Wednesday, September 4, 2013

Seeing Stripes

Fall can be a lovely time of year in VA, the  warm temperatures continue without the oppressive humidity of midsummer.  This time of year is the best for flower garden fragrance. I let the autumn blooming clematis scale two stories, to the roof line of our house, just because of it's fragrance.
autumn blooming clematis

 The faintly fruity scent of the osmanthus (sweet olive) tree hidden in the back corner of the property perfumes the whole yard and greets me when I get out of the car after a long day at work.  I love being outdoors this time of year, which make sewing projects slow down a bit.  I did manage to finish a blouse.  It was inspired by a striped blouse on my favorite style blog,  Wendy's Look Book



  To replicate it, I looked for a loose fitting shirt pattern with no darts and shirttail hem. I found one in the Burda Oct 2010 magazine. Pattern 110.  The blouse has a yoke and deep inverted pleat in the back, cut on front facing and two part sleeves.

Burda 10-2010 #110

  The fabric is a printed strip silk from Fabric Mart. I prefer woven stripe fabrics.  With printed stripes there is always the chance the print is off grain.  As this one was; about 1/2 inch from selvage to selvage.  It was small enough I decided to go head and match the stripes even if this caused the garment pieces to be slightly off grain.  The stripes are uneven and the length of fabric had only two repeats of the pattern.  Both the front and back pattern pieces were fabric hogs; the front because of it's cut on facing and the back because of the pleat.  I was able to fit the upper sleeve in the same band of stripes as the bodice pieces so they would match, but there was no extra fabric for the under sleeves.
Layout


   On a whim I decided to cut the under sleeves out of a different  fabric. I love the surprise of it when the blouse is seen from the back.








Yes, it is lace.  I shortened the shirt tail about 2 inches. The majority of the time I will wear this blouse tucked into a skirt or pants and I don’t like having blouses so long I have to stuff the shirttails down the legs of my pants or worry about them showing below the hem of the skirt. Just kidding on the latter situation, I don't wear my skirts that short.  I will also wear it out over jeans. Friday work dress code in the summer is jeans.  I don’t consider it a perk to be able to wear jeans to work. They aren’t as comfortable as a well fitted pair of dress pants. They aren’t always the best look for anyone over the age of 35, and as a coworker of mine said. “I went to college so I wouldn’t have to wear jeans to work.” But everyone comments if you don't wear jeans, so I'll wear them, but with a nice blouse on top.


25 comments:

  1. Oh my, I love the lace that you added to the back of the sleeves. I also love, love this shirt. Fantastic!

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  2. This blouse is stunning! Beautiful work. And I love the contrast fabric.

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  3. It is a wonderful idee to combine the pattern Burda 10/11/110 with stripes fabric! And the lace under sleeve - great.
    Mema

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  4. That is a great shirt and the lace under sleeve is a brilliant touch!

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  5. Your planning and whim has really paid off. Love it Audrey.

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  6. Great looking blouse. Love what you did with the sleeves!

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  7. Just when I thought "Is that lace?" there was your answer :). Such a unique detail, really surprising. Well done, as always!

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  8. Great shirt and those peekaboo undersleeves - wonderful!

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  9. Perfect use of stripes! Great job matching them too! I like the rhythm of the uneven stripes better than the much more common even and repetative stripes that are everywhere.

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  10. fabulous matching, you know I appreciate that. what a great blouse.

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  11. Totally overlooked this pattern.
    Beautiful job!!!

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  12. Stunning blouse, love the lace detail.

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  13. That pop of lace is just inspired. And, as always, your construction just makes my jaw drop.

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  14. What great fabric that is and placed so nicely. The lace is a nice surprise too.

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  15. Fantastic, as usual. The lace is a wonderful touch and the stripe matching is perfect. So funny about the jeans!

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  16. What an inventive use of the stripe and the lace. And even though I almost seem to live in jeans in retirement, I too liked to "dress up" rather than dress down at the office.

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  17. Congratulations on being chosen one of the 10 finalists for the Fabric Mart challenges! Can't wait to see what you sew up!

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  18. Congrats on getting picked for the Fabric Mart contest. Good luck, let me know if there is anything I can do. I'v got plenty of scraps you're free to take. I will glady make that sacrifice for you! ;)

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  19. Brilliant! I love the lace surprise, and the stripes are wonderful. It's a beautiful blouse!

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  20. Nice Shirt. Love the Stripes and the back pleat.

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  21. What you've done with the lace undersleeve is so cool!

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