Shirt Duo

This is my first version of Simplicity 1538. Made up in a poly/cotton shirting blend from the local fabric store. It kind of looks like a man's shirt, except for the feminine buttons. 

From this version, I learned that I cannot skip the broad back alteration as I had some pulls in the back yoke that seemed to indicate I needed extra width there.

 This is version #2. I bought a stretch cotton shirting from Emma One Sock about a month ago, and wanted to add some contrast similar to the pattern above. This was the result of getting the advice from a lovely woman who works at Fabricville. She is a quilter and has a wonderful gift for putting fabrics together. I asked her how she knows what will work.

She had a couple of tips. One is the scale of the print, you need to keep them similar. For instance, I had a polka dot cotton picked out and she said the polka dot was too large for this printed shirting. Another fabric she said had too  much contrast in the colour, it was too sharp.  The original shirting had a muted look to it, so she picked out a couple of quilting cottons that might work and then we eliminated them until we had this one. I think she is a genius and told her that I hope the manager realises this and gives her more scope in her job there. For instance, she could be a wonderful window dresser instead of just cutting fabric for customers.

I put the contrast on the yoke, the collar, the cuffs and the front bands.

The pattern calls for a ribbon to be sewn down the button band, but I simply cut a narrow strip of the shirting and folded it so that it was about 1/2" wide.

There is one more version of this shirt to come. The fabric was also chosen by my newly found friend at Fabricville. I had chosen a vintage cotton print in lovely tones of pale mauve and yellow and she found a contrasting yellow made by the same manufacturer so it matches perfectly.

I was saving this fabric combo until I got the fitting just right on this shirt. It is definitely my go-to shirt pattern now.

Too bad that Simplicity patterns aren't sold in Canada. Apparently they aren't allowed into the country because they lack a French translation of the instructions. Bah!  what a silly excuse to ban the patterns. New Look suffers the same fate apparently.