Failure and Victory

I can not believe it's been two weeks since I hopped a plane and headed to Toronto!  Never enough time in the day, eh?  (see?  I speak Canadian now!)  I had such a fantastic time there that taking so long to write about it is just a big, fat FAIL! 

Pure laziness, I assure you, and nothing to do with the trip itself.  Like Gillian (who I met - yay!!), I'm having a bit of low blogging mojo.  I'm finding that I either have time, energy and motivation to make stuff, or write about making stuff - not both.  So I'm choosing to make stuff!

Anyway, back to the trip - or actually just a part of it in this post.

Andrea is a fabulous hostess; not only did she make me feel right at home and like one of the family rather than a guest, she also organized several events for me with other bloggers.  A good portion of our time was spent hanging out on the couch, drinking coffee (or wine, depending on the hour), talking away and knitting.  Like this:

Just lovely!  Something I don't get to do often in "real" life.

The first of the outings that Andrea organized was a visit to Kristiann of Victory Patterns.  I was so excited about this - I've been a big fan of Kristiann's work from the beginning, even if my own lack of fitting knowledge has kept me from being 100% successful with the patterns.  I own ALL the patterns except for the Ava dress (which I didn't buy because I already had the very similar Colette Macaron pattern); I purchased them all immediately upon release and am slowly working my way through them.

Andrea already knew Kristiann, having taken some classes from her.  I got to meet Sara on my first evening in Toronto, after having corresponded with her for several months, and she joined us for the visit to the Victory Patterns studio. 

I really expected nothing more than to have a quick meeting and say, "I'm a big fan!"  But Kristiann was so generous with her time - I think the four of us spent a good three hours together!  Kristiann is just a lovely person - so friendly and enthusiastic.  She took us on a tour of the building where she has her studio; many other artists also rent space there, including some clothing designers and production seamstresses.  It was so interesting to talk to her about her process in designing and releasing a pattern.  I especially loved seeing the original version of the Nicola dress - the gorgeous border-print one from the pattern envelope!

I made my Nicola expressly for this meeting, and Andrea decided to whip up a Roxanne blouse to wear.  Here we are, all four of us, in a cute little coffee shop in Kensington Market:

L - R:  Sara, Andrea, Kristiann & me;  photo courtesy of Andrea

Kristiann is wearing the Madeleine skirt!  And Sara is wearing her gorgeous Kara cardigan.

One of the things Andrea and I tend to do when we're together is try on each other's makes.  We have similar taste in patterns and we're about the same size, so it's great to be able to try on a pattern you're thinking about making!  I've been wanting to make the Roxanne blouse since just about forever, and when Andrea visited me in December, I found a beautiful piece of silk on the sale rack at my local fabric shop that I  knew would be just perfect.  It was on my list for spring, but after trying on Andrea's beautiful blue silk Roxanne, I had to bump it up in the queue.

So last week I traced the pattern and did a tissue fitting, then got going.  Because my fabric is very busy, I made the tie-neck version, but I'll definitely be making another one with that amazing folded collar.

This version is so quick to make.  I realized on Friday that I didn't have any silk thread in the right color, so on Saturday morning I headed over to JoAnn's to pick some up.  I didn't start sewing until after lunch, and I was done by 4:00!

front

back

pleat detail

tie detail

My big concern with this pattern was the back and sleeve fitting.  I had Andrea measure me, and my back fell into a size 12, while my bust puts me in a size 2!  I settled on a size 4.  When I did my tissue fitting, the back and armhole felt OK as drafted, so the only changes I made were to take a 3/8" forward shoulder adjustment and to remove 1" from the length at the lengthen/shorten line.

Once the top was finished though, I wished I'd done a broad back adjustment and scooped out the armhole a bit.  It's a teeny bit tight, but not so bad that I won't wear it.  For future versions, I'll make those adjustments.

Here's how it looks on, front and back:

One of the things I love about this design is how the back swishes out when you walk.  It's a blouse with a train!  I tried to get a pic of the swishiness in action, but wasn't too successful!

And I tried to get a good shot of the high/low hem, but once again I'm pressed for time.  So this silly one will have to do!

"Hmmm, what should I sew next?"

Nicola: Construction

Before I get into the details of construction on this dress, I thought I'd tell you a cute little story about the fabric.

Almost exactly two years ago, my friend Erika out in New Jersey made a lovely top from this same fabric.  When she posted it on her blog, I left a comment telling her I'd been looking at this print for months at my local fabric store here in Chicago, but hadn't let myself buy it.  She had only been able to buy one yard, and said she'd love to have more, so I offered to go pick some up and send it to her - and got myself the last 2 5/8 yards from the bolt as well!

OK - now on to the construction :-)

Fitting this pattern was one hurdle I had to get over to make this dress.  Getting over my apprehension about sewing with silk was the other!  It's funny - when I first got back into sewing about 3 years ago, I made lots of things out of the inexpensive silks I found at my local shop - successfully too!  And then I read on several blogs how "sewing silk is so hard" and "it's too easy to mess it up" and I kind of choked.  I thought maybe I wasn't doing it right, so I quit sewing with silk altogether.

But I love silk, and one of my unstated goals this year was to get over that fear and use some of the lovely pieces I've acquired over the last few years.  So I enrolled in the Sewing with Silks Craftsy class and started watching.

It's a good class and I'm glad I watched it.  There are lots of great tips given to help make sewing with silk a successful enterprise.  As I got ready to make this dress, I went back over my notes, and decided that these points were the most important:

1.  Cut all pieces single layer.
2.  Make sure the fabric is perfectly square and true, and then measure to ensure that the pattern piece grainline is exactly matched to the selvedge. 
3.  Use a smaller gauge needle for lighter weight silks.
4.  Use silk thread if you can get it, and mercerized cotton thread if you can't.
5.  Use a short stitch length.

dress front - flat

For me, here's how those 5 points played out.

1.  In order to make cutting single layer easier, I made full-sized pattern pieces for all the pieces meant to be cut on the fold.

2.  I was lucky that this fabric tears cleanly across the grain, and I had started out with a torn edge.  For each piece I cut, I placed my fabric on my gridded cutting mat and held down the edges along two perpendicular lines with pattern weights.  Then I placed my pattern piece on the fabric and measured to make sure the grainline was parallel to the selvedge, and cut the piece out with my rotary cutter.  Before cutting the next piece, I tore the edge again to make a new straight angle, and re-trued the fabric on my cutting mat.  So it took me almost 3 hours to cut out and mark my pieces for this dress (including the lining and facings) - but it was worth it because having all the pieces perfectly on grain not only makes the dress hang well, but it was easier to sew.

3 & 4.  I was able to pick up Gutermann silk thread and universal needles in sizes 60, 65 and 70 at JoAnn's.  I use size 70 needles all the time for sewing cotton voile, so I thought I might want to use the 60 for this fabric.  But I couldn't get the silk thread through the eye!  So I used the size 65, and it worked just fine.  Also:  silk thread - mmmmmmm!  I wish it were appropriate to use it for everything!  It's so silky!

5.  I used a 2.2 stitch length throughout on this project, except for basting.

dress back - flat

This pattern is rated as beginner, and if you don't have to do any fitting adjustments or use a finicky fabric, it is quite easy to sew.  Of course, I changed a few things which made it more difficult for me. 

The pattern includes a piece for bias binding the sleeve hem, but for this fabric I felt I wanted a narrow rolled hem.  Now, I'm not great at doing these on straight hems.  Having to sew a narrow rolled hem on a curved edge like this sleeve meant that I spent a fair bit of time practicing before I moved on to the real sleeves!  They're still not perfect, but good enough in this busy print.

narrow rolled sleeve hem

As written, only the skirt of this dress is lined - and in quite an ingenious way, so that you don't have to sew the hem!  You sew the lining and outer skirts together at the side seams, and then sew the two pieces together all along the hem edge, right sides together.  Turn it out and understitch the lining to the seam allowance and you're done!

understitched hem

Once I had my bodice and lined skirt made, I started to feel that the weight of the skirt would be too much for the unlined bodice to bear.  The pattern only includes facings for the bodice, which I'd cut out in black.  I put the question out on instagram, and everyone who commented said "line the bodice."  I knew they were right, but I also knew that I couldn't get to the fabric store to buy more black silk for another 3 days, and I wanted to finish my dress!

But after I thought about it for a while, I remembered that I had some of the outer fabric left - I'd used quite a bit less than the recommended 3 yards, less even than the 2 5/8 yards I had.  I checked and realized that minus the facings, I had enough of my outer fabric to make up the lining.  So I used my facing and bodice pieces to draft linings - the bodice pieces minus the facings plus 1/2" for seam allowances of 1/4".  And I was back in business!

I constructed my bodice lining in the same way as the outer bodice, then sewed the facings to the neck edge all the way around as instructed in the pattern.  The pattern does not say to understitch the facing down, but of course I did because I didn't want the black to peek out at all.  Once I had the bodice attached to the skirt, I sewed the lining's sleeve openings and waist to their respective seam allowances by hand for a clean finish.

The pattern recommends using a buttonhole and button as closures at either side, but I decided that since there's a fair chance I'd be wearing this dress with a belt, I didn't want any buttons to be in the way.  Instead, I chose to use plain old metal snaps, sewing them on with this couture technique presented by Susan Khalje that I'd come across some time ago.

Those snaps are on there to stay, and I find it incredible that although the dress is only two thin layers of silk held together with two small metal snaps, I don't feel in any way exposed when I wear it!

Nicola: Fitting

So, let's start at the beginning.  And fair warning:  this is going to be a VERY comprehensive fitting post, so if you aren't into that kind of thing, skip it!

I printed and traced the Nicola pattern well over a year ago.  I had a beautiful piece of Anna Sui silk georgette that I knew would be just perfect for this design.  But my lack of success with the fit of the  Anouk dress made me afraid to cut into my fabric, or even try the pattern in a muslin.  So I set it aside.

After I took the fitting class in December, one of my goals was to figure this pattern out.  Really, all the Victory Patterns.  Because I think that the draft is for a body type very different from mine.  But I love the aesthetic enough to work through it, and I'm happy to say that I think I'm on my way.

When I traced the pattern, I had graded it from a 4 bust to 6 waist to 8 hip.  That was a good start, but I'd already figured out that just grading from one size to another is not the whole solution for me, with my broad back, forward shoulders and hollow chest.

Luckily, I had traced all the pieces onto Swedish tracing paper.  So a couple weeks ago, I spent a couple of hours tissue-fitting the dress.  Having the pieces on Swedish tracing paper made it a lot easier than the tissue I'm using these days - it's more durable and more supple.

The adjustments I made ended up being pretty standard for me:
* 1/2" broad back adjustment, with a shoulder dart to make up the difference at the shoulder seam
* 1/2" forward shoulder adjustment - on the front only
* 1/2" tuck to correct the gaping neckline over my hollow chest

The skirt actually fit pretty well - it was a bit on the big side, but I decided to leave it because I do sometimes have "fluffy" days.  When I make this dress again in a solid fabric, I'll take in the skirt, but with my busy print it looks fine.

My biggest problem (and this is something I've found with all the Victory Patterns I've used so far) is that the armhole was way too high and small for me.  So I had to do a fair bit of experimentation with how much to scoop out.  I ended up lowering it 1/2" at the side seam, and having to scoop out a bit more in front than in back.

front - the innermost line is the one I used

back

Here's how my pieces looked after my tissue fitting adjustments:

forward shoulder adjustment on front only

broad back adjusment

shoulder dart to take up excess at shoulder seam

Once I had a pretty good fit, I retraced all my pattern pieces onto tissue:

front

back

And then used those to create a bodice muslin.

When trying on the muslin, I noticed that the neckline was gaping, so I took out a tuck and then transferred that adjustment to my pattern piece and the corresponding facing piece.

Once the bodice was fitting well, I moved on to the sleeve.  I had to figure out how much to scoop out of the sleeve to make  it work with my new armscye.  I measured the total armscye and then the sleeve cap, and made sure the sleeve cap had at least 1.5" more length than the armscye.  This really was all just trial and error, and once I thought I might have the right amount removed, I made a sample sleeve and added it to my muslin to make sure it fit.

front

back

sleeve scooped out

new sleeve piece

Once I had all my fitting done, I retraced any pattern pieces that needed it.   For all the pieces that are cut on the fold, I created full pattern pieces so I could cut my silk single-layer.

So - a lot of prep work.  But totally worth it for the fit I got!  I went into this in depth because I only found a few finished Nicolas online, and not much fitting advice at all.  So I'm hoping this information will come in handy for someone with similar fit issues who wants to sew up this lovely design.

Next time:  construction!

Nicola

Yesterday, after almost two weeks of work, I finished a dress I'd wanted to make for two years:  Victory Patterns' Nicola.

I had to do a fair bit of adjusting to get this one to fit me well, and then work slowly on my construction with this beautiful silk georgette.  I have lots to say about this make, but I promised my Instagram friends that I'd show the good stuff first, and save the details for later :-)

So here is my new dress.  My new favorite dress.  I have to say, I'm not 100% happy with these photos because I don't think any of them really do the dress justice.   It is so beautiful, and I can't wait for the weather to warm up so I can wear this someplace.  I've made Hubby promise to take me on a date just so I can show off my new dress.

I realize that it's really hard to see the design details in this busy print.  In the first few photos, I'm wearing the dress with a vintage full slip, which you can see peeking out at the neckline and front center hem.  I'm going to talk more about this slip in another post, because it's special to me, and I always had a vision of pairing it with this dress so the bits of lace could peek out.

The hemline dips down a bit in the back, which I love:

I got a flattering and comfortable fit across the back - hallelujah!

The sleeves are quite long under the arm, coming down below the waist.  When my arms are down, it hides how slimming the lines of the dress are.  Here you can see the shape of the body a bit better.

I lined the skirt in black silk, and when I walk or there's a breeze, it flutters a bit and shows.  So lovely!

I also took a couple of pictures with a half slip, so you can see the neckline uninterrupted.  For these I added a belt and hot pink pumps, which sadly don't match each other or the pink in the dress.

I think this dress looks great belted or unbelted, but the belt does help define the waistline with this busy print.  I'm going to try to find a belt that works better, color-wise.

You can see the sleeve a little better here:

And even better here, although my eyes are closed and I look like a goof!

I'm so glad I finally made this dress up.  And I'm also glad I waited as long as I did.  I'm not sure I could have produced a dress of this quality a year ago.  Having learned some fitting tricks and some tips for sewing with silk (thanks to a Craftsy class) made all the difference, I think. 

I'm not really sure how many dresses like this I need, but I do think I'd like to sew at least one more in a plainer fabric, so that the details show.

A Lola Fail

Well, I said I would sew the Victory Patterns Lola this month, and I did.  But it's not a winner.  In contrast to yesterday's post, I have a fair amount to say about this :-)

I've wanted to make the Lola dress for a couple of years, and finally bought the pattern a year ago.  When Andrea and I were in Michigan in December, we came across some two-sided merino wool jersey we thought would be a good match for this pattern.  And although the fabric wasn't expensive, it felt "special," so I decided I'd better make a muslin before cutting into it.  I headed over to JoAnn's to find some sweatshirt fabric, and came away with a piece in NEON pink because it made me happy.

And then I got stuck for a while.  Here's why:  according to the sizing on the envelope I need:

size 2 bust
size 6 waist
size 10 hip

Yikes!  Grading across 5 sizes?!  And on top of that, I've never made a princess-seamed garment.  Ever.  I tried to do some research on the interwebz, but I only found a couple of projects where the makers said they'd graded the pattern.  However, they didn't say how, just that they graded from x to y.

I thought long and hard about how to deal with this pattern, and finally came up with a method that I thought would work for me.  That in itself is pretty involved, and I'm not going to share how I did it because the end result doesn't warrant it, IMO.  That said, if you guys are interested and want to see what I did, I don't mind writing a separate post about it.  Let's just say, it was a lot more mathy than I'm comfortable with.

In the end I went with a size 6 bust, 8 waist and 10 hip.  That enabled me to only have to grade across 3 sizes, and I thought it would be OK to have a slouchier look on a sweatshirt dress.  I was also worried about the armholes - my previous experience with the VP Anouk dress made me suspect that the armholes on Victory Patterns are drafted higher and smaller than is comfortable on my body.

Well, I managed to look moderately cute in this shot, but you can probably see that the upper bodice is just unflatteringly loose.

Same here.  And the sleeves hit me at a very awkward place just below the bend of my elbow.

I feel like I want to take a couple inches out of the front center:

And it's no better from the back:

And yet, despite all that excess in my mid and upper back and at the waist, the shoulders and under arms are tight!  Remember, this is 2 sizes above how I measure on the chart.

If you look closely above, you can probably see how the neck band is flipping to the inside because that little contrast triangle is too heavy to lay flat.  So I had to smooth it down:

So, in spite of all my hard work, this dress is a no go for me.  It's a little sad - I'd thought I could at least wear it around the house because this fabric is so soft and cuddly.  But when I had it on to take these pictures, I couldn't wait to get it off again.  The shoulders and armholes are just too constricting.

I could probably use all the information I gathered from this muslin to make the pattern work for me.  But you know:  I don't think I'll bother.  This is one of those cases where I was really fulfilling an old desire - I loved this style a couple of years ago, but I love it less now.  I'm finding myself wanting a sleeker, more classic look these days (probably for a reason which I'll post about on Wednesday).  I don't think this silhouette does me any favors - it makes me look bigger than I really am, and who wants that?

No regrets though:  I said I'd do it, and I did.  I learned some things.  And now I can move on :-)