A tale of three tops

Well hello there, from a rainy Edinburgh. How's your day and weekend been so far? In the last few days I've been busy sewing with mixed results. You can tell there's a story brewing, can't you? Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.

The story starts with catching sight of the Natalie top pattern from Liola Designs. I like that kind of top and it's for woven fabrics so I could use a lovely jade green coloured Trieste fabric from my stash. I printed off the PDF and taped it together. I measured the bust and hips and did an FBA. I measured across the back and did a broad back adjustment. I even made a muslin to check the body size...but I didn't muslin the sleeves. Everything was going so well until I tried on the top before doing the body and sleeve hems. The bust fitted. The back was still too tight and the sleeves were far too tight, unwearably tight.

Here it is. all crushed...just like my hopes! *sigh* I was going to give up on the pattern but after a wee while I thought I'm almost there. I just need to make a large arm adjustment and to increase the amount added for the broad back adjustment. By the way, the fit on the shoulders was perfect so I know I'd chosen the correct size to begin with...before all the adjustments began!

I go to swimming classes to develop my strokes and I'm learning butterfly so when you think about it, all the places I needed to add width correspond to the muscles I use in swimming.

So, back to the cutting and taping and adjusting the pattern. In the meantime I also visited Remnant Kings in Bonnington Road for the first time. It's a bit out of my way so as a holiday treat that's fine. They have a sale on at the moment so I bought some fabrics. Well, it would be rude not too!

So I cut out my pattern pieces (Mark 2) and used some fabric I'd bought at £1.99 a metre. The colour hasn't photographed very well but here is my Natalie Top Take 2.

Yes, it's crushed, just like its predecessor...and my hopes again! The problem with this top is that while it now fits everywhere, I'm not sure about the style on me. It's still unhemmed and laying on the table near my sewing space. So there we are. I decided to quit while I'm ahead. The pattern is lovely and it's an interesting garment to sew and I thoroughly recommend it but I don't know if I'll be making it up again. I'd like to believe in third time lucky but I can't be bothered to waste the time on it.

Three tops, remember! So, after all the disappointment of two fails I really needed a guaranteed success. What do you think I made next? Yes, that's right I went back to my favourite Simplicity 1364 and used another fabric from my stash. I've made this pattern so many times but I decided to make a broad back adjustment of 2cm. This has worked really well and the back now fits perfectly.

This is a lovely fabric, a 100% viscose. I loved the print so much that I also bought it in the blue and dark green colours and made this and this. Now it's the turn of the red!

I didn't have a lot of fabric to play with so couldn't do any pattern matching for the back seam and the zip, but I don't think it's that bad. Here's a close-up of the fabric so you can see it in all its glory!

So, that sums up my last few days, full of sewing ups and downs. Stay tuned for my next project...Vintage Pattern Sewing Pledge...well, fingers crossed!