today's sewing project
Oct. 9th, 2011 01:20 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kareinaToday, in between cooking and organizing stuff for to take with me to Tromsø tomorrow morning, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lord_kjar and I made me a new top. A little thing that gives the same sort of wonderful support as my favourite medieval underdress, but only a shirt. I have been wanting this top to wear with modern clothes instead of a bra for ages. It will also be useful under the costumes I haven't yet taken in to fit so well.
Some folk asked for photos of the underdress when I made it, but the linen was so sheer I choose not to have any taken. The linen for this top is heaver, so I was willing to let a camera point at me whilst wearing it.
The top was made by taking a rectangle that is exactly as wide as my ribs just under the breast (+ seam allowance), another two that are exactly wide enough to go around my arm, two squares that are just big enough to fit under my arms with the bottom corner aliened with where my bra strap would be were I wearing one, and a waist band and sleeve cuffs.
We cut a neck hole, sewed the sleeves onto the body, and the underarm squares were stitched to the back of the body and sleeves.
Then we attached the waist band.
We sewed the sleeves shut and then started pinning the seams at the front of the underarm square (where it attaches to the body rectangle along the breast) to get it to fit smoothly and support. It took three iterations of pinning, trimming away fabric and repinning that part before it was ready to sew shut and finish up all of the seams. The hard part is making the curve look more or less the same on both sides, since, of course, the breasts are different sizes. We managed it by pinning the larger side such that the square remained square and the body rectangle became curved along that attachment, but on the smaller side we curved the body only the same amount as the other side, and took the rest of the slack in by shrinking the square.
Now I need to finish packing and get some sleep--tomorrow is a 10 hour drive, and then I have a week of classes before returning home...
lord_kjar and I made me a new top. A little thing that gives the same sort of wonderful support as my favourite medieval underdress, but only a shirt. I have been wanting this top to wear with modern clothes instead of a bra for ages. It will also be useful under the costumes I haven't yet taken in to fit so well.Some folk asked for photos of the underdress when I made it, but the linen was so sheer I choose not to have any taken. The linen for this top is heaver, so I was willing to let a camera point at me whilst wearing it.
The top was made by taking a rectangle that is exactly as wide as my ribs just under the breast (+ seam allowance), another two that are exactly wide enough to go around my arm, two squares that are just big enough to fit under my arms with the bottom corner aliened with where my bra strap would be were I wearing one, and a waist band and sleeve cuffs.
We cut a neck hole, sewed the sleeves onto the body, and the underarm squares were stitched to the back of the body and sleeves.
Then we attached the waist band.
We sewed the sleeves shut and then started pinning the seams at the front of the underarm square (where it attaches to the body rectangle along the breast) to get it to fit smoothly and support. It took three iterations of pinning, trimming away fabric and repinning that part before it was ready to sew shut and finish up all of the seams. The hard part is making the curve look more or less the same on both sides, since, of course, the breasts are different sizes. We managed it by pinning the larger side such that the square remained square and the body rectangle became curved along that attachment, but on the smaller side we curved the body only the same amount as the other side, and took the rest of the slack in by shrinking the square.
Now I need to finish packing and get some sleep--tomorrow is a 10 hour drive, and then I have a week of classes before returning home...
