You know, this is the first time I have ever made a long sleeve shirt. The few short sleeve shirts get worn regularly to work but I have always made long sleeve or 3/4 sleeve knits tops since they work better with layers.
This shirt is #109 from Burda 9/2005. I know, another old pattern. I have tried to warm up to new Burda patterns but they leave me cold a lot of the time. Plus I have a collection from 2005 at home ready to use all the time. So much easier that going to the library to borrow out newer copies. I chose the pattern because of the tucks and the shirt collar that is drafted ever so slightly off to the side so that the collar is not meant to button all the way up. Not a huge fan of the curved hem though but too lazy to change that this time around.
I was surprised with the tucks - I thought they were pintucks but the pattern has you topstich 7mm away from the fold, so that is about 1.4cm per tuck. I thought that was yuge and the tucks would stick out but with a good steam press they sit beautifully. The blouse ends up extremely close fitting, so much that I had to let the sides out a little. In the future, I would only make the tucks this big if I was using a stretch woven. Otherwise it will be pintucks all the way.
The back looks terrible. I am pretty sure it is because it is probably too tight on me. The fabric above the tucks just puffs out. See it - yick. I will have to make the pattern again to see if making it with a little more ease will take care of the puff or whether the tucks make it do that.
My favourite part was how crisp the front band looks. The collarband is not sewn perfect since it was really hard to see the white thread on the white interfacing. As usual, I followed
Gigi's instructions. Well, without the topstitching.
I used those intructions for the cuffs as well, though I handsewed inside.
I thought I would link in Sherry
tutorial page - I used quite a few on them on my shirt (turn of cloth, continuous bound sleeve placket, block fusing,
When I saw that
Suzy has the same problem as me with pooling in the back waist that a sway back does not solve, for some reason I thought I would give it another shot, using Sherry's
easy way. When I hitch up my shirts at the back shoulders, it seems to work. Anway, I needed another white top for the cooler weather.
This is a cross of Jalie 2805 and 2806 - a scooped neck without gathers and with 3/4 sleeves.
See the wrinkles again in the back - this is with the sway back adjustment of about 12mm. It does not bother me too much, but if anyone has any ideas, I am keen to hear from you.
I think the reason this top does that is your shape. Not that that's a bad thing! But you are very curvy...that is, you seem to go in quite a way from your shoulders to a small waist and out again to your hips. You are curvy...the tucks are straight. Maybe you need to make the tucks a bit bigger at the top and bottom and smaller in the middle so they follow your shape more?
ReplyDeleteMaybe I will try that next time. Do you mean make the tucks bigger at the waist, or smaller at the waist?
DeleteLooks great. Me personally would probably not have any tucks at the back (but that is just me.) They look fantastic at the front.
ReplyDeleteWhat fabric did you use for your white knit top? It looks nice and un-see-through :)
Liz - a cotton lycra fabric. I got it from my local bargain box store.
Deletefirst up, great top! It looks fabulous on you - that shaping is such a lovely style element.
ReplyDeleteTo my eye, and the fitting technique I am using a lot at the moment - is that you need to pin out a wedge all the way across the shoulder blades until you remove all the excess length (that is what is causing that blouson effect). Measure how much you need to take out and then tuck out that amount on your pattern piece for next time. By doing this you will be reducing the size of the arm scythe, so to make sure your sleeve will still fit you need to drop the armhole the length of the tuck you remove.
In my case it is caused by my sloping shoulders making me short in the back and front (oh and being short too - that also makes me short in the front and the back - my front needs a 2 cm tuck but my back only needs a 1 cm)
Makes sense that sloping shoulders make it shorter in the upper body. I think I do need to take that into account. Thanks for the feedback.
DeleteI've been thinking about the sway back thing lately - I've been reading the swayback thread (here: http://sewing.patternreview.com/SewingDiscussions/topic/34787) over at patternreview and I found the 3rd post down really interesting - basically you scoop out the side seams only on the back piece of the pattern. Not sure if it will work any better, but its what I'm planning on having a go with next time I do a knit top (anything's worth a try, right!)
ReplyDeleteYou've achieved a really lovely shape at the front of the first blouse. So slimming. The details are really lovely.
ReplyDeleteThey are great tops. I love the tucks on the shirt, it looks very crisp and sharp.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Mary Nanna, there is too much room above the back tucks. I was wondering if you make a sloping shoulder adjustment? Mary Nanna's tuck across the back would give the same effect as an ajustment at the shoulders,but if it were my blouse back and I was happy with the back armscye fit, I would make it a fish eye tuck on the pattern piece, because I am lazy and hate changing more than one piece if I can get away without it.
I had a similar problem on one of my daughter's blouses with back tucks, and turned the top of the tucks into much longer darts to take in some of the excess, it worked nicely on her without me having to make a whole new blouse.
She wore a vest with it until I fixed it ;)
Yes, I made a sloping shoulder adjustment. I think I may have to try either the tuck or the fish eye tuck. Thanks for the suggestion.
DeleteWhat a beautiful shirt. The tuck detailing is really nice. I think if you can, let out the side seams - it looks to me like you need to add width from the waist down to avoid the bubble in the back. You could do a sway back adjustment, but with all those tucks it's probably just easier to add extra to the side seams and then tweak the fit using the extra-wide allowances. I'm going looking for this pattern....
ReplyDeleteThe tops are beautiful---the pintucks look great, and I think (as a chronic swayback-adjuster myself) that the little puddling on the Jalie top is nothing major. If you really really really want it gone, the easiest way is to add a back seam and take out a dart in the puddling area there (a dart in the pattern, not in the final fabric, obviously.)
ReplyDeleteSome other things you could try (if you haven't already ;) )might be shortening the length above the waist (our real waists are often a bit higher than we think) and, as others have said, widening below the waist (especially in the back piece).
Still, all over looking great! :)
What a lovely blouse. The tucks make for great shaping. I like the fish eye tuck idea for moving the excess. Our personal "adjustment needs" are especially noticeable when we make anything fitted!
ReplyDeleteThe Jalie top is very nice, too. If it were me, I wouldn't do anything about the pooling. Or, I would gradually tweak it each time I made the pattern again. My Jalie knit tops pool more in the back than do other patterns. I think they must add a little more waist shaping.