Did someone say “Contest”?

If you have read my blog for any length of time you know that I participate in sewing contests.  Sewing with a Plan (SWAP) contests, internet fabric vendor sponsored contests, and the wide variety (Pantone color, accessory, vintage garment, etc.)  of contests found on  Pattern Review.   I participate more for the challenge than the prizes, which are usually minimal.  

 The American Sewing Guild  (ASG) announced an Anyone Can Win Contest in early June.

 Every ASG member who entered a garment had a chance to win, regardless of their sewing expertise or experience, because the winners were chosen at random.  The only requirement was that the entries had to be made with one of ASG's Simplicity patterns.  I had Simplicity 1621 in my stash, purchased for the jacket which has a interesting collar that can be adjusted by pulling a drawstring.

This contest was all the incentive I needed to sew the jacket.  In addition to the jacket, the pattern includes a sleeveless tunic/dress with a fitted top, with  flaring below the bust on  all seams; side, center front and back.  It also has a Hi (in front)  Lo ( in back) hem. I decided to sew the dress too, so I would have two garments to submit to the contest and have a complete outfit to wear.
  
The jacket is made out of very lightweight open weave linen with a dégradé from rusty orange to dusty purple.

 I should call this my” rusty, dusty” outfit.  The fabric was horribly ravely and shifty. I  used French seams, but instead of sewing the first 1/4 inch seam using a straight stitch, I used a 1/4 " wide serger stitch to stop the fraying and sew the seam in one operations .  While I wouldn’t use this technique on finer fabric, because of the weight the serger threads adds in the seam, it did not adversely  impact the side and sleeve seams of this jacket. I added 2 inches to the length of the jacket, because I thought it looked a bit too short on the real women in the review pictures on PR, and  I needed the extra length in the jacket to get the full range of colors in the fabric.




Simplicity 1621 Jacket

 

 

 The dress shown on the front of the envelope, which I think is made of a woven fabric, has a unattractive bell like silhouette. I decided to make it out of a knit, hoping the weight and drape of the knit would improve the appearance.  My dress is made out of an inexpensive  T-shirt type knit. The cut edge of this knit curled like a spring. It was sooo annoying to work with.  Rather than finish the neck and armhole edges with bias trim as the pattern instructs,  I cut  facing pieces using the dress pattern.  I cut the facings off at the under bust  elastic casing line (for the view B top).  I added elastic, cut to my under bust measurement, to the bottom of the facing piece which added a shelf bra to the dress. The finished dress was sort of boring. While I was trying it on DS2 passed through the room, en route to forage food in the kitchen, and he asked me "Are you going to bed?" I was really puzzled about his question until I realized I don't usually make or wear this style of dress, but I do wear straight hanging garments in T shirt knits as nightwear.   To liven up the dress,   I hand overcast the seams on the outside  in contrasting rust colored  embroidery floss.    I knew the overcasting  would  create a raised ridge, taking up about 1/8" of the fabric on each side of the seam.  So I sewed the seam allowance corresponding smaller,  at 1/2" so as not affect the fit. I also cover stitched the hem and around the neck and armholes in the same color thread.

Simplicity 1621 dress

 

overcast seams and cover stitch hem

 

 

Simplicity 1621 dress and jacket

 The contest entries were due on July 1st. No announcement of winners or pictures of the garments submitted are on the ASG website at the time of this post. I do like the jacket and was actually surprised to find I like the look of the jacket worn with the dress. I am not so sure I would wear the dress by itself. It echo's my body shape a little to closely, small on top, lots of volume below the waist. Maybe with a killer statement necklace to draw attention up.   I am also not sure this is a work outfit. The jacket with a coordinating tank top ( where did I toss those scraps?) and slacks would be great though.