It’s hard to believe after thinking about a potential trip to Glasgow for five years, here we are on the other side, having been there and back already. We’ve been home for more than a month! I want to share some of my favorite photos from that trip, but I’m actually not finished telling you about the sewing and knitting I finished before we left. So how about we wrap that bit up today? And then I’ll be back in a few days with a photo-heavy post for you.
Sewing
So, last I told you I had gone down a shirt-making rabbit hole. I thought I was finished with that, but it turns out, I had a few more in me. And I wanted to try my hand at making a dress to wear to the Hugo Awards, too.
I made one more top based on my Barefoot Summer Sheath pattern, and one more Simplicity 3835. Then I got all experimental with sleeves. (Apologies if these photos are not up to my usual standards, but I got so tired of costume changes and posing for selfies, that I thought it would be ok to just hang them on the bed, even if it makes them look kinda wonky.)
I wanted to add sleeves that were a part of the bodice, and didn’t require any additional pattern pieces or seams. Because I am lazy. So, for inspiration I used this excellent book by Sanae Ishida: Sewing Love: Handmade Clothes for Any Body. In the book, she talks you through making a sloper to match your measurements, and then the sloper is used as a basis for drafting the other patterns. I also watched her CreativeBug class on slopers, which was fantastic, though I have yet to actually make my own.
For now, I continue to hack the Barefoot Summer Sheath. I used the batwing top pattern in the book as guidance for adding sleeves to my sheath pattern. (There’s now a CreativeBug class for this, too, though it came out after my trip, so I didn’t watch it before I made my pattern adjustments.)
I started with an old sheet, engaged in a whole lot of trial and error, and emerged on the other side with a franken-dress that was ugly, but comfortable and it fit me well. Then I cut into the nice fabric, and sewed myself a Hugo-Awards-attendee-worthy copy.
This dress is made from a heavy two-tone linen that I purchased at Fabric Wholesale Direct. After getting the short sleeves right and trying it on, I thought that it was maybe not curvy enough, and too casual-looking. I could have solved that by cutting open the back, removing some fabric, and adding a zipper, but A) see above about being lazy, and B) I really wanted to maintain that easy breezy pullover style. So, I sewed a piece of elastic in back of the dress at waist-level. This had the effect of pulling in the waist somewhat and giving the dress some shape, but because elastic is stretchy, I could still get in and out of it easily. Problem solved 🙂
I wore it to the awards and the after party, and it was super comfortable all night.
I also made one more top, this time in a lightweight linen, and with similar sleeves added to it. I somehow made the neck too wide, though, and the side seams have since come apart in the laundry, so I am probably going to just repurpose this fabric as something else. Maybe I’ll make a couple of handkerchiefs out of it 😀
Knitting
The shawl is another one of those squishy garter stripe styles that I’ve been making for the last year or two. (Sooner or later I am going to publish this pattern.) There’s not a lot to say about this that I haven’t already said, except, ta da! 🙂
I think it worked well with the dress. And with the silly amount of matching jewelry I made, LOL! There were earrings, and a ring, and pair of plaid magnetic toppers for my glasses that matched the WorldCon tartan exactly. (There’s still plenty of this jewelry left in the shop, if you like these colors.)
And there was a shawl pin, of course.
And that’s it for the pre-trip making. I’ll be back in a few days with some pictures from Glasgow, Edinburgh, Stirling, and Loch Lomand, among other places. It was a lovely, photogenic trip!
