I also made the mistake of rummaging in the jersey remnants bin and found this wildly patterned tropical jersey fabric. It was £7 for 2 metres which also had three holes cut out of it when presumably it was used on a display mannequin. I can cope with that. I think the fabric is a viscose with a little bit of lycra. It has a slubby surface texture. The top fabric is another rescue from the jersey remnants bin again at £7 for the piece. This is a nicer quality and again I'd say it's a viscose. The background is black and the bluey spots are more of a teal colour in real life.
The bottom fabric is a taupe/grey version of the forest green polyester fabric above and is also destined to be a pair of Ultimate trousers.
This rather nice fabric was in their sale area, which had lots of jersey fabrics so I was right in there! I think its sale price was about £4.99 a metre so I took 2 metres. I'd like to make a jersey top for work with this but I haven't decided on a pattern yet. Again I think it's a viscose jersey.
The bottom fabric is gorgeous! It's a thicker viscose twill. Maybe there's something else in it as it has quite a bit of stretch to it but I can't remember. This is destined for a top of some sort but again I don't know which pattern to use. I've seen some lovely patterns recently so I might have to try a new one.
The fabric on the bottom is a lovely 100% wool (twill?) which is destined to be a jacket. More forest green, yay! I bought Vogue pattern 9136 when their patterns were recently half price. I've already made a muslin and yesterday I pre-shrunk the fabric. That's an afternoon of my life gone! I also cut out the fabric so I'm ready to start cutting out and applying the interfacings.
You can also see the glorious green buttons I found in Mandors too. Not cheap at 99p each and I bought 6 or 7 but I think the jacket is plain so it needs statement buttons. I also know that if I didn't buy them I'd seriously be kicking myself when I got home to Edinburgh. They're the perfect colour for the fabric and I love the shape and design of them. I might even challenge myself to make bound button holes. *Gulp*. Anyone else planning to make a jacket or coat for the cooler weather?
Great haul! I'm trying to use up some of my stash before going back to mandors coz I know I'll be too tempted by their winter stock :-( I must ask - how did you preshrink your wool? I have a nice piece which I'm building up to using but have the fear about felting it!
ReplyDeleteI have to severely ration my visits to Mandors, I don't think I could live in Glasgow it would be far too handy and I'd be broke!
DeleteYes I would be afraid of felting the wool too so I didn't ever use the tumble drier method, even before our washer/drier broke down and we got a new washing machine only.
As always, test on a scrap of fabric before going ahead with this. I use a steam iron on the hottest setting, filled up with water and I give 3 shots of steam to every press of the iron on the wrong side of the fabric. It takes aaaaaagggggeeees to do the whole piece of fabric but there's no alternative really. Unless you take the piece of fabric and have it dry cleaned before you cut out. I accept I will not wash the coat, only dry clean it. So, it was a couple of recorded programmes on the tv and me at the ironing board for a good couple of hours on Sunday afternoon!
Jen from Grainline Studio uses the steam iron method when she knows she's dealing with good quality 100% wool fabric, see: http://grainlinestudio.com/2015/02/03/cascade-sew-along-cutting-prepping-your-pieces/
My fabric has shrunk a little but no great surprises there. I cut out the fabric on Sunday evening and cut out the interfacing pieces last night after work. Just need to fuse them to the fabric pieces...now there's another boring job!