Saturday, March 1, 2014

Issy Fit

In a miraculous turn, my latest Style Arc package arrived on Friday afternoon. Since I joined the Club, it included my ordered pattern (Elle pants), my free pattern (Janet Jacket - yup had to reorder since I trashed my first pattern), my free pattern of the month (Issy top, which thrills me from a design perspective) and some more of the black Bengaline (more to come on the topic of this fabric at a later date).

In brief - I ordered the Elle pants in the wrong size (12 vs 10, my error) so I wonder how difficult it will be to make them. Fortunately, Andrea ordered them in my right size, so I may just trace hers.

Apparently, the Janet Jacket was delayed because they discovered an drafting concern in the bust of the size 12 - the one I muslined to hell, so it's not so relevant to my latest, hideously-fitting version of this jacket - and they had to change it. Since I'm starting from scratch, I don't suppose this makes much difference to me - but apparently, the original 12 was drafted too tight in the bust. Alas, I'm not going to be working with the same original version as I started with last time, so I'm not going to be able to take every (correct) alteration for granted. Whatevs. I'll worry about this next week.

Now, let's get to today's topic - the Issy Top:


IMPORTANT: On the topic of omnipresent, minor irritation with Style Arc (despite improvements in communication and delivery time), this pattern is printed on thermal paper - unlike the previous patterns I've received from them. That means, when I pressed the pattern on the right side (I know, you're not supposed to do it but I always do and there's no problem), it melted:


I then had to spend an hour with my husband scanning and processing the instructions and tech drawings to make them legible again. Yeah, I ironed those bits first. They're only nominally readable now. What a pain in the ass. Intriguingly, when I carefully experimented next with ironing from the wrong side of the paper (gotta get those freakin' creases out in order to trace, after all) the ink came through on the wrong side and got darker on the right side, but there were no problems with melted ink. Proceed with caution.

I'm really trying to get with the whole "I don't care how long this takes, it's my fucking hobby" philosophy because I've worked on it for 3 hrs and haven't got to the pattern tracing yet.

Here's the deal - this pattern, as drafted, is not shaped like me at all. Well, altered-Issy, she is Kristin-shaped, we gotta hope. Cuz I sure put in the effort.

To wit:

My arm circumference is smaller than the size 10 and higher too but the unaltered sleeve head curve is pretty much like mine...

Oh, this is where things start to go to hell, from an alteration perspective. My shoulders are narrower than the pattern's, though the Clothing Engineer has indicated that the pattern fits small in the shoulders (and my math corroborates this).

The thing is that the alterations for the front and back - especially given the whack look of the pattern pieces - have to equal one another, though it's unclear exactly where I need to remove my shoulder length. My sloper is for a crew neck T. This is a high-necked, wrap-V. It's not really an apples-to-apples comparison.

After considering the outcome of every change (I hope), I landed on these alterations (penciled around the original pattern lines:

Altered back piece

Altered front piece - see what I mean about the challenge of enacting this alteration on asymmetric pieces that fold all weird-style??

Altered sleeve
This is the fabric I'm going to use:

Appropriately stretchy rayon jersey from Gorgeous Fabrics - it's by some designer apparently...
On an unrelated note - or maybe it's quite related since I seem to be making a sexy, knit top in animal print - I just received info that my 25 year high school reunion is coming up. Process that, if you will: I have been out of high school for most of my life which, given that I am still a Clementine to my core, is rather confusing to me. I'm tremendously grateful to still know much of my graduating class (there were 20 of us), so it will be more like a party in a weird venue than a total reintroduction to a bunch of middle-aged people I don't know. Seriously though...

15 comments:

  1. I hope the top works out, because I think it'll be a great style on you!

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    1. Thanks G. I think it has a lot of potential. Trying not to get too hopeful though...

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  2. i really love this pattern, hope it works out! and this top in animal print seems like just the thing for a high school reunion ;-)

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  3. I looked at the measurement charts for Style Arc, and I appear to be a size 12 on the bottom (or at least closer to a 12 than a 14). If you were interested in selling the Elle pattern (that's OK to do, isn't it?), please give me a shout (esther_mcafee at canadalife dot com). I'm in London Ontario, but I have family in Toronto (near High Park or Younge and Eglington) if you prefer to keep it local.

    I've decided not to order any patterns from Australia until we sell out house, but my deal with myself never said anything about helping out a Canadian who had an 'extra' pattern... :)

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    1. I think it's ok but I'm inclined to keep it (for the moment) for science. I'd like to compare the 10 and 12 against my sloper, now that I have the chance. Don't know when that will happen. BTW, the Style Arc pants fit large, according to what I've read and my experience of one pattern corroborates that. So you might be closer to a 10 than you think...

      Having said this, I"m happy to gift it to you if I discover that the 12 is not the correct size and I'm not going to get more use from it. I'll keep you posted, Esther. Nice to know your IRL name!

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    2. No worries! It just seemed a shame for a pattern to be sitting around all unloved... :)
      I don't know about you, but whenever anyone at my house says 'for science', it ends up coming out in that Thomas Dolby 'She Blinded Me With Science' voice. My 7 year old can't decide if he's amused or embarrassed. :)

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  4. Interesting note about the paper -- I had noticed it seemed different from earlier patterns, but simply thought it was thinner. Didn't notice ink transfer, but will keep a close watch from now on.

    Will be interested to hear your take on bengaline -- not sure I am in the 'love it' camp on that fabric. And, oddly, I didn't think the stuff from Oz was that much nicer than some I had gotten years ago from a US company

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    1. I haven't got that much experience of the brand (maybe 8 patterns at this point, but this batch is definitely different seeming in some way). Also, the Janet was printed "on-demand" (i.e. it has my full name on it!) Maybe that's cuz they just fixed the draft issue and they wanted to get a copy out to me re: the long delay I emailed them about. Or maybe it's a new thing they're doing? Can't imagine that. I'm not sold on Bengaline. I mean, I might change my mind once I work with it. But you can't wash and dry it - or dry-clean. So it's high-maintenance.

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    2. Wait, so how do you launder it?

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    3. Hand wash. Hang dry. Not really my scene.

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  5. I hope this pattern works out. The drawing looks very pretty and the pattern piece very interesting. Bummer about the paper.

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    1. I know - as it is, the instructions are next to non-existent. Now I've got to try and read between the smudges.

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  6. WTF with the thermal paper???? Who does that????

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    1. I know?! Esp. after one wasn't doing that before?? Without warning?? BTW, the instructions are in negative point size so you actually need to scan them (or photocopy enlarge) and resize in order to read them with any ease. It's not perfect - and I do think this company is having growing pains - but the patterns are worth it.

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