Light as a Feather

Stashbusting is good this month!  I have finally, finally used a piece of viscose that I honestly cannot remember buying.  It’s been in the stash for what seems like ages, just waiting for the right project to come along (another of those!).  It’s a lovely drapey weight, closely woven, unlike some cheaper viscoses.  And the little feather print is lovely, without being too cute!  Really, I’ve earmarked this fabric to many a pattern over the last few years, but have always bottled it at the last minute.  So what happened this time?  Who’s the lucky pattern?

Well, it’s actually a vintage Vogue, from 1956.  I’d always liked this pattern, the front is interesting with the dart pleats at the neckline.  But, I wasn’t the right size…  Thank goodness that’s all changed, and now I have a variety of 50’s Vogue patterns, jackets in particular, that I can make!  I’d come across it again while searching the vintage pattern stash for patterns I know I won’t use to re-stock the Etsy shop.  I took it out and checked mesurements – and realised I had to make it now!  A quick toile revealed it wasn’t tricky to put together, although I did manage to put the band on inside-out.  That’s mostly because I wasn’t concentrating on the right and wrong side of the fabric!  The toile showed I needed to take the shoulders in by 1cm and just let out the narrowness of the waist a little.

I didn’t cut the pattern up, just marked the edge of the armhole and shoulders with chalk and drew a new line 1cm in, tapering to the original line just over halfway down the curve.  The waistline was just as easily altered, chalk marked the new cutting line.  I French seamed wherever possible and used a polyester fine sheer fusible interfacing on the cuffs, back neck facing, front band and to support the fold in the front opening.  It was just enough to add support without bulk.

There’s a zip in the left side seam to enable getting in and out of the blouse, although I suspect that by the time I’d widened the waist diameter, I could have just as easily pulled it over my head!  Not sure I want to check that now though..  I used a lightweight invisible zipper in that seam, not that it makes much difference to the stiffness of the zipper.  It did make it tricky to stitch close enough to the teeth to get a good invisible insertion though!  In the end I stitched 3 rows of increasingly closer stitching on that zip.  Got there in the end!  And, of course, to support the zip, I’d used a 2.5cm strip of interfacing on each of the seams.

I’m really rather happy with the finshed blouse, the sleeves are the right length – I know, a little chilly for winter, but I’m constantly pushing my sleeves up anyway.  The hem is the right length too, I don’t like tops any longer than this.  It’s the right length to wear out, or tuck in.  And it goes with just about everything in the wardrobe!  Win, win, win!

Author: Anne W

I love fabric, and sewing. And I could do nothing else but sew, all day, every day, if I could! View all posts by Anne W