My second Lamazi blog post

Much as I’m a big fan of sewing and wearing dresses, I do love separates too, especially tops. I think this version of the Amaya shirt by Made My Wardrobe may just have gone to the top of my favourites list! [Full disclosure, Lydia offered me my choice of one of her patterns as a PDF with no expectation of a review and I selected the Amaya with its gathered neckline, raglan sleeves and full floaty cuffs] I printed it off but then didn’t start it for a while until the ‘right’ fabric came along.

As a Lamazi Fabrics blogger we each volunteer for a number of slots throughout the year but Liana was short of a post for early August so I offered to do it. I thought the Amaya would be a good option as it’s not complex and I could probably sew it quite quickly to meet the deadline. When my eyes fell on the beautiful printed Broderie Anglaise I knew I had my perfect match! 

When the fabric arrived it was absolutely gorgeous, so soft and pliable. Broderie Anglaise can often be quite stiff and crisp, which may be what you want, but I’ve also found it to be a disguise for a cheaper quality cotton fabric with lots of dressing or starch in it so do be slightly wary of very cheap Broderie Anglaise. This version is a printed soft cotton lawn which is then embroidered, there are lots of eyelets so personally I’ll probably be wearing a plain-coloured RTW camisole underneath as no one needs to see my undies or midriff thank you! This specific fabric does not have an embroidered edge which some Broderie Anglaise does, and also be aware that the embroidered part of the fabric doesn’t run right up to the selvedge, this is normal with this type of fabric. On this particular fabric there’s a wider gap down one side than the other so you may find the useable part of the fabric isn’t as wide as you would think. In other words, don’t scrimp on the quantity of fabric when choosing Broderie Anglaise for a project because you could find yourself a bit short by accident.

I opted for a UK size 14 with no modifications according to my measurements but I think I will go down a size when I make another, the fabric you choose could make a significant difference to the finished look so a soft and floaty georgette or silk crepe de chine for example would look divine with plenty of volume but a firm linen, or a cotton poplin could give you the appearance of a ship in full sail! (that may, of course, be the look you’re after!) 

This fabric has a one-way design but I chose to turn the upper sleeve pattern piece to interlock better and make it more economical to cut out, I really don’t think it’s that obvious on the finished garment, always worth checking though! 

It’s pretty well impossible to see snipped notches or even triangles on this fabric so, in order to tell the front of the sleeve from the back, I marked the single and double notches with long thread tacks and this seemed to work well.

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I used a French seam finish on the cuffs but found there wasn’t any particular advantage to doing this, for the rest of the construction I sewed regular seams and overlocked them together. 

The pattern calls for interfacing to be attached down the centre front seam to stabilise it but I chose not to do this as it would show through the eyelets, I simply neatened the edge of the self-facing with the overlocker. I had a rummage through lots of the miscellaneous trims and ribbons I’ve had from past projects and tried a few ideas out with them but in the end I only used a white cotton trim down the front and simple edging lace on the sleeves, I would have used this on the hem too but there wasn’t enough, more on that later. 

I added a triple zigzag stitch to embellish the sleeve ruffle seam too.

The neckline is gathered up into a bias-cut band but instead of cutting it on the bias I used a straight strip of the printed lawn from near the selvedge. I did this because a bias strip of such holey fabric wouldn’t have worked well at all, the one drawback of the tie being cut on the straight is that it doesn’t curve around the neckline quite so smoothly but it’s fine. The tie is topstitched close to the edge so, to match the sleeve, I used the triple zigzag stitch again. 

Finally I had to finish the hem, I could simply have turned up as per the instructions but I wanted some kind of pretty finish to echo the cuffs. As I didn’t have enough of the sleeve trimming, or any other edging lace which I felt worked alongside what I’d already used, I opted to try out one of the satin stitches which my Pfaff machine is capable of. 

I’d never tried this before so I did a couple of experimental tests with a few stitch designs that appealed to me, I used Vilene Stitch N Tear as a backing behind it to stabilise the fabric.

This seemed to be satisfactory so I sewed the whole hem by this method a few millimetres away from the edge. The Stitch N Tear is then carefully torn away to leave the actual embroidery and then finally, as accurately as possible, I snipped away the excess fabric to leave the pretty scalloped edge.

I’m very happy with this finish on the hem BUT it’s just possible that it might not be very durable in the wash, I’m half-expecting that it might start to come away in places. If this happens then I’ll have come up with another idea but for the moment it looks nice. 

I hope you’ve found my tips for working with Broderie Anglaise helpful, and things to look out for with it. It’s certainly a fabric that is having a ‘moment’ at the moment, it’s timeless and feminine and I’m looking forward to wearing my Amaya for a few years to come. 

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Thank you as always to Lamazi for providing me with the fabric to be able to write this, and thank you to Lydia at Made My Wardrobe for generously giving me the pattern. 

Until next time,

Happy sewing

Sue

Revisiting a ‘vintage’ blouse pattern

I know many of us often sew patterns multiple times because we like them but I’ve taken this to a new extreme recently. I last sewed this blouse pattern Simplicity 8704 when I was around 16 or 17 years old, the date on the back is 1978 so I must have made it while I was still at school! I remember I used a burgundy-coloured viscose (or similar) with a floral print on it and it was definitely one of my favourites as I wore it a lot, probably swanning about in the Sixth Form common room!

There have been several times when I’ve been tempted to revisit it but for one reason or another I’ve put it back in the box for another day but this time I kept it out and went in search of fabric in the stash. Initially I was going to use a really pretty pastel pink lightweight checked cotton I got from Sew Me Sunshine (I can’t see it on the website now though) but when I realised I was going to have to pattern match the deceptively tricky check I thought better of it. I wasn’t in the mood for taking an age over that so I continued to rummage until my eyes fell upon the (also) pale pink linen I acquired from the local Scraps Store last year. I found it in a container full of various unwanted fabrics and there was nearly 5 metres of it so, for a donation, it came home with me! I laundered it at the time but put it away. I thought I might make a dress with it originally but, because it’s such a pale pink, I didn’t want to end up looking like a blob so I left it for another time.

A plain linen blouse appealed to me though and I didn’t have to fiddle about pattern matching so away I went and it was cut out in no time. Even though the pattern was a single size-this is how most patterns were sold until multi-size patterns were introduced-and my size has fluctuated to say the least over the years, amazingly it was still going to be the right size with no alterations.

There’s not much else to say about making it up except I remembered that an @SewOver50 stalwart, Lisa, had shared on her grid the day before that she had used a wing needle to decorate a plain linen tunic she was making which reminded me that I’d intended to find a use for the same effect at some point but forgotten all about it-Thank You Lisa!

The wing needle (I’ve also seen it called an ‘heirloom’ needle recently too) is like a regular needle except it has fine metal ‘fins’ to each side of the shaft which creates a little hole like a tiny eyelet in the centre of the stitch as it forms. A stitch which looks like a little star works best for this effect but you could try experimenting to see if any others look nice

I made a little video of my machine in action.

It’s worth bearing in mind a couple of important points if you’re going to use this decoration. Firstly, you can’t easily pivot at a corner with the needle down in the work-I sewed the collar in three separate moves, secondly you won’t be able to use the automatic threader if your machine has one and thirdly (thank you Lisa for telling me this because I don’t have this feature) you can’t use your automatic thread cutter if you have one.

As well as the collar I embroidered the cuffs, the front raglan seams and down the button placket, although I did this last one after I’d hemmed the bottom and sewn the buttonholes so that it was the exact distance from the edge and the buttonholes.

I love the way the blouse gathers into the collar, which is a two part construction incidentally, the raglan sleeves are straightforward but the gathered cuffs add a nice touch. I found a selection of Mother of Pearl buttons amongst my tidied-up button boxes to add another of my usual quirky details but otherwise that’s it. It’s a reasonably quick make but it was lovely to sew the details of collar construction and the cuffs, there’s an elegant simplicity to it I think. I will either wear it loose over the top of trousers or tucked in, or underneath a pinafore dress maybe?

It might sound strange but it feels a bit like an old friend has come back to visit, and I might even make the placket front version now too!

Until next time, keep sewing!

Sue

Holiday shirt & top from Maker’s Atelier

I made two versions of the short-sleeved shirt by The Maker’s Atelier last summer, I love ‘em and wore them constantly. One was plain white and the other was a Liberty print voile which I embellished with fancy stitches.

I wore it on the second day of The Sewing Weekender 2017, that’s me with the pink fringe on the right!

I wanted to make the hooded version sometime and originally I planned to make it in linen like the photo but on a recent visit to Backstitch near Cambridge I spotted a nice Ponte with an interesting diamond weave that was a little bit brushed on one side which I thought would work well so I bought that instead.

Making it up was pretty straightforward except I wanted to utilise the rows of diamonds and they proved a bit tricky to match up in the cutting out. Eventually I managed to cut it fairly satisfactorily but there’s one or two wonky spots although I think only I will notice them (I hope)

The inside seam of the hood and the back neck are neatened with tape so I used 2 pieces of striped grosgrain ribbon which had come off a gift bag! You never know when these things might come in handy 🙂 

Gift bag ribbon in situ!

There’s a casing that runs around the waist with elastic cord through it but after scoring the striped ribbon for the part that shows I hadn’t got anything else suitable for the casing! I knew I wouldn’t be able to get what I wanted locally so I ordered some navy cotton twill tape and some navy and some grey cord elastic off t’internet. The tape was a tad wide but that’s fine and the elastic was just right. Before sewing the tape on you need to make two eyelets for the elastic to come out through so I reinforced the fabric behind with iron-on interfacing and then made two small round-ended buttonholes, you could use metal eyelets if you have the gadget for this.  The buttonholes were actually bigger than I needed them to be so I didn’t cut the whole thing open, only enough for the elastic to go through.

As I’d bought two colours of elastic I put it to a public vote on Instagram because I came over all indecisive. This is with grey threaded through initially although in the end navy won by a narrow margin.

Before you can thread the elastic though it needs something to thread through! I carefully sewed on the tape on the reverse of the fabric following as best I could a row of diamonds as I went. I’d actually pressed a crease along the line before I started in order to have some idea of where I was heading.

The casing is only narrow so there’s a bit of excess tape, a narrower one would have been better but on one can see it anyway.

In the end I went with the majority vote and used the navy elastic so after slotting it through the ends are passed through metal toggles. I got these in Backstitch too, I think they are ‘Vogue’ brand. The ends of the elastic frayed badly so I used doubled double thread in a needle and hand-stitched them to stop any further fraying.

So that’s pretty much it, the hem still has the deep notches of the shirt version but the hooded one has long sleeves. I used the twin needle to stitch up the hem and sleeves.

I think this will be a really useful cover-up, the fabric isn’t particularly thick but I’ll either layer things under it or it will be ideal for a warm summer evening (although they feel a very long way off yet!)

The Maker’s Atelier patterns are not cheap, in fact they are rather expensive, but they are the sort of chic, timeless styles that you can remake countless times.

Happy sewing,

Sue