WIP: SW Reunion & Laurel

I hate that I don't have anything new to show you!  I've been working on the Sew Weekly reunion project very diligently and, sad to say, the project was a giant FAIL!  I suppose I could fix it, but it's going to take me a while to unpick all the seams and sew it back up with a smaller seam allowance. 
Behold the crappy pictures!

This crazy shiny polyester creation is OMG! so tight all throughout the bodice.  The sleeves are tight. The waist is tight. So freakin' tight.

This is a polyester blend of some sort that I picked up crazy-cheap at JoAnn's. I think it cost $2 or $3 a yard.  Not a huge loss money-wise on this project fail.  I had the pattern and notions already.

The pattern (not that you can see any of the detailing with the SHINY!) is Simplicity 2588  I chose to use the slim sleeves, neckband, and full skirt. The pattern also has options for sleeveless with a yoke, a slim skirt with a back vent, puffy sleeves (probably called pleated), a belt, a bow, and tabs.  The Project Runway pattern collection is really awesome for giving you prompts when you decide you want to change something.  "Designer's extra:  Sew tabs in with back darts (or whatever)."

I threw in a zipper and called it a loss.  I have this thing that I spent so much time cutting it out and trying to make it perfect.  I made a muslin!  I made sure to find the pattern's wearing ease (4.5" my nose) before tracing the pattern pieces.  I don't ever work with polyester and this might be why.  There is zero give on the sewn fabric.  It seemed stretchy(ish) when it was laying flat, but no stretch on my body at all.  I actually really like this pattern and I really like how it went together.  I feel that this was a pattern/fabric matching FAIL.  It's unfortunate that this was going to be my sew weekly reunion project too.  Now I have ten days to make something else to submit and I'm going to be out of town for six of those days.  FUCK!!  I have a backup.  I'm going to draft and sew something.  Stay tuned for the madness.

 

(Meanwhile in Colettelandia...)

 

I'm still working on making all the adjustments to my Laurel.  I swear I'll never use another shirt pattern ever if I can just get this thing to look and fit right.  See, I have giant shoulders.  This is a good thing if I need to carry a 50-pound backpack or lift heavy things.  It's not so great when I need to buy new button down shirts, for example.  The giant shoulder thing on it's own isn't so bad, but I also have giant muscley arms.  Women have told me they would give their first born for my arms.  I'm happily child-free and I tend to like my arms as long as I'm not having to cover them with fabric.  So there's that.  RANT.RANT.RANT.

 

Pictures of progress so far:

In order to make my muslin shoulder wider, I first marked the seam allowance (purple).  Next, I found that dent where my arm bone meets my shoulder bone and I marked that with orange (this is the top orange dot--the other one marks my collar bone I think).  I found the center of the shoulder seam and marked that with a pink dot and drew a line from the armhole to that pink dot.  I had to make one more pivot point (blue) from the arm seam allowance to my pink line.  You'll notice that my blue line ends parallel to my orange dots.  This is awesome!

 

Cut along the pink line first, stopping when you hit the seam allowance.

 

Then cut along the blue line, stopping when you hit the seam allowance.  (This is the back.  I forgot to take the front picture.  Sorry, not sorry.)

Then you need to pull your pink line over to widen the shoulder to whatever you determined it to be.  I had to widen my shoulders an inch.  Then you move that blue line triangle just a bit until the top edge is flush again.  Then repeat the line process with the back piece. 

 

As you can see, I used scraps of fusible interfacing to hold my pieces in place.  I do intend for this weird cotton to become my new pattern, though I may end up having to transfer all my changes onto the paper pattern (twice because this is only the shirt part of the Laurel pattern.  OMGWTFBBQ!)  As I mentioned before about my Hulk arms, they don't fit so well in this armhole.  I thought the shoulder adjustment would help relax that mess out, and it does, but it still isn't perfect.  I already lowered the armscye 1" and I have to either redraft the sleeve or find one in a bigger size that will work for the Hulk arms and my top. 

 

So, no progress on anything really.  Happy stitching (or bitching if you're me),

~elle