Let me preface this with a word about my style. I don't have much, so I keep things pretty simple. I'd be perfectly happy with a wardrobe of 3/4 sleeve boatneck shirts, knee-length skirts, jeans, and capri pants. As I've moved past college (and, let's face it, gained more weight than I should), clothes that I like are harder to find. Fashion has left me behind in a flurry of cap sleeves, embellished jeans, peasant tops, t-shirts with contrived "vintage" screen prints, and skirts with ruffles. And did I mention the @%#$& cap sleeves?
The clothes I like are still available, but they seem to be either too small or too expensive. Winning the lottery doesn't seem like a great plan to solve this problem, so I've decided to try my hand at sewing my own clothes. I've never been terribly crafty, but I can definitely appreciate the world of choices that being able to sew opens up. I have a 1969 Singer sewing machine and the basic skills needed to use it, so I decided to take the plunge.
I picked up a couple of clothing tutorial books - Sew U by Wendy Mullin, and Sew What! Skirts by Francesca DenHartog. The first explains how to sew clothing with a pattern (although the patterns included only go up to a 12), and the second gives detailed instructions for making various styles of skirts without a commercial pattern. I also got some practice fabric - a green quilting cotton with pink dots. (Yes, I'm ready for spring.) I set up shop in the dining room, with the dog crate, seeds, and delinquent baby shower gift. We can worry about neatness later.
I started with a basic A-line skirt from the second book. I took my measurements, did a little math as explained in the book, and drafted the pattern pieces (skirt body and facing) on brown wrapping paper. The skirt went together pretty quickly. I liked having the books available, as I had two very detailed sets of instructions for putting in a zipper, making darts, and fitting.
The skirt turned out to be too big at first - I'd wanted the waistline to hang on my hips, and that turned out to hang all wrong. I increased one of the seam allowances and improvised a couple of darts by pinning back the fabric to fit and drawing a slightly curved line for stitching. They don't lie quite flat, but I'm satisfied.
And so, the final product. Please excuse the ponytail and baggy shirt left on from work.
The improvised darts. I am really not used to having pictures taken from this angle.
The zipper. This was quite the accomplishment, I tell you.
I'm pretty pleased with the results for my first foray into sewing clothing. I don't quite know where to go from here, though. I may try one of the other skirts in the no-pattern book, and then something with an actual pattern. It will have to wait a few days, though - spring cleaning, seed-starting, and more electrical work are on the docket for the next week or so.
