I finally finished the white jumpsuit. Standards slipped as the project dragged on and on. There’s an XKCD comic for any situation Much of the planned top stitching was skipped and I used snaps for the cuff closure instead of buttons. But failing to stick to the plan isn’t the only reason I think this one is a failure; the fabric choice was wrong too. It’s too lightweight so the seams and pockets show through, and it’s a very cold shade of white. Trying to the complexion, as they say. As a reminder here’s the Saint Laurent look I was knocking off. They made this particular design in both beig ..read more

I’m not entirely sure what I was thinking with this project. I wanted to have another go at knocking off a wonderful jumpsuit from the Saint Laurent Spring 2024 collection. My previous attempt was based on the runway photos on vogue.com from the show in 2023, which was all the information I had at the time. But the original design has now become available for sale, which means YSL.com and net-a-porter.com have detailed pictures of it to pore over. I may have spent some considerable time zooming in and making notes. I’m very happy with my first version and have worn it a lot, but it could be ev ..read more

My last go at this pattern was a fail because of the fabric. So what to do but make it up again immediately in something completely different. This coated denim came from Top Fabric quite a few years ago. I bought it to make skinny jeans. I ended up with two cuts of the fabric instead of one because the first parcel got lost in the Goods In at work for a time. I eventually gave up looking for it and reordered, whereupon it turned up. Those were the days when everyone was expected to work in the office all the time and we were allowed to have our online shopping delivered there; things have ce ..read more

These trousers are from my favourite Burda trouser pattern, 112 03/2012. The design is very simple: flat front with a fly closure, straight legs, front slant pockets, back darts, back patch pockets, waistband, belt loops. I can make a pair of these in about six hours, including cutting out, which might not seem fast by Sewing Bee standards but is pretty quick for me. Here’s the line art. Burda 112A 03/2012 line art, burdastyle.com The original pattern has three-quarter length legs but as they’re completely straight it’s trivial to lengthen them. I also change the belt loops so there is one ju ..read more

I made this jumpsuit as a wearable toile for an attempt to reproduce a look from Saint Laurent’s Spring 2024 show, below. The original is orderable from ysl.com for a quite astonishing £3885. For a jumpsuit made out of maybe three and a half metres of cotton twill. Yes, it’s beautifully designed, and I bet the quality of the fabric and notions is amazing (and the leather belt the model is wearing is included). And a lot of fashion is exploitative and bad for the planet and we should be buying less and paying more for our clothes…but I still can’t see myself ever paying that sort of money for ..read more

“How many jumpsuits do you have?”, my husband asked the other day. The answer is currently seven (four Closet Core Blancas, one each of The Assembly Line’s maxi and v neck jumpsuits, and vintage Vogue 1500). It would have been eight, but Vogue 1645 is in the donation pile and so doesn’t count even though it’s still in the house. So what am I making now? A jumpsuit. Or rather, two jumpsuits, because the latest project is slightly experimental and so I’m doing one in cheap and cheerful fabric before I cut into my fancy wool suiting. I’m knocking off a Saint Laurent design. The last time I tried ..read more

Here are two of my sewing favourites combined: vintage Vogue designer patterns and jumpsuits. The pattern is Vogue 1500 by Christian Aujard and dates from around 1976 [Vintage Pattern Wiki entry]. It’s a dolman sleeved jumpsuit with wide straight legs, a front zip fastening, four pockets, and a blousy back bodice ending in gathers at the back waist. Vintage Vogue 1500 pattern envelope I haven’t been able to find out much about the Christian Aujard brand. The pattern envelope has a short blurb on the flap: Christian Aujard is known as the “Couturier of Ready to Wear”. His soft, feminine clothe ..read more

People often talk about the number of wears an individual garment gets as a way to measure its value – cost per wear – or its sustainability; we should aspire to 30 wears per garment. My ikat dressing gown gets worn most days and I made it over five years ago, so it’s the best value and greenest garment in my wardrobe by some way . And unsurprisingly it’s now looking a little tired. Replacing it was one of my sewing plans for 2023. I don’t often sew with print fabric. But if there’s one place you can go really wild with print and colour it’s a dressing gown. I wanted a large scale print with s ..read more

I’m calling this the Top N of 2023 because this blog post is based on Gillian’s Sewing Top Five format, but as I only made 12 items this year doing a top and bottom five wouldn’t leave much of a middle. Gillian does five categories: successes, fails, highlights, reflections, and goals. My most successful project was my blue trousers. I wear them about once a week, almost always with the blue jumper from the photo, but in hot weather with a grey RTW t shirt. I love the colour and the shape. The pattern was originally Burda, but I adjusted it to try to match some of the features of a Saint Laure ..read more

I never thought I’d sew a waterproof. I find it difficult to find ones I like in RTW, but there weren’t any patterns that called to me either, at least not enough to be worth wrestling with waterproof fabric and seam sealer for. Then I saw The Assembly Line’s hoodie poncho pattern which has the twin virtues of being relatively simple and having all the drama one could ever need in a garment designed for keeping dry. Here’s the technical drawing. There’s a bit more to this pattern than meets the eye: that big front pocket has extra snaps inside so the whole garment can be folded inside the poc ..read more