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Readers, in these busy times my sewing hours seem to be relegated to the block of time from 11:00PM until midnight (err, or sometimes a wee bit later at the expense of sleep), and you can imagine that this is just enough time for me to pull out my materials and equipment, do a tiny bit a of sewing, make some show-stopping screwup that I wouldn’t have made had I not been so tired, and then give up in disgust. Naturally this has made your typically-grumpy Selfish Seamstress even grumpier than typical. So although I have no new sewing worth showing here, I will engage you with a funny anecdote followed by a rant regarding some recent Etsy explorations.
First the anecdote. It was brought to my attention that an Etsy seller was offering up dresses that look remarkably similar to the Coffee Date Dress, the pattern for which I make available for free download. Upon inspection, the similarity was indeed quite uncanny. The Coffee Date Dress, being quite simple, is by no means an innovation of design, and plenty of other designs also have a neck ruffle without being similar enough to make me wonder. But this dress was really *really* similar in those details that you notice when you’ve made or designed something- similar in the not-quite-scooped-but-not-quite-jewel neckline which is fairly unique, in the particular amount of flair of the a-line skirt, in the exact placement, proportion, and folding of the ruffle. The dress was rendered in a knit with no back darts and no zipper, unlike the Coffee Date Dress, and topstitched around the arm openings, but otherwise looked in shape and line pretty much like my own design and quite different from the store’s other drapier, ruched offerings. Realizing this could have been a coincidence but finding the similarity of the design to my own really startling, I sent an neutrally worded message to the store inquiring whether they had perhaps used my design, and if so I did not mind and do not charge, but would they be so kind as to credit me for it?
Anyway, a couple of days later, I received an email back from the store that was, let’s say… humorously defensive :) I mean, I can completely understand if the similarity was a coincidence. Free pattern production and Etsy clothing shops aren’t exactly high stakes games anyway so it’s not like I was getting my lawyer on the phone. The store basically pointed out that their dress is made of a knit and that their ruffle is hemmed rather than cut on the fold so it they clearly didn’t use my pattern or design, but their own. I don’t know if I follow that logic, but if they say it’s their own pattern and design, I can take them at their word for that. So what’s the funny part? The funny part was the last line of their message:
“I also removed the dress from my shop as nobody liked it and nobody wanted to purchase it.”
I love it! The Selfish Seamstress is a huuuuuge fan of passive-aggression (if you can’t tell, check out THIS VERY POST), and feels it is a tremendously underrated behavioral pattern. It’s fun to listen to, and it’s fun to do! Anyway, too bad for the Etsy store that nobody liked their dress; more than 100,000 people have downloaded mine. (Yes! I just totally out-passive-aggressived them!)
Okay, but after that little humorous incident, onto the actual rant. A couple of days ago I was poking around Etsy, and I found a listing for this blue taffeta dress on a different store:
Whoa. Hold up there a sec. Does that look familiar? Surely none of you have ever run into this pattern before, or perhaps even made it up yourselves? UNCANNY. The dress is available in size medium, but the seller says she’ll also make it for you custom in the size and color of your choice.*
I realize that some people may not realize that manufacturing garments from copyrighted patterns for sale is illegal**, and I have no objections when someone who doesn’t sew pays someone who does to make a garment for them from a pattern, nor do I fail to realize that we take inspiration from other people’s work as part of the creative process. But this is ballsy. Here’s a snippet from the Etsy seller’s description of the garment:
“I gave it a beautiful cut with gathered bodice and gathered skirt. There is a hand gathered ruffle around the low scoop neckline that gradually grows bigger around the back of the neck. It frames the face perfectly.”
No. NO. No. YOU did not give it a beautiful cut with a gathered bodice and gathered skirt. A nice lady named CYNTHIA ROWLEY gave it a beautiful cut with a gathered bodice and gathered skirt, and then a nice little company called Simplicity made that cut available to you so you could make a dress for yourself, NOT so you could take credit for it and resell it as your own.
I’m not interested in policing Etsy or playing Big 4 anonymous tipster, and I realize that Simplicity probably isn’t losing any business from this person. But it peeves me as I see more and more Etsy stores hawking renditions of commercial patterns (and it happens A LOT) and claiming them as their own designs because I just don’t understand what they get out of it. Unless you’re the next Vivienne Westwood-type innovator who can command big bucks for gorgeous, unique pieces, or you’re selling basic tubes of stretchy fabric that can be whipped up in 10 minutes, there’s probably not much money to be made in one-person operations sewing dresses to sell on Etsy. We know how much time it takes to make a dress and how much money you’d have to charge for it to make it a decent source of income as an Etsy store. So why else would you do it unless you want to scratch that creative itch and share YOUR OWN ideas and creations? And if you just love sewing that much but don’t want to design your own stuff, then why wouldn’t you say it was “inspired by” or an “homage to” the design you’re knocking off? Why would you claim creative credit for Cynthia Rowley’s ideas and put yourself at risk for a lawsuit from a pattern giant for what probably ends up being pocket change after you factor in labor and materials costs? You’re not even making a quick buck off contraband design.
Maybe it’s just me who gets annoyed at such things. Maybe it’s because I’m a science professor at a research university and in my line of work we call that “plagiarism” and people lose their jobs and get kicked out of school for claiming credit for others’ work. Or maybe I just need to find more sewing time to calm my nerves, stop me from writing pointless, bitchtastic posts, and keep me from wanting to punch everyone I encounter. I guess I could lose my job for that last one too.
*Haha! I didn’t ask permission to use your image on my blog, nor did I give you credit for it! See how that feels? You wanna sue me over it? Do you??
** Ok, it seems that experts who know more than I are suggesting that this practice is not technically illegal (though I suspect there’d still be a lawsuit if a big clothing manufacturer started producing from copyrighted patterns en masse). I appreciate that informed people have taken time to share their expertise – thanks! And I apologize for putting potentially inaccurate information on the internet and acknowledge my potential misinterpretation of pattern copyright. But the whole issue of legal vs. illegal was not the point of this post, and people who feel the need to write incredibly rudely worded comments (now deleted) complaining that I dedicated a “whole post” to the illegality of someone else’s actions should read before they write “whole comments” making inaccurate accusations themselves. The point of this post was not law (though I appreciate the constructive comments on that topic), but creativity and claiming credit for the work of others. And for the record, I make no claims in this post about my own pattern having actually been used by Etsy sellers, being under copyright, or legally requiring credit or compensation. I put my work out there so others can use it and benefit from it, and I request acknowledgment as a matter of courtesy and ego, not law.
The Selfish Seamstress has a disproportionately large waist. It’s nothing that can be corrected with crunches or dieting; I’m simply built like a cylinder. And before you make any diagnoses of body dysmorphic disorder, I’d like to point out that I’m basing this on (somewhat) empirical evidence. For example, according to the Big 4 size charts, I’m size 4 in the bust and hip, and between a 10 and 12 in the waist. Even as a scrawny, smallest-in-my-class kid in elementary school, and a 90-pound ballet dancer/cheerleader(!) in college, every time I had my measurements taken for a costume, the teacher or costumer would say, “Wait, that can’t be right,” and I would have to assure them that it was indeed, and that my waist really was that much larger than those of my dancer peers, and yes, that’s just my anatomy, and no, their expressions of shock at my huuuuge waist measurement were not doing wonders for my self-esteem. Smaller-than-average hips plus smaller-than-average bust plus larger-than-average waist is sort of the opposite of “curves.” Instead of of having “curves,” I have what could be referred to as “straights.” As one might phrase it nicely, “She’s not fat, she’s just big-waisted.”
And although I’m shaped like the world’s fastest hourglass, the only real inconvenience of this shape is the occasional need to alter patterns at the waist. Dresses, jackets, and tops are usually fine without alteration; wearing ease seems to accommodate me and my monstrous midriff just fine. But skirts and pants occasionally need a little extra room, probably because the waist of skirts or pants need to be close fitting such that they actually stay up. I’m currently making slow progress (sewing time these days is very limited) on view B of Simplicity 2451, which is going fine construction-wise but is starting give off a vague air of frump:
After holding the tissue paper pieces of the yoke up to my waist, I could see that I was going to need to add a little room just to the waist edge and that the hip would be fine. No pics from the skirt, but here’s an example of how I did this on my Vogue 1051 alice + olivia pants. I first traced the original yoke pieces onto scrap paper, made some slashes through the curved parts, and spread them at the waist edge to add about 1/4″ to each piece. If you slash each piece 4 times like I did, then you only need to spread the slashes open by 1/16″ at the waist edge. Add all these tiny slashes together and that’s an extra inch added to the total circumference of the waistband (16 slashes of 1/16″ each.) Notice that the bottom hip edge of the yoke remains the same because I didn’t need to add any extra at the hip. The purists would then trace the new shapes onto paper and work from those, but I just used the slashed pattern pieces and some scotch tape directly on my fabric.
Here you can see the difference between the original pattern pieces and the edited ones. It doesn’t look like much, but it makes a difference. You’ll also notice that a little bit of the curvature of the yoke is lost. If your waist is large-ish in proportion to your hip, this is what you want. Think about a making a cuff to go around a cylinder versus a funnel – you’d need a straight strip of paper to go around the cylinder, but a curved piece to go around a funnel. And if you’re closer to a cylinder than a funnel, then you need a straighter waistband.
Now that we’ve gone through the instructional portion of this post, I’d like to get to my real point. Much in the way that it didn’t exactly feel great when my dance teachers would stare in disbelief at the tape measure wrapped around my teenage midsection, I’m never exactly overjoyed to find that a pattern fits everywhere except for in the waist, where it is woefully small. Other deviations from the standard are addressed with names that sound somewhat flattering; you might need to alter your pattern to accommodate a “full bust” or a “swayback” or “sloping shoulders.” Or perhaps you are “petite” or “tall.” Nothing sounds good about having to alter a pattern on account of having a larger than average waist.
Obviously the Selfish Seamstress is about as perfect as one can be, physically and otherwise, so she sees no need to saddle herself with unflattering terminology. I’m therfore introducing… the FWA. Yes, I’m now going to refer to my pant and skirt edits as a “Full Waist Adjustment.” Doesn’t that sound all womanly and curvy and voluptuous? I want people to sigh with envy when they read that I had to alter a pattern by doing a 2″ FWA. People should read my blog entries, look down doubtfully at their own sad, deficient middles and wonder why they weren’t blessed by the gods with the kind of midriff endowment that the Selfish Seamstress has. Pre-teen girls should look at photos of me and wonder when their waists are going to develop. Guys should meet me at parties and then have this kind of conversation on the following day:
Guy 1: Dude, did you meet that Elaine chick last night?
Guy 2: Seriously, I know. She was like [makes crude gesture of putting his hands in the space on either side of his waist] out to here. [Two older women at the next table look over disapprovingly]
Guy 1: Daaaamn, I could not stop staring at her waist. It was driving me crazy. And she knew it too. She knew I was into it.
Guy 2: Whoa, dude, did you hit that?
Guy 1: Pfft, I WISH! Seriously, the last girl I went out with was, like, 23″ max. And that was AFTER eating. It was pathetic. Her face was okay though.
[Ugh, and for those of you who are about to comment something stupid like, “Haha, I have the exact opposite problem! Patterns are never small enough for my 22″ waist! It’s so inconvenient- I eat whatever I want, and my waist just stays tiny! Even my doctor says I have to gain weight, and I don’t even exercise!” you should know that my eyeroll switch is always triggered well before my envy switch. First, allow me to congratulate you not only on your figure but also on your complete freedom from self-awareness; second, yes, you can use this trick to make the waist of a pattern smaller- just overlap the pieces slightly at the waist edge rather than spreading them apart; and third, I think there are some other, more interesting blogs waaaayyyyy over there that you might want to check out.]
Hey, kids! Are you ready for some science? Of course you are! So, on the topic of the Fabric Mart “silk” versus the Denver Fabrics “acetate,” it’s time for a little experiment. After getting lots of helpful tips from readers and reading a bunch of web pages about burn testing fibers (not terribly consistent, by the way), I went to my local pharmacy after work and picked up some nail polish remover with acetone to see whether the fabric would dissolve in it, thus indicating acetate.
After my initial burn test I was fairly convinced that whatever the fabrics are, they are the same. Even so, I decided it would only be fair to test both of them. So I took a scrap of each and some glass yogurt jars, figuring that would be nice and non-reactive (I save them for when I make jam or pickles – useful and conveniently sized!) and here’s my experimental setup:
I then poured in a little bit of Cutex “Strengthening” Formula, enough to cover:
I kind of figured that if this fabric were acetate, there would be a rather immediate shriveling reaction, sort of like when you pour water on the Selfish Seamstress. But nothing happened. I swirled it around a bit. About fifteen minutes later, both swatches were still intact:
So. It’s been about a half hour now, and there’s little change except that it seems like maybe some of the blue dye has run off into the nail polish remover. Other than that, the fabric is holding up.
On the basis of this test, as well as the fact that the burn behavior of the swatch (crispy nubbins of black char on the burning edge, no obvious melting, self-extinguishing) was similar to my known-to-be-silk dupioni scrap (the dupioni feels, crumples, and smells like silk), I’m going to call this one in favor of Fabric Mart and declare both fabrics to be silk. I’ve already ruled out rayon, and I assume polyester and nylon would melt. Yay for science and observable phenomena!
Now, a little bit of sleuthing, as I think we were all a little bit skeptical and perhaps still are. How could Denver Fabrics possibly have listed a silk fabric as acetate, sold it at $3.75/yard, ad then put it on sale for $1.99/yard? Well, if you look at the fabric description, you’ll see there is another error:
The fabric is described as “jacquard,” which would suggest a pattern woven in different textures. This is incorrect- the fabric I received is definitely twill, with a consistent diagonal weave, and the design printed on. So what happened? A little poking around on Denver Fabrics’s website turns up several other “100% acetate” linings that have this pattern rendered in a single color at a 49″ width, such as this navy one:
Close inspection of the image suggests that this one actually *is* a jacquard in a solid color, and that the clover pattern is woven in (satin weave clovers on a matte ground, reversed on the other side), rather than printed as it is on my fabric. This lining is also available in all green, all pink, all purple, and a couple of other colors. My best guess is that the solid color ones actually are acetate, and that the whole bunch of rolls came from the same manufacturer in the same shipment along with my silk one, and whoever at Denver put them into the database didn’t take note of the oddball, other than that it was 5″ narrower.
So that’s how I’m going to explain this mystery to myself until any contradictory evidence presents itself. For those of you who were hoping I might write a nasty email biting the heads off of the folks at Fabric Mart, aren’t you happy just knowing that Denver Fabrics might one day send you surprise silk?
It’s something of a sport to surf the various fabric discounters and look for identical fabrics priced very non-identically, for example this stretch cotton velveteen, available in a magenta colorway and an aqua one:
which is currently available at Denver Fabrics for $11.00/yard, and a mere $5.99/yard at Fabric Mart. Add in Fabric Mart’s much faster and often free shipping, and this one’s a no brainer. (Especially not for me since I’m not planning on buying either.)
But obviously the Selfish Seamstress is a savvy shopper, no? No. As it turns out, the big online fabric discounters have duped your innocent, well-meaning Selfish Seamstress. On a routine hunt, I discovered a wonderful navy and cream geometric silk twill on Fabric Mart- the kind of pattern and fabric I have been seeking for many moons to make the wonderful modern shirtdress that exists only in my mind’s selfish little eye. Here’s the listing:
I hastily ordered 3.5 yards and patted myself on the back for having decided against a different geometric brown and white cotton print at a London fabric store the week prior, about whose weight and drape I felt a little bit iffy for my hypothetical shirtdress. The salesperson was just about to make the first cut into the roll when I was like, “NO! I DON’T WANT IT!” They love me there, I bet. Anyway, I felt smug that I had held out for perfection, and been rewarded with silk twill in just the right print for a very, very reasonable $9.99/yard.
So imagine my joy when I discovered a perfectly matching lining fabric a few days later on Denver Fabrics! 100% acetate, not my favorite, but certainly something I could work with for that lovely pattern on a lining. I imagined myself walking down the street in my modern silk shirt dress topped with a coordinating cream 3/4-length trench lined in matching print, navy slingbacks, with a tiny dog on a leash, who in turn was wearing a matching scarf cut from the remnants. (In my mind’s eye, my outfits are often accessorized with tiny, expensive dogs, even though I have no real desire to have one.) Anyway, here’s the listing from Denver’s page (now sold out, btw):
The following week, this lining went on sale for $1.99/yard but I already felt like I’d gotten a good price, so I wasn’t too bummed. I think you know what I’m going to tell you next, and before you tell me that I should have known, let me make the disclaimer that manufacturers often use the same prints on different fabrics within a collection, to make coordinating sheers and solids, to use the same print on a blouse and a coat, etc. So really, in my mind this made perfect sense- I reasoned that Fabric Mart had bought some surplus of the dress fabric from Ann Taylor or whatever, and the Denver Fabrics had bought up the surplus of the coordinating lining.
Okay, so now to the punchline, which you should all be able to guess by now. I received the fabrics today. They actually came in the same box because I had them shipped to my mom in the US and she repacked them together to ship to me. And I opened the box to discover that… (say it with me now)…. they’re the SAME FABRIC. Yes. (This explains why my mom called to ask why I ordered two of the same fabric and why one was so much more expensive. I was like, “Oh, silly sewing-ignorant mother, don’t you know the difference between acetate lining and SILK TWILL? How undiscerning you are in your fabric-ly ways!” As it turns out yet again, my mother is right. She is ALWAYS right.) Here’s pics:
These fabrics are really and truly THE SAME. They have the same drape, they are the same width. The only way I can tell them apart is that the one from Fabric Mart has a sticker on one corner that proclaims “SILK TWILL GRID $9.99.” My intuition is that this is not silk, not just because I’m a cynical beeyatch who tends to assume that the world is out to screw her over, but because the fabric doesn’t feel luscious like silk to me. Those fibers coming off the cut edge have the resilient bounce of a synthetic, not the yielding limpness of silk. Then again, I rarely sew with pure silk, so I’m not really an expert on it. The fabric has no scent at all. If I crush it in my hand, it does not retain wrinkles. If I picked this up at a store, I would guess it was a polyester or nylon lining.
Anyway, feeling pretty grumbly and still harboring the hope that one was a silk and the other a synthetic and they just happened to look and feel exactly the same (why that would be a good thing, I don’t know), I decided it was time for a burn test.
I pulled a few threads from each, and did a burn test that revealed that I have no idea how to read a burn test. Seriously. I will say that the two samples did the same thing. They sort of balled up where the flame hit them, leaving behind a little black knob that crumbled in a “crunchy” way when I smooshed it. I couldn’t tell whether any melting was happening. The smell is supposed to be very revealing, as silk is supposed to smell like burning hair, whereas acetate is supposed to smell like burning wood chips. Honestly, it all smelled like burning match. Maybe ever so slightly like peanut shells. I subsequently cut little squares of each, as well as of some silk dupioni and rayon lining and proceeded to nearly set my house on fire repeatedly. The rayon lining definitely didn’t ball up so I think I can count that out, but the others did, and they all just smelled like smoke. Also, my lungs feel kind of fried now.
So, anyone have any advice about how to figure this one out? Or has anyone more knowledgeable purchased this fabric from Fabric Mart and feel pretty convinced that it is what it claims to be? Either I got an amazing deal from Denver Fabrics, or Fabric Mart has incorrectly identified this as silk and I’m going to have to write them some email. In any case, I now have a LOT of this stuff.
Hrrmph.
Okay, a bunch of you asked about the shoes I was wearing in yesterday’s post on my Heidi Merrick-inspired dress. They are Nine West’s “Elona” model in desert nude (they also came in black), and they are ridiculously comfortable for stilettos. I can wear them the whole day with no pinching, chafing, fatigue, aches, or soreness. I can walk at my usual New Yorker “get-the-f-out-of-my-way-you-stupid-tourist” pace in them. Yesterday they were sold out, but as of THIS VERY MINUTE (3:05AM EDT, August 16th, 2011), there is ONE SIZE for sale on the website – size 9M for the bargain basement price of $29.75.
Go! Go now, all you size 9M women! And if they’re already gone by the time you get there, don’t look at me. I may be selfish, but I’m a size 5. And I, unlike you, already have them. Also? Nanny nanny boo boo.
Update: As of 12:45PM EDT, it appears they’re once again sold out! Sorry, kids!
Good news for you, Selfish readers! On Saturday, soon after setting off on a lovely hike, I got stung twice on the butt by a wasp! Well, not exactly on the butt, but high enough on the back upper inner thigh that I was sitting on one cheek for the rest of the day while periodically squealing in pain. And yes, though it is my nature to antagonize all living things without provocation or justification, this time it wasn’t my fault. I actually was just walking along the trail, minding my own business when the wasp decided completely of its own accord that it was time for some target practice. And why is that good news? Well, with every step sending shooting pain through me, I decided it was best to turn around while we were still close to the trailhead and head home for the quiet pleasures of an ice pack and my Husqvarna (which I bravely pedaled while sitting in an awkward, lopsided fashion.) And now you have some sewing to read about.
Here’s the result- a very loose interpretation of Burda 5-2008-125 (a.k.a. my favorite Burda dress), rendered in a black wool and silk blend flannel suiting with subtle white pinstripes, and off-white (though looks white in these pictures) silk and cotton voile:
I’m generally not a fan of wearing a sheath over a blouse or turtleneck. I’ve seen other people work that look to good effect, but it never looks right or feels comfortable on me. But when I saw L.A. designer Heidi Merrick‘s “Kate” dress (I believe from her Fall 2009 collection), I fell for the dress and for the nifty optical illusion yielded by the clever voile puffed sleeves and scarf attached directly to the sheath.
You’ll notice it’s not a completely faithful copy of the Heidi Merrick dress, but rather a Heidi Merrick-inspired dress. Among other differences, the original was done in solid black cotton piqué, has an exposed back zip and pockets, which I didn’t add to mine. I don’t have a shot of the back of mine, but it’s just a regular centered zip because that’s what I had in the house.
The pattern is my go-to for sheath dresses, actually the lining pattern of Burda 5-2008-125 with some edits to the neckline. This lining pattern also formed the basis of my Audrey dress and vintage-inspired blue roses sheath. I drafted the puffy sleeve and the scarf bow thing.
Because there’s so much scarf and the voile is quite soft, it’s a little difficult to get it to wrap nicely around the neck and keep a little body. I can arrange it nicely while standing in front of the mirror, but it does kind of sag eventually. Maybe a little spray starch will help. Really, it’s a lot of bow.
By the way, thanks for all the lovely comments on my last post! I tried to go through and high-five everyone back, but after a while I was starting to annoy even myself. But suffice it to say, I have mentally high-fived all of you. And for those of you who are demanding to know where I’ve been and what I’ve been doing for the last couple of months, oh, you know how I love when people ask me to do stuff for them :) I’ll get around to posting details but it’ll probably be a boring and disappointing post.
Figure 1-1. Wasp posterior with stinger and venom. N.B. Wasps are a-holes.
In the meantime, thank the wasp who gave his life such that you might have something comparatively interesting to read about on this blog today. Personally, I hold a little bit of a grudge against that buzzy jerkwad on account of the fact that I was deprived of my hike and in an insane amount of pain for a good chunk of yesterday. But a new dress almost makes up for it.
Face it. Sewing makes you awesome. And I looooooooove being awesome. How awesome am I? Am I (left) Michael Kors awesome? (center) Tahari awesome? (right) Via Spiga awesome?
No? Am I perhaps alice + olivia awesome? Karen Millen, L.A.M.B, Jones New York, Dolce & Gabbana, or Lanvin awesome (awesomeness pictured clockwise from left)?
Unlikely. But I am completely and totally 100% Selfish Awesome, thanks to my old friend McCall 5525 (awesomeness pictured front, center and in your face)!
I finally got around to completely gutting my previous attempt at this jacket, and bringing it back to its pre-sewn state (note: ripping out miles of triple straight stitch topstitching is tedious). I interfaced every single piece with heavy, sew-in woven interfacing, and that finally gave me the body I wanted in this gorgeous, slightly sueded leopard fabric that I picked up last year in Montreal from Sam Textiles. And of course with that fabric, combined with my trusty McCall 5525 that has now yielded three favorite coats, my just-finished leopard version, the Key Lime Trench, and the Guggenheim Coat, I am feeling Selfish Awesome.
Here’s the obligatory photo pr0n, taken by Dan using his fancy schmancy new Nikon D7000 and budding artist’s eye:
What are you looking at?
It’s like I can’t stop checking myself out. Ooh, what’s that on the inside?
Hey, it’s turquoise jacquard lining! Awesome! I picked the lining up on a recent trip to London to visit Martine. She’s like my snarkwife. And she’s never asked me to sew anything for her in 15 years of snark marriage, and she went fabric shopping with me for a whole day even though she doesn’t sew. She is also awesome.
Unfortunately I don’t remember the name of the store- AAA Fabrics? A-Plus Fabrics? It’s the big place on Goldhawk Road right near the tube stop. It is also awesome. I was going to go with green lining at first, and I was all like, “Turquoise or green? Green, obviously.” And Martine was all like, “Duuuuh, turquoise.” And then I was like, “Well, duuuh. Obviously.” And that’s how that decision came about.
Here’s the macro shot with all of the redone topstitching:
As usual, I took everything in at all the seams to make for a slimmer fit. I’m also considering adding the button bands on the sleeves but with buckles, but I have yet to find the right buckles so that’s a project for the future. And that’s about it.
How about you? Are you sewing yourself some awesome today? How awesome are you? Are you Selfish Awesome?
The Selfish Seamstress 