It's not often that a new pattern release gets made at Casa Unzipped, but I happened to watch the Pattern Emporium video for their new About Town and was sold. The video cleverly shows how versatile the pattern is by styling it with a selection of other patterns in their line, and it went with so many other types of garments that I could see it fitting into my wardrobe really well. It was on introductory sale at the time and that didn't hurt, either.
Now that I'm aware of Pattern Emporium and have looked at some of their other videos, I see that showing their new releases paired up in different ways is typical for them. That just seems so smart, a great way to sell patterns. It worked on me, anyway, and I'm glad it did because I'm really happy with my results.
About Town is a boxy popover top with sleeve and length variations. It has a collar and the option of a two-piece front, with a seam down the middle, or front facing with no seam. It has a deep hem, and the short or long sleeves have a clean-finished cuff with optional decorative tab and button. It can also be made dress length. It seems to have been thoughtfully designed to give satisfying results.
The instructions are written for ultra-beginners. Every little step is photographed and described. This was frustrating for me because when I did want to check their recommended method for certain steps, I had to hunt through pages and pages to find the information I wanted. Their instructions for the collar are stellar; following them worked beautifully.
There are also extensive extensive instructions on picking your size. Working through them was tedious, but again, I'm happy with the fit. There are different fronts depending on your bust measurement (darted and undarted) and different heights. Although I could have gone with the undarted front, I chose to have the dart because I knew I'd look sloppy without it.
Alterations for me - lowered the dart about 3/4" and lengthened the body about an inch (using the tall cutting lines would have been too long). I cut a 14 at the shoulder and blended all the way out to a 22 at the hemline. The sleeves needed to be widened 3/4" at the bicep.
I used the split-front option and two breast pockets because I wanted to do aaall the edgestitching and topstitching on my cotton chambray. I used a matching thread and right now the topstitching doesn't show much, but I think as the piece gets repeated washings the space between the two lines of stitching will bubble up slightly so there will be a little dimensionality going on.
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| cuff outside |
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| cuff inside |
It's a sharp-looking little top and I immediately made some pleated pants in lightweight black twill to go with it (pattern from Burda mag). The shortest length looks great with pants and skirts that have a little volume - that was one of my takeaways from the video.
It's easy and quick to make, so I'm working on another one right now as a palette cleanser after the laborious fit-as-you-go process I took with the pants. I really needed something easy and satisfying before starting the lined jacket that is next up. The only change to this next top is raising the neck opening a little.
It's great to have found a new pattern company and have more options. My Burda subscription came up for renewal and even though I really enjoy getting the magazine and Burda drafting, it's expensive, and I let it go. For the price of the annual subscription I can easily buy more single patterns as I can sew in a year, and there are always Burda envelope patterns.
It's time to end these reflections and go feed the dogs! (or so they tell me)
