Plannin' a brown jacket

I dug through the entire pattern cabinet and all my BWOF magazines trying to decide what I wanted to use for a brown jacket.

I have some lovely brown Zegna wool from Michael, so I knew what fabric the pattern must work for.

But I had some criteria...I didn't want to use my lovely wool on something that would be dated in a season or two; it had to have Staying Power. It also had to work w/a number of different shirt necklines. Shoulder princess lines were preferred, for ease of alteration.

And it had to work w/my body type...Middle Aged.

I compiled a short list of about 5 patterns, but ultimately decided upon Jacket 116 from BWOF 12/2008:


I've got 4 yards of the brown wool, so I might make pants, too.

Anyway, I expect it to take about a week to get the pattern traced (I think there are something like 12 - 13 pieces, some of which will have to be adapted and traced again for the lining).

But it's out on the Project Table to be traced...who knows, maybe I'll get a TNT out of it...

The Burda Denim Vest

The topstitching is pretty far from perfect; the denim was really bulky right at the edges and my little New Home just couldn't seem to feed it evenly. But, it doesn't show from any distance and the worst of it is on the underlap.

But it's a great top piece; especially good for wearing over a white blouse that has less than complete opacity! ;)

Here's the review....

How 'Bout a Vest?

Maybe a variation on a jacket would be nice...I've been eyeing This Vest Pattern in May's issue of Burda (formerly World of Fashion) magazine...and, hm, maybe a denim vest would be a good thing to use to just put a light layer over t-shirts for choir. It'd, um, cover some issues that a cotton/lycra or rayon/lycra t might not camouflage quite as well as I'd like.

Now, if I make it w/the little cap sleeves, I could wear sleeveless tops under it (sleeveless tops are one of the few no-nos in choir). But...any of my cap sleeve tops might look a little goofy under a cap sleeved vest. And most of my tops have at least cap sleeves, so I *can* wear them in choir.

I'll probably trace the sleeves and decide when I cut it out... ;)

Shoulder Query

I posted the review of the Burda Top I wore yesterday, and mentioned that I thought the drafting in the shoulder was rather odd. Some discussion ensued, so I thought I'd post some photos of what I was talking about.

So, I did a quick copy of the bodice upper front and upper back pieces straight off the pattern sheet w/no seam allowances. You can see how far offset the front shoulder is from the back shoulder:
















Now, there may be an entirely rational reason for this. It may be a stroke of pattern drafting GENIUS to draft this way. But I have extremely narrow shoulders which also happen to be pretty square, and I have lots of trouble with front necklines draping and gaping. And this looked to me like a prime candidate for neckline droopage. So I whacked away on my piece to pull that shoulder up...and ended up using what I'd added as facing as filler so I wouldn't have a huge kink in the neckline. You can see my altered piece (which does have seam allowances and has also been lengthened an inch) compared to the original here:
















Here's a better shot of the altered-up front piece:
















And a photo of what I did to the back to make it all match:






















Anyway, what I did worked great for me; the shoulders are very nearly spot on and the neckline is fine. But that may just be due to my particular set of fitting issues (narrow square shoulders). So I will no doubt continue to alter my BWOF tops this way.

But, because I'm curious... can someone enlighten me as to the rationale of the offset shoulders?

A Year of BWOF

I got the Feb '09 issue in the mail yesterday...that makes a full year of BWOF now residing in my little sewing cubicle.

And, out of that year's worth of monthly pattern magazines, I have made exactly one (1) pattern.

Um, that was a pretty expensive pattern...unless I get in gear and use more of them.

And there are more that I want to use. LOTS more. But...time!

I'm going to have to figure out a way to squeeze in a little fashion sewing amongst all the costuming that's looming. The problem w/BWOF is that I think I need to muslin just about everything I want to make and that takes, um, more time. And there are so many options I'm not sure where to start.

So...what are the BWOFs I want to make and haven't had a chance yet? Well, how about just one from each month:
From March '08, there's this cute wrap blouse, for starters.

I even have some black-and-white-stripe cotton/lycra fabric to make The Cover Jacket from April '08. I've not decided if I want to use hooks/eyes as a closure or whether I'll add some overlap at the center front and use buttons/buttonholes (what I'm leaning towards, actually). Need to make a muslin and see if the overlap would work....

I made This Dress from the May '08 issue, but there were some great dresses in there...I'm pining to make this one, too.

I'm not sure where or when I'd wear this cute trendy t shirt from June '08, but it has caught something in my imagination and I keep coming back to it.

The Cover Dress from July '08 caught my attention...not because I thought I'd wear a dress like this, but because I thought with some modification, in the right knit, this would make a great nightgown. That's one for the muslin trials, for sure!

From August '08 is the Deitrich pants that have been so popular on the boards. Classic, comfy, camouflaging... what more could a girl want? Oh, already traced and tested and ready to go would be nice...

I've been wanting to try this shortie jacket from Sept. '08, if only to compare it to Louise Cutting's Anything But Ordinary jacket. The similarities struck me the moment I looked at the line drawing.

I loved this twisted skirt dress from the Oct. '08 issue but I fear I am too, um, mature to pull it off. Perhaps I should make the dress for The Princess and just use the bodice portion for a nice top for myself.

The Cover Jacket on the November '08 issue talks to me, too, although some of that may be due to the appeal of that gorgeous fabric....

December 08 had me wishing I had an occasion to wear a drop dead formal dress. But, alas, I do not. However, the pleated ruffle blouse is definitely calling to me. Feminine without being frou-frou!

On first glance,this top from Jan '09 didn't grab my attention until I started seeing the reviews for it. Now, I think it's kinda cute and quirky and definitely worth a try...

And from the current issue(Feb '09), I'm liking the lines on this jacket bunches...in a different fabric/color, I think that'd be something fun to wear.

And of course there are issues that have two or three 'I want to make that!' patterns in it, but if I could just manage one from each issue I'd more than pay for the subscription.

I just need some time... ;)

Whaddya do w/ BWOF?

One of the reasons I hesitated so long about subscribing to Burda World of Fashion was the whole storage thing...how on earth can you keep track of the cool patterns and the tracings and the magazines and...

I hit upon a solution that should work for me for at least the rest of this year, and I've told myself that, unless I sew a *lot* more BWOF patterns this year than I did last year (um, that would be 1 pattern sewn last year...but it gets lots of compliments...), I can't reup for year three. So this might be sufficient for a while.

Anyway, My Sweet Baboo has been bringing home some boxes for miscellaneous storage; I believe they're the boxes for the copier/printer paper they use at work. Turns out those boxes are just right for filing BWOF magazines. (I'm not going to worry about a lid; if I put a lid on it, I'll forget about them...).

I pulled all the pattern inserts from the magazines, put the patterns (and the rare tracing of patterns) in Zip-Lok bags, one for each issue, labeled the bag w/the issue date, and filed the bags in order behind the magazines.

Unless I become a lifelong subscriber, this should work!

How do other folks handle this?

Friday Fun Drawing

Ack! I completely overlooked the fact that yesterday was Friday and so I forgot to draw for the pattern freebie. Oops!

I rectified that this morning; My Sweet Baboo did the honors and MARY (Sewfast) won the pattern! Mary, if you'll email your snail mail addy to tig77lw (that's a lower case 'L', not a number one)at yahoo dot com, I'll get that off to you! Hope you make it and review it! :D


But I was busy sewing! I finished the BWOF black dress and had Number One Son take the photo, since DH was out of the house until late in the evening. He looked at the dress and said, 'Is that what you were cutting out last night?' When I replied that it was, he observed, 'That was fast!'

The next one will be faster...I had to, um, use the seam ripper a bit to get the fit passable, since I was chicken and sized up.

And trying it on about 4 times to get the fit adjusted totally disproved the 'little black dress friendly' claims on my anti-perspirant....

But I like the dress...now I just need an occasion to wear it ;) (The review's linked on the side bar)

I still want to get SOMETHING made from the orange ASAP, but I'm having difficulty hearing the fabric tell me what it wants to be. I'm afraid that's because it really, really wants to be something for DD, whose favorite color is orange... sigh.

A Cloud and the Silver Lining

I'm sewing along, making good progress on my Oxford/Euro morph pants (basically just the Oxfords w/the zipper added from the Euros) and, boom, I hit a brick wall.

No elastic. Somehow I thought I had enough left for one more garment, but, no, I only had about 9"...definitely not enough. So I folded the pants and laid them aside and came in and made a Sewing Place order, since no one locally carries that really nice, 100% stretch elastic. I was seriously bummed. I guess I'll work on my PJ's today...I *do* have some PJ elastic. And I would like to have them to take to Atlanta Friday.

But still. I could've finished those pants last night....

There was, however, a silver lining to my cloudy sewing day; the March Burda World of Fashion appeared in my mailbox yesterday! I knew the subscription should be kicking in sometime soon; I didn't know if I'd get the March issue or the April issue. Some interesting formal wear/bridal gowns in here...I need to sit down and look everything over carefully to decide what I might like to try. So now I get 11 more months of fashion sewing patterns arriving in the mailbox.

Cool. ;)

A Promise Kept

Keeping promises is extremely important, but sometimes it's easy to let those promises made to oneself kind of slip away.

So yesterday, I kept a promise to myself. I promised myself if I made parity for 2007, I would reward myself with a Burda World of Fashion subscription.

I dropped some large hints about it for Christmas, but apparently no one caught them, so yesterday I went online and subscribed.

My first issue should arrive sometime after Feb. 15.

I'm looking forward to it! I've seen so many terrific garments made from BWOF patterns in the last couple of years; now I can do something besides gaze wistfully at them.

I'll worry about how to store them later...12 issues shouldn't be too bad.

RRRiiiiggght......