics. A nude netting, white floral lace and a peach chiffon. "Combine a dress for me from these" She then begun explaining what she wanted where. I would be lying if I said I wasn't overwhelmed by all this.

So this is the result of her idea. See through front, a netting back with some of the flowers from the skirt lace hand sewn on the netting plus some flowers around the armhole. She said she felt insecure about her armholes showing and this was our solution. The front lace stayed the same shape as there wasn't much to work with to begin with. The lace skirt is a semi circle with a train. The chiffon under the lace skirting is gathered at the waist and also has a train.

The dress fastens with buttons in the front until mid thigh so she can show off her legs while dancing. As the bodice area is very light and the white lace fabric is VERY heavy and would drag the whole dress down, I built in a waist stay that fastens with hooks and holds up the weight of the dress.

My favorite part of this dress is the train. She would have liked it to be even longer but I simply didn't have fabric for longer train. However she did like the fact that she can easily hook her finger through the lace and carry the train when she felt like. I attached the chiffon layer of the skirt to the lace with a tread chain.

And that's it. A wedding dress combined of four very different fabrics. The dress isn't something I would wear, but I still think it's pretty. And the bride was very happy with the result. The train, buttons, slit, bodice, see through bits were everything she wanted. Some brides go for modesty, some for sexy.

Folded Squares Cardigan

I can't seem to catch a break. After a period of feeling down and unmotivated, I get a writer's block.  You know the feeling when you upload the pictures for a post and then when it comes to writing, you come up empty? Yeah, that feeling. Guess I just have to power through and write something. Anything, really. 

This is the Folded Squares Cardigan a free pattern from Purl Soho. And just like writing this post, knitting it took FOREVER. Mindless knitting with no charts or patterns to follow. But in the end I have a soft and snuggly cardigan, so I guess win? I like to wear it on those days when I can't get warm no matter what I do and feel like wearing a blanket. Cause that's what this is. A woolen knit blanket with sleeves. I know the pattern suggests a bamboo yarn, but let's face it, I'm not rich enough to buy bamboo yarn for a huge cardigan/blanket. So I used a woolen yarn.

On the pattern pictures the model is wearing the cardigan loose with the collar area flat. I've found that it's not really comfortable like that and feels like it's falling off any minute. So I've started to fold the collar so it creates a little shawl collar and the shoulders move up to where they are supposed to be. This makes the sleeves shorter than on the pattern pictures, but hey, I'm not a fan of full length sleeves these days anyways. Give me a good 3/4 length sleeve and I'm a happy camper.

So that's it. Me in my little blanket cardigan. I'd also like to say that I'm taking part of Me-Made-May again this year and you can follow my month on Instagram. I will do a roundup post of my month after the schenanigans are over.

Woolen Circle Skirt + a Giveaway&Discount!

Hi. Today I have a really short post which will get me back on track with blogging. A self drafted circle skirt with pockets. 

The skirt itself is a basic circle skirt drafted based on my measurements. For comfort and stashing purposes I added inseam pockets to the side seams. The skirt fastens with an invisible zipper. The seam allowances are finished with a contrasting red overlocking seam and is hemmed by hand with invisible stitching.

The fabric came from my stash. It traveled there after my gran moved out of her house and in with my parents and found a bunch of fabrics from her closets and gave said fabrics to me. This was one of those fabrics. It is a woolen and synthetics blend. Which mean it's warm without feeling too thick or woolen(if you know what I mean)

I love the movement of this skirt and it's perfect to wear with a fun shirt or a blouse. A true wardrobe staple. I've been distracted by fun prints and discarding "boring" basics sewing that it has been challenging to find cohesive outfits at times. So I made a commitment to sew a few basic items that can be mixed and matched with multiple items in my wardrobe.

Now for the Giveaway and a Discount.
I am giving away 20€ to use in my Etsy shop. For details how to enter, read this post on Instagram. Additionally I am offering a 10% discount in my shop with the code HURRYUPSPRING (code is valid until 10th of April)