Corset, Chanin style

I have finally completed a project that I’ve wanted to try ever since I bought Natalie Chanin’s first book Alabama Stitch.  One of Alabama Chanin’s best-selling and most-beloved designs, the corset, “is designed to show off a woman’s best assets and enhance her natural curves. It is cut low in the front, the neckline and armholes are bound, and the back hem (measuring approximately 22 1/2” from the center back neck) is slightly longer than the front hem.”  The pattern and instructions are included in the book.

I started with four sleeveless white t-shirts that I picked up at the thrift store.  White shirts are difficult – even if just gently worn they often show stains – so try and find ones that are new.  I was lucky and found four identical white men’s t-shirts that had never been worn.

I cut two layers of each pattern piece from the tees as well as binding for the neck and armholes.  The entire top is sewn by hand.  Each seam is hand sewn and then hand felled.  The binding is also sewn on by hand using the Cretan stitch.

I made the top exactly by the pattern since it was my first rendition.  It needs a few tweaks to perfect the fit, changes I made on the paper pattern for next time.  I will also raise the neckline just a bit.

I love how this garment feels when it’s on.  It is super comfortable, and there is something about the double layer of fabric that gives it stability and hugs your body in a different way than a standard t-shirt.  Someone asked me how long it took to make this, and they were surprised when I told them eight hours.  Sure, it’s not the 1-hour tee that you can whip up on your serger, but for a completely hand-crafted garment, eight hours is not that much time to commit to.

I encourage you to try this (or another) garment inspired by the folks at Alabama Chanin.  I think you will love the way they fit, feel and flatter.

Creating at the Workhouse

A few weeks ago I took a class at Workhouse Arts Center in Lorton, VA.  My friend Joyce was signed up for a machine felting class, and I looked forward to spending the morning with her.  This was my first trip to Workhouse and I found it to be a wonderful space to create.  The center has an interesting history.  The buildings and grounds formerly housed the Lorton Prison.  When the prison closed in 2001, the facility was re-purposed in a number of ways.  The historic buildings were transformed into artist studios, galleries and public spaces. The center is now home to more than 100 professional artists and offers over 150 classes and workshops each quarter in a wide range of artistic disciplines.

The class consisted of three students and one teacher.  We had the opportunity to use the various materials provided to create felted pieces using our own felting machines.  The class was very unstructured, and we were encouraged to play and create as we wished.  The classroom where I worked shared space with a number of fiber artist studios, and the artists came and went during the time I was there, often stopping in to see what we were working on. 

I really enjoyed the space at this center.  It was very easy to get to, parking was directly outside the studio, and the grounds are beautiful.  The classrooms are full of natural light and the inspiring architecture of an older building.  This would be a great place to hold a workshop or special event.  This fall I plan to take advantage of some of the other available courses.

Color Me Cool

Today was an interesting day.  The DC area was hit with a tremendous storm yesterday that knocked power out for 1.5 million people.  Our house was affected, though we were pretty lucky that much of the surrounding area was not, so we were able to hit the library and some restaurants.  We were also lucky that our power came back on tonight after only 17 hours.  Many will not be so lucky.  Adding to the misery are the current temps near 100 degrees.  And it's only June.  Sigh.

While I was spending my low-tech day catching up on some magazine reading I came across an interesting ad which I had to wait for power to check out.  Sherwin Williams has a new feature called Chip It! which allows you to create a customized paint chip card based on any image.   Here's how it works.

First, you have to install the Chip It! button on your tool bar (drag and drop, simple).  Then, when you come across an image on the internet that you like (or on your own computer) you click on the Chip It! button and roll over the image.  A chip card will be generated based on the colors in the picture.  Here are some examples on some of my previous blog pictures.

Couple this with the internet's current sweetheart Pinterest and you could really have some fun.  Last week my monthly sewing guild's program was all about color, and I think this might be a great way of creating a color scheme for sewing projects based on images that are pleasing to one's eye.  Try this one out for yourself.  It's easy and free.

I hope wherever you are that you are cool and comfortable (or warm and cozy).  Tonight I have much to be grateful for.  An extra special thanks to all of the hard-working storm crews who are getting my city back on the grid.  And the fire fighters in this country who are working overtime to combat all of the natural disasters.  I wish all of them an extra dose of cool and comfort tonight.

Comfort Blankets and Mitered Corners

I once heard someone say that they had only so many perfect mitered corners allotted to them for life, so they carefully chose the projects they used them on.  If that’s true, then the last two weeks used up a whole bunch of my tokens.  I had a bunch of blankets to finish up for a charity sewing project which required binding.  My friend Joyce had pieced several quilt tops years ago and donated them to be cut up and repurposed for lap quilts.  She already had the backing and binding all ready to go which made this project pretty foolproof.  I have found over the years that charity quilts are a great place to practice techniques.  The recipients are usually very grateful, even if your corners aren’t mitered perfectly.

I also completed and mailed off a little lap quilt for a dear friend’s child recently diagnosed with a difficult medical condition.  My church blessed this blanket before I sent it to add their prayers for healing.  I hope it brings a lot of comfort to a little 5-year-old and her family.

The blanket is made of two layers, one quilt-weight cotton, one flannel, stitched together in a large checkerboard fashion.  The edges were then bound with homemade bias binding.

Summer has definitely arrived where I live.  I’m working on a summer top right now and hope to be finished with it this weekend.  I hope everyone has a great weekend.

Summertime Pool Robes

Last year I made my boys some robes to wear to the pool.  In that post I mention that just as I finished these I came across the Beach Robe pattern from Dana over at Made and noted that I might try that next time.  So, when one of last year’s robes turned out to be too small this year, I knew where to go.  If you search the internet for reviews on this pattern you will find dozens of glowing ones.  I think this pattern has lots going for it:  great style, easy construction, useful pictures in the instructions.  There are, however, a few things I did differently and I’m going to talk about them here.

The first robe I made was for a gift for one of my son’s friends.  If you’ve been reading my blog for long you might remember that I get very excited about making birthday gifts for girls.  In fact, each of the girls in my son’s class has been gifted with a frilly apron with her name embroidered on it.  This friend, however, is really not the frilly apron type (her little sister might have been thrilled even though it had the wrong name on it).  I know that “L” has been taking swimming lessons this year, so a pool robe seemed the perfect gift.

I found a nice quality towel at Kohls in the hot, hot colors I love to work with.  It had a regular stripe pattern which also made it easy to work with.  During the cutting out phase I did two things differently than the pattern suggests.  First, I placed the sleeves along one of the finished edges to take advantage of a woven stripe (yellow) and to eliminate the need to bind the cuff.  When it came time to cut out the hood I paused; I wanted the stripes to match the center back but since the back is cut on the fold and the hood is two pieces I had to do some fancy footwork.  I removed the seam allowance at the very bottom of the hood and placed it on the fold just as I did the back.  Only the bottom few inches ran along the fold, the remaining seam forming a sort of dart above.  This was simple to sew and allowed me to match the lower hood edge to the back piece.  I cut the lining per the pattern piece and it worked out just fine.

The ties gave me fits.  I could not get the bias binding around the tie in a neat manner to save my life.  I tried 3 times.  First I gave up on a curved end and tried for a straight one.  Neither worked.  The pattern recommends you sandwich the towel pieces between the binding edges and stitch in one pass.  I even tried applying the binding the traditional way (open it up, straight stitch it on, fold it over and topstitch).  Ultimately I gave up and made the ties from the contrast fabric I was using.  I liked that result best.

Dana recommends two methods for applying the hood.  I have one I think is better if you are using a lining.  She suggests turning under the bottom edge of both hood pieces to finish them and topstitching in place.  An easier way is to sandwich the robe neck edge between the two hoods and stitch it in one pass.  Place the right side of the hood to the right side of the robe; place the right side of the lining to the wrong side of the robe.  Stitch the seam and then flip the lining up into the towel hood.  Bind the edges as one.

Here’s a picture of the birthday girl wearing her robe.

I think she was happy with this gift.  Here’s what she told her mom:  "I can't wait to put it on when we go to the pool so that I can be warm and cozy and eat snacks and then when I am ready to swim again I can take it off fast."  In the thank you note she wrote she drew a picture of herself wearing the robe .

With that deadline past I could now turn my attention to the robes for my boys.  This time I bought some towels from Target.  They were *very* inexpensive but also a much lower quality than the one I got from Kohls.  The major drawback is that the wrong side of the towel is not printed, so it is unattractive.  They were also smaller so I needed a total of three towels for two robes.  In the end this worked to my advantage, and if you can make two robes at once there are a few tricks you can employ.

In the pattern, Dana cautions about following a nap layout with terry cloth.  I really like to use the finished edges of the towel whenever possible, but doing so with only one towel means the fronts and back would have a different nap direction.  Since I was making two robes I was able to cut one in one nap direction and the other reversed, using two towels and swapping out the pieces so they matched.  Because these towels were small I cut one back on the fold, two fronts and the tie pieces from one towel (repeating with the second towel), the hoods and sleeves for both robes from the third towel.  I placed both the bottom hem and the sleeve hems along the finished towel ends.

These towels were thinner than the one I sewed first so I had an easier time with the ties.  I did apply the binding in the traditional method both on the ties and around the front/hood opening.  I used a zigzag stitch for the topstitching to add extra security.  The only difference between the two robes is the color of binding I used on them.

So here are a couple of other things I did not like about the pattern.  Some of the seams were not true.  I am willing to admit this might be a printing issue.   The pattern comes as a downloadable PDF which you print on your home computer and tape together.  It was particularly noticeable on the armhole/sleeve cap.  At first I thought this was because Dana prefers the set-in sleeve method (do yourself a favor and use the flat construction method) and I assumed the extra was sleeve cap ease until I realized the extra was in the armhole, requiring me to “reverse ease” the sleeve in.  The design is forgiving and it didn’t matter in the end.  The instructions are full of detailed pictures and are easy to follow, though the writing style of the instructions is chatty and informal which I don’t prefer.

All in all, this is a pattern I will keep in my repertoire and reuse.  It makes a great gift and works up easily and fairly quickly.  Adding contrast fabric can really up the style quotient and make it unique.

Our pool changes over to summer hours tomorrow and I’m hoping these robes get a lot of use.  Happy weekend to all.