May Make a Garment a Month Challenge Completed!

The theme for May's MAGAM Challenge was:

I think my choice of Vogue 1309 - an Issey Miyake pattern fits the theme perfectly.  Let's start with how the garment looks on the envelope.

Looks quite unusual.  Right up my alley!

One thing to note on this pattern is the seam allowances are 1/4 inch so there is no room to let anything out. With this word of warning, I decided to make a muslin first before cutting into my $29.00 per yard fabric.

There are only three pieces to this unusual top (not including the bias binding piece - I'll address that piece later).  One long piece that is cut down the middle to become the main part of the vest and two smaller insets - one for each side.  After reading thru the instructions, I decided to place dots on all of the needed markings on the pattern and then transfer these to my muslin.  As you can see, there are alot of dots!

More dots.  This is the small inset for the right side.

After sewing up my test muslin, things weren't looking so pretty.

I mean look at this - it's huge!  I think a paper sack would fit better.

Without trying to flash anyone, the left front was flopping open so much it looked like a kangaroo pouch and the right side was so big, I could put my whole hand in it.

The back looked a little better, but it still reminded me of a shopping bag.  

After alot of pinning, and adding a pleat to the front drape, I managed to rid the garment of it's sack like qualities.

Another view of the pinning.

Just a few pins to the back.

That's better. Fits much better now.  Still a little baggy in the shoulder area though.

Back view after pinning.  Much better fit.

Now it was time to cut into the real fabric.  Since I couldn't write on my real fabric like I did on the muslin, I decided to try out sticker dots on the material. It's essential to mark every letter, dot, square, etc. on your material because the left side of the rectangle becomes the right side of the garment and the right side of the rectangle becomes the left side of the garment.  It's very easy to get mixed up in the construction process if everything isn't marked.

Here it is sewn up with no adjustments.  The sticker dots were great reference points and they did stay put thru construction.

 

Here you can see where three different "C" marks come together at one point.  And remember earlier when I said I would address the bias binding pattern piece - well now is the time.  The pattern asks you to sew bias binding around the two small square insets to finish their edges, yet none of the other edges in the garment are finished.  See in the picture below, on the right side the unfinished edge?  Well, it seemed pointless to me to have two pieces finished and then nothing else finished on the inside so I omitted sewing on the bias binding and just opted to serge all of the exposed edges that I could get to after it was constructed.

 Here's the right side again, where the fist could fit in.

Back view with the zipper pinned in place.

Using my muslin as a reference, I started pinning away.

Here's the pleat I added to the front.

More pinning in the back...

Once everything was pinned and I tried it on for fit, I topstitched everything in place.

Looks good on the dress form!

 And bonus - I think it looks quite nice on me!

I found the perfect jewelry to match on a recent trip to Carmel.

I am quite happy with the garment now.

Back doesn't look bad either.

Until next time - 

Happy Sewing!

January Make a Garment a Month Challenge - Done!

This is my January finished garment for the Make a Garment a Month Challenge.  The pattern is an Issey Miyake pattern by Vogue, number 1052.

The jacket is a loose fitting, lined, above hipline jacket with double draped collar, welt pockets, princess seams and back ties.  Lots and lots of topstitching as well!  I changed the single welt pocket to a double welt and added a double flap with a button.  I also shortened the sleeves by 1 1/2 inches.

Side View

The sleeves are a sort of raglan style with two pieces making up the front and back sides that marry up with two additional pieces making up the sides of the sleeves.  It forms a sort of gusset underneath the armhole.  I'm used to a more fitted, inset sleeve so these feel a little strange to me.

Back view

A special thank you to everyone that voted for the "Circles" lining.  This was left over from another project and I couldn't decide between the circles or the cherries so I put it out to vote and the Circles won!

Inside front

Inside back

For the ruffled collar, I knew I wanted to do a rolled hem on my serger because I found some variegated thread that matched perfectly.  I also knew the corners would be a bit of an issue with my new serger (lack of practice on my part), so I decided to slightly round out the corners instead and just serge away.  Below is a diagram of what I trimmed off before serging.  The collar is supposed to have a 5/8 hem zig zag hem around the edges, but I opted to keep the extra 5/8 inch rather than serging it off and have a slightly bigger collar. 

Doesn't the variegated thread look great!

Here's a close up of the rolled hem.  On the collar, both the right and wrong sides of the fabric show as you can kinda see here.  The wrong side is slightly darker.

From the side, the buttons slightly show as well.  I just used some plan buttons from my stash.  No need for fancy ones here since the collar is the main feature of the garment.

This is just a cool angle so I thought I would throw it in as well.

Here's another view of the pocket and the ruffled collar.

I think my jacket turned out pretty good and I can't wait to wear it to work tomorrow!

Happy Sewing!

Make a Garment a Month Challenge

I've joined the Make a Garment a Month Challenge.  Here's my January project:

It's Vogue 1052 - an Issey Miyake pattern from 2008.  I will be making the jacket from the teal fabric, but I can't decide which lining to use?  The circle one leftover from my last project or the cherry print one?  What do you think?   Please leave me a comment with your lining preference.  I will start cutting this out next weekend.

Also - stay tuned each day this week as I will be posting different ways to organize your sewing stuff.  Thanks everyone and Happy Sewing!

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