Jane's Journal

Yesterday I spent a lot of time drafting patterns. I've finished two orders recently, so it's time to get started on the next one. I've not been looking forward to it, mostly because I wasn't quite clear if the image I was forming in my head was the same my customer has, which makes pattern drafting an exercise in denying all the self-doubt. The front closure cost me extra brain CPUs because I redid it several times.

("Normaal gesproken" teken je 7 centimeter overslag aan voor een dubbele knoopsluiting. Maar is dat wel mooi voor een grotere maat? De knopen moeten wel een beetje bij het bustepunt in de buurt komen anders heb je een hele smalle dubbele rij knopen en een enorm lijf wat ernaast nog enormer lijkt. En dit is voor een very curvy maat 46 met scheve taillelijn, dus uitdagingen genoeg!)

I also tackled two basic blocks I've been wanting to draw for a while now, filled out the lists and everything. This was (of course) what my PMS-squirrelbrain started with as soon as I came in that morning (I have NO responsibilities! Nuts! Acorns!). In short, I was pattern drafting from nine to three-thirty, standing around on my feet and crunching the numbers.
By the time I had my third "and now I need to sit down for a bit" break, I wanted to do something fun. The pattern for my customer's coat was done, but starting on it meant having to pre-shrink the fabric and a lot of standing around. So I decided to just make myself a fun t-shirt top instead.
Which, of course, involved more pattern wrestling.

First I drafted a new basic T-shirt block. Then I started to doubt the shoulder line -- my last t-shirt block is now hideously too large in the bust, which involves the armscye, which you can't easily take in because then the sleeve has to come out, and....argh.
But my new basic t-shirt block does not have the adjustments for my wonkily rotated shoulder joint, or the adjusted shoulder seam. I tried copying the line from my old block, but since the waistline is higher up than last time (we measured it on the natural waist this time), and my bust has shrunk, my shoulder is now closer to my waist than before (less curvature to go over). So the waistline is higher up and my shoulder is further down. There's no telling how my shoulder should slope unless I make another muslin.

I didn't feel like working on a bustier (too much pattern drafting for something I might not wear a lot) so instead I picked up the only copy of Knipmode I currently have at the atelier, picked a stretchy top with an interestingly shaped hem, and was pleasantly surprised to be able to fit a size 44. It's the top from the cover of the november 2015 issue.
So more pattern drafting and standing on my feet. Luckily, I only have to correct the length of the garment as my back is 3 cm longer than other people's, so I added these in the waist. I also dropped the front neckline 3 centimeters. No fiddling with the armscye here!

Except that the sleeve looked rather 'formal' -- a high sleeve head, nothing like what you'd expect from a t-shirt. And indeed, as soon as the side seams were done I tried it on. For one, the shirt is rather large -- I suspect that was the design of the shirt. And the sleeve is indeed very formal.
So I threw it down in disgust and went home. Mission failed.

At the end of the night I browsed my old Burda magazines and picked out several models of t-shirts I want to try my hand at. Now that I've lost weight, I'm slowly getting back to more normal proportions and all I have to do to fit Burda sizes is lengthen the nape-of-neck to back-waist measurement. I might even get to re-use the top I tried making yesterday if I find a more fitted t-shirt and re-use the neckline.

In any case, today I will start on that coat. T-shirts will come another time.

First things first: I handed in the dress shirt yesterday. The teacher said "Mooi strak hoor!" -- which roughly translates to "nice and tight!". Looking at the pictures this morning, I have to agree with her.



( A full-length one under this cut )

Eisirt asked me if I was satisifed. This, after sewing frantically and in a very focused manner for a week or so. And the perfectionist in me says: Yes.
I made mistakes and I learned things, and how not, when this is a school assignment. I'd do things differently for a next version! But this shirt is a good representation of my current skills. I don't have a knack for a couture sleeve split yet, this was the first one I sewed. I also had a hell of a time trying to get the interfacing to stay put, as the glue didn't fixate at all, and my interfacing came loose as I turned collar or cuff. Luckily, everything is sewed down, and none of it shows. It's a beautiful shirt, and I'd even call it a dress shirt because of the contrast collar and cuffs.

Then, on to the other assignments!

Blazer
I'd drafted a one-piece blazer sleeve (to be divided into two pieces, later on) and it was alright. The sleeve head has 10% overwidth, so that's a lot. I have to reduce it, but first I need to deepen the armscye a bit, which will help (it will make the armscye larger, but the sleeve head will not quite grow as much).
I've also made a start on the actual pattern, but didn't get around to drafting the collar. (I wanted a few hours of weekend.)

Now I can do the sleeve alteration, draft the collar and pre-wash my fabrics. I have to decide at some point whether I just want the collar and elbow patches in darker grey suedine, or the pocket flaps as well. I'm unsure yet, we'll see.

Trousers
All my alterations were approved! The jeans crotch seam is just so much tighter than the trouser crotch and it turns out you can use one on the other (to a degree). I managed the waistband alteration quite well and I'm very happy I can start on the pattern. I'd planned to spend this week on the jeans, so I'm right on time. Four weeks to go for two more assignments.

Studying
In previous years we hardly got around to studying the theory for the exams, because of the last minute panic on handing in the assignments (not handing in the assignments means not participating in the exams!). But there's also a test next Monday on the fitted coats and the blazers, so I do want to spend some time with my nose in the books.

I'd hate to sound like a nerd perfectionist, but I am one. So far all my grades have been an 8 or higher, so graduating with an 8,5 seems feasible. Wouldn't that be wonderful?
Since I'm working full-time on school now, and everything seems to be going well (touch wood!) I am sure hoping I can keep this up. So looking forward to sewing the hunky-dory pants! Awesome!

Some days I face some pretty unique pattern drafting challenges. Like when your cat is insistent on making your basic shirt block her new hiding place:

And here it is: my whopping pile of a pattern. I spent most of my week tracing all these parts.



This is everything but the sleeves. As you can see, I made a list of the pattern pieces and ticked off the pattern parts I had traced. It helped me keep track of which parts I still had to do and where I could find them. I could also number the pattern pieces right away. I wrote down a lot of notes on the pieces themselves, most are pretty ambiguous. It's hard to tell the difference between a flared vertical seam and a side seam if you cut off the part above the waistline.

I still need to do the sleeves, but those only have minor alterations and will only be 4 pattern pieces to trace.
Here's to hoping having the seam allowances drafted on my pattern pieces will save me a lot of time cutting!

Next week around this time I'll be hip-deep in my pattern drafting exam. So I suppose it's time I get started on my exam training. I've been a good girl and haven't missed any lessons anymore since that time there was a snowfall and the NS was panicking. I have also made my homework each week and I feel that this has really helped. I could explain the theory behind raglan sleeves, sleeves that are cut in one with the body and other things clearly to Jeske when she was here.

Teacher Helen, from my practical class, said it would be good if I copied the basic gown block several times and just practiced designing, designing, designing. This is a very good tip! I wonder how many times I'd just draft my own basic gown before figuring out I could just make copies.

- Practicing basic gown block in 2 or 3 sizes.
- Deviations: VOG, AOG, high/low shoulders, flat/full tummy, flat/full backside, long front waist length and large bosom.
- Sleevils. Drafting them and placing them onto the basic gown block for raglans.
- Collars.

I am also still struggling with pleats (where to get the fabric!?), so I'll work on some of the more difficult homework assignments we've had recently again, try and see if I can remember what we did to do them and how to work with them. I can check my results with the hand-out of the pattern, yay!

In other news: Swordfighting practice was tough yesterday. My back was still in a knot from school, where I was bent forward over a table that is too low for me, pinning and chalking and cutting a pattern. Carrying and fighting with a shield is hard if you have to do it two hours in a row, but more so if your back is already complaining. I also got whacked on the thumb by one of our resident Belgians.

We now have learned the four ... kata's? ... for sword and shield. I must say my wrist needs to seriously toughen up for that fehler but I think the hardest is not to look like a total ballerina in the second series the wechselschlag in the fourth series. Ah, so many muscles to train, so little time!

Last night I was still dead tired from &Eva but I dragged myself to school anyway. It wasn't wholly in vain despite my lack of enthusiasm because we learned something I'd wanted to learn for a while: patterns with a drape.

I had read in Detje Bosgra's book (thank you again, anemoona!) that you can fold out your darts to create a drape in your pattern, but I'd never done this before. I was very interested to lear it, but had not yet taken the time. When Hanny said last night "we'll work on an asymmetrical pattern" it caught my interest to be sure, but I'd never expected that it would include draping.

The trick to it is in part that you're allowed to move the bust point a bit. Normally this is no more than 2 cm, but when making a drape or pleated bit it can move as much as four centimeters, because the garment will not be as fitted as other garments might be. On the right half of the pattern, we created two bust points, even. One was 4 cm above the old bust point and allowed us to rotate the top dart closed so the first drape would open up. The other one was 4 cm below the old bust point and allowed us to rotate the bottom dart closed so the second drape would open up.
It sounds pretty complicated, and it is. When we had drawn all the design lines into the pattern, I had no idea how to make the pattern pieces from it, but once we got started I got the gist of it pretty soon. It certainly opens up possibilities and I haven't forgotten my promise to myself about that drape-y heavy linen at the market.

Hanny also warned us. It's seven weeks until the exam, and we're going to be working towards the exam from now on. We've pretty much covered all the basic pattern making so far, so it's just repetition, new interpretations of new line drawings of different garments and exercising to keep focus. We're supposed to make 2 pieces of homework now, each week. One coat and one gown at half scale. And we're going to be working through them every week, so we understand why certain things are done a certain way. She will only be looking at the collars and the basic block, and the rest will be discussed in the lessons.
It's a pretty rigid schedule, but it's all for the best. The exam is going to take most of the day on April 20th, and we need to be able to keep our focus.

Welcome to my newest Dress Diary! Of course, as usual, the start of this dress diary was preceded by a long, rambling post discussing a variety of topics because I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to do. It included the whole history of my lovely purple lambswool dress, which was a previous dress diary in itself. I shall not be repeating the ramblings here, but you're welcome to read them through the above link if you wish.

( The shape of things to come )

Your comments are very welcome!

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