What a flattering pencil skirt, Vogue 1656 by Donna Karan

After the heartache of a shattered pleather that marinated too long in my stash, I immediately took mental inventory of what other fragile fabrics in my stash might be deteriorating as we speak. One of the first fabrics to pop into my mind at that moment was this lovely pleather with a flower print.

Nothing like panic to focus the mind, eh? This fabric has only been sitting in my stash for 3 years but I don't want to blink and find myself 10 years later with another crumbling fabric in my hands... So I immediately picked a pattern and got to work and this is what came out:

My awkward pose notwithstanding, this is a very flattering skirt. The skirt pattern is from 1995 and from the pattern envelope you don't even notice the skirt. But it is by Donna Karan so we know we must look at the tech drawing. Indeed, then you see that the skirt has princess seams and a yoke, all working to produce that trademark flattering fit that Karan is well known for.

Unfortunately, this pattern comes in single sizes only! Was that the norm back in the 90's? I know that some people complain about too many lines on a pattern sheet, but my waist and hips don't share the same size so I really appreciate, no, need multiple sizes. My pattern for this skirt is size 14 only, so I had to add 0.5cm to each seam (princess seams as well as side seams) to bring the hips to my size. Easy enough to do, but I'm just saying, I like having multiple sizes right there on each pattern piece...

I do not dare to iron pleather, especially this one that is so thin. Instead, I used a gadget I bought recently to flatten real leather seams. The cylinder is really heavy and it worked very well on this pleather. I used it as if it was an iron, flattening each seam after it was sewn: first flat, then to one side and finally flattening the topstitching to "blend" the stitches with the fabric. And presto! all seams lay very nicely flat.

The skirt has a very tapered shape, but there are two kick pleats at back, one on each princess seam. They provide plenty of room for walking, so the skirt is very comfortable.

Here is a 360° view of the skirt. That weird pose in the middle photo is me trying to show you the skirt yoke... sigh! I didn't do a review at Pattern Review because there isn't much to say about this skirt, it's a classic design and it went together with no special efforts required.

I'm quite pleased with this skirt and I am especially pleased that I "saved" this fabric from withering to dust in my stash!

Now, before I go I want to show you something: my prize patterns from Eva Dress have arrived!

Actually, they got here some 3 weeks ago, but I've been traveling quite heavily for work, coming home just long enough to do a load of laundry and pack again. So only now I had time to take them out of the envelope. I think I know which one I want to make first...

Thanks again Eva Dress for this very generous prize!

My radiant orchid coat, Vogue 1321 by Donna Karan

My new coat has been done for a couple of weeks now, but it took me a long time to get all the photos done. And then another while to write this post. It's just that I am so proud of this one that I want to give you more details. I hope you won't mind the longer post and gazillion photos.

We begin with a first impression photo. Came out nice, no?

Please forgive the sunglasses, one of my superpowers is to always know precisely when to close my eyes just in time for the photo. After so many tries I just decided to give up and make use of camouflage. Mmmmmhh, that hem needs another good pressing...

Anyway, my fashion fabric is a wool knit that was felted in some way and then bonded to a much thinner and silkier knit at the back. Its thickness and the backing fabric give it a stiff drape. It falls in wide folds, standing away from the body. With the silky backing I can easily get in and out of the sleeves without needing a lining. It also means that I cannot use any fusible interfacing.

All of these qualities make this fabric perfect for Vogue 1321 by Donna Karan, a full-skirted coat with a dramatic collar.

Before cutting into my fabric I made a proper full body muslin. I didn't have any muslin fabric as thick and heavy as the actual fashion fabric, but the muslin could still tell me about the fit, even if not so much about the drape. And I am soooo glad that I did!

In the muslin I could see that the sleeves were too wide and there was too much fabric around the sleeve at the bodice and especially at the underarm. In fact you can see this also on the pattern photo, but because the model is so thin, she still looks stylish even with all that extra fabric around. Me? Probably not so much.

So I removed a total of 6cm from the sleeve, making it narrower all along its length. I divided the 6cm between the underarm piece and the front sleeve piece, 3cm each, parallel to the grainline.

Then I also raised the armhole by 6cm. I also redrew the armhole shapes to match both sides, on the bodice and the sleeve. This was not much change at all since the sleeves are not deeply set.

All the seams are lapped, including the darts on the bodice and on the collar. I had never sewn darts using lapped seams so I made some tests. Lucky for me since the dart point ended up with a gaping hole because the overlap becomes too small for the stitching to grab the underlayer. Nobody wants holes like that, and especially not on an attention grabbing collar! I first tried sewing a normal dart and then topstitching it, but it looked too raised compared to the lapped seams. So in the end I just didn't cut the dart all the way to the dart point as the instructions said to do. I stopped cutting ±5cm before the end point and voila, hole averted!

With all those lapped seams to mark and sew do you know what was my absolutely unmissable tool? A 5/8" gauge, homemade out of cardboard. Completely free and totally invaluable :-)

Except for my choice to narrow the sleeve, it is a rather easy coat to make. There is no interfacing, no shaping with heat and moisture, no lining and only two buttonholes (which you could omit if you decided not to make the sleeve tabs). It did take me forever to hide all those thread ends, but then the inside looks sooooo pretty and neat, doesn't it?

For the pockets I used some leftover silk charmeuse for a lovely feeling on my hands. I used an overlock thread chain to keep the pockets from flapping too far around.

OK. I've tortured you enough with all these details, so here are the three views of my coat. I'm really loving it. The color makes me happy, the collar is actually very nice against the wind and the wide skirt goes perfectly with all my full-skirted dresses.

I did have to rummage through my belt collection to find the longest possible belts since all that fabric requires quite a few more centimeters than usual. And this is not a coat you want to wear without a belt. Saying it looks shapeless doesn't fully describe the mess of fabric swinging all around.

I've submitted my review of Vogue 1321 by Donna Karan to Pattern Review.

BTW, tomorrow is the last day to sew for the Stitcher's Guild 2014 SWAP and this coat is only my second garment posted! Yup, I'm afraid I'm not going to make it... I've actually sewn 6 of the garments in my 2014 SWAP plan, but it is obviously not the full eleven. From the beginning I knew that SWAP was too ambitious for my skill level and speed, but you know what else I discovered? I got a bit bored. Bored of working with the same fabrics and color scheme, but also bored with knowing exactly what I was going to sew for the coming 3 months... I kept getting new ideas that I really wanted to get to, instead of these old ideas I had long time ago. So, I'm officially bowing out, though I will still try to post the rest of the garments I sewed for the SWAP. Here's a sneak preview. Thanks for reading!

Nice or my grandma's dress?

Hi. I am Lucia, I am a fabricholic. I buy and I buy and I never make anything. Here is to changing that.

Vogue 1250 DKNY dress

I finally made my own copy of the super popular dress Vogue 1250 by DKNY. My motivation finally came after joining Pattern Review's Best Pattern Contest. I made my version in a large format knit, overprinted with a paisley pattern that I bought a year or two ago in Portugal. At the time I remember thinking how cool the fabric looked and what a great avant garde something I could make with it... now, I am not so sure!

I do like the pattern, although it does not make it into my list of absolute favorites. I like it because it is really simple: 4 seams plus hems. Because of this it also went very quickly, once I got over the weirdness of the few seams. But it's not quite my favorite because there really is too much fabric at the cowl. I may have aggravated that problem by using a thick knit, but in the myriad of versions I've seen with lightweight knits the neckline is really rather low for this reason.

I lengthened the dress by a good 8cm, to my new favorite length of 4cm below the knee. I also added sleeves to the elbow by simply extending the pattern as far as I could before hitting the attached skirt piece. This worked beautifully and I think this is my new favorite sleeve length. So Duchess of Cambridge, too!

Finally, the fabric... now that it's made up I am not sure if I like the print anymore. I can't get over a faint "grandma-ish" vibe I get from it. Or maybe it is just that the colors are more for Fall and I am in a Spring soon-to-be-summer mood? Hmmm. What is that concept I've come across in many sewing blogs? That closet where garments go to sit for a while until our head is clear of the prejudice that builds up when working intensely and closely on something... That's where this one will need to hang for a while to see if it improves.

My review of the pattern is here at Pattern Review.