Tag Archive | jumper

Big Stripy Jumper

This jumper is very much a product of Instagram Sewjo. I got the fabric at a #SurreySews fabric swap, a couple of weekends back. And it was made largely at a @VirtualSewingRoom Sewing day.

Firstly, the fabric. This is a Sweater knit, cottony, quite loose and a tiny bit see-through. There were a couple of pieces of this fabric available at the Swap, but I had a really clear idea of what this was going to become, and I knew I’d only need this one piece.

The Fabric Swap was great. Enough people attended for there to be a good choice of fabrics, several long tables-worth, plus there were patterns and notions too. The organisers, Yvette (of Stash Hub) and Melanie, had put on teas and coffees and yummy home-baked cakes (big thanks to Mel!), and there were a couple of tables to sit and drink your beverage, eat your cake and fondle your new fabric. I was strict with myself, and stuck to a One In, One Out policy, so I took 4 pieces along and came away with these 4 – the stripy knit that I was using for this make, a navy sweater knit, a beautifully soft jersey the colour of purple crocuses and a blue zebra print jersey. I have plans for each of these!

The inspiration for this make had come from the Sew Different Layer Dress and Top, specifically the top.

I had been intending to make a top like this for a while. I could see that it was a simple enough pattern to draft myself. In the event, I didn’t even commit it to paper, I just cut straight into the fabric. Cause it’s that simple.

I was making this on a Virtual Sewing Room sewing day. The Virtual Sewing Room is a lovely project created by Jenny. It’s pretty much what it says on the tin – it’s a Zoom meeting where everybody can be at home sewing, crafting, knitting, whatever, together. There are 2 evening meetings per month and occasional Weekend Days, and there’ll be more next year. And its free!!! (though I usually make a little donation to contribute to costs). I’ve found it helps me to be quite focused about my sewing, and I’ve made some delightful new sewing friends from all over the country. Anyway, Jenny had organised a Saturday event and I used the morning session to do my workings out for this top and cut it out, and to do the same for a cardigan in the new navy knit fabric, and the afternoon session to overlock All. The. Edges. Because I figured I didn’t want either of those two project pieces to fray or unravel.

When I unfolded the stripy fabric to cut it, I was a bit disappointed to find it had a hole in it. But it was in a spot that I thought I could cut around it so I wasn’t too worried about it. Then I found a second hole that I couldn’t avoid, but thankfully it was small enough that I could patch it. I’ve made that the back piece, just in case anyone notices it, but I won’t mind if they do.

**Though I say so myself, pretty nifty!**

Structurally this jumper was a piece of cake to construct. There are two big squares for the body, and two small rectangles for the sleeves. I sloped the shoulders a little and tapered the sleeves, and I cut a lower front neck line. I wanted the sleeves to be nice and snug, compared to the billowy-ness of the body.

Having sewn the shoulder seams and added the sleeve pieces to sew them in flat, I pinned the side seams and tried it on to see whether I needed to to make any adjustments. I tightened up the sleeves a bit, but I was otherwise happy with the construction. I sewed the side seams, paying careful attention to my stripe-matching, having pinned carefully on each of the stripe edges.

**I don’t know why I’m looking grumpy, that’s some pretty good stripe-matching there**

Then I decided to re-overlock the sleeves, because I had taken them in quite a lot.

And that’s when I broke my overlocker. Which was unfortunate. I had to finish the sleeve seams with a sewing machine zigzag instead. I’m hoping that the sewing machine centre down the road can fix it.

I sewed the hem and cuff hems with a small turn under. But for the neckline hemming, I added a narrow (5mm) strip of interfacing before doing the turn under, to stabilise it. I decided I liked that so much, I redid the hem that way…

I am so happy with this jumper! It’s probably a bit too cold right now to wear it on its own. It would need to be layered with a camisole or tee underneath. It’s definitely meeting my vision of what I wanted to make, which was a slouchy top that would be comfortable to wear, but smart-looking enough for work/going out.

The Go It Alone Christmas Jumper

Dec23

My first ever Christmas Jumper

I like having something new for Christmas. I haven’t sewn much this year, because I haven’t really had any need for new clothes, with all of the working from home, and all the not meeting people. But once the nights start getting earlier, knitting becomes a good outlet for creativity and makery.

This jumper had its origins in April/May 2019. I started and damn near finished the Sewrella My First Holiday Sweater. It’s a fab jumper, but it’s very boxy, and the shape just wasn’t working for me. I put it in the pile of things to think about, and by summer this year, I’d come to accept that despite all that work, it was time to frog it, and use the yarn for something new that would be more flattering on me. I wanted to use the lovely colourwork again, but have something a bit more close-fitting. Whatever pattern I used, I knew I’d have to adapt to suit the colourwork repetitions. I decided to Go It Alone, and write my own pattern.

My last three jumpers (apart from the ill-fated First Holiday Sweater, have been based on the Jenifer Stark Nutmeg pattern which I’ve tinkered with each time, to suit what I was aiming for. (It’s no longer very recognisable as that original, but credit where it’s due). They have been knitted top down, and I have no idea why but I decided to go bottom up for this one, probably because the first thing I wanted to change was the ribbing at the hem. I did a sample square to check my tension, and used that to work out how many stitches and rows I would need to make the basic torso, how many increases I would need to make my sleeve widen as I knitted it up, how the yoke would join, and how much I’d need to decrease to get to the neck. You never realise as a child how much you will use Maths for fun.

I wasn’t making it up as I went along – I had a plan – but I did find that I adapted slightly as I knitted, and

Obviously, the most fun thing was working out the colourwork. I used the Sewrella pattern as my starting point, but I needed it to be a bit longer, and I needed to fit in a different decreasing pattern. If you’re that interested, I’ve put the chart, as well as all my construction details, on my Ravelry Project page.

I started this project at the end of November, and I’m thrilled that I’ve got it finished this quickly. I am literally going to be wearing it all week.

Merry Christmas!

A Coatigan and more…

Nov4

Radio silence for months, then two posts in a row… As I mentioned in my previous post, I had a visit from the inspiration fairy, who doesn’t normally come calling in the Autumn and Winter. While I was planning my sweatshirt dress I received an email from the Sew In Brighton School (I’m on their mailing list, they didn’t just spam me! They wouldn’t do anything of the sort) about the courses they were running. And one of them was to make a coatigan in a day. This was appealing enough with my Winter Sewjo in full flow, but then I realised there was a massive discount on the workshop price. That sealed the deal for me, it was the kind of discount that would be rude not take up!

My main difficulty was that I wasn’t sure about the sizing of the coat. The details on the website talked about the sizing going up to a generous Medium, but I’m definitely a large, and I’m even more large across the front. I emailed the Sew In Brighton team, and the lovely Kat (Sew in Brighton’s owner) was super-understanding, and was able to grade the pattern to a large size for me (and for future plus size sewers).

I didn’t have any fabric in my stash that was suitable, so I looked around for possible options. The information about the fabric needs suggested 2m80 of boiled wool or sweatshirting. I know that the first make of a pattern isn’t always my best version, so I wasn’t going to spend £25 per metre on boiled wool, just in case it was a disaster. So I searched for sweatshirting instead. But then I came across this gorgeous black and white fleece-backed knit from The Textile Centre, and I was hooked. I wasn’t sure if I’d need extra fabric, beyond what the course information said, what with the extra width of a larger pattern, and with the possible need to pattern-match, so I went ahead and ordered 4 metres, just in case. I figured that would be plenty, and if I was able to be frugal with my cutting, I could do something with the leftovers.

This is a mahoosive check – each square is 8cm x 8cm!

The workshop was on the Sunday after Lockdown 2.0 was announced, so I was really grateful that we had the chance for one nice thing before we all have to stay home for weeks on end! The studio was well set up for social distancing, and we wore masks whenever we were moving around. It all felt very safe.

The teacher was Jo, who was great. She was able to explain really clearly the techniques we were using to get the shawl collar of the coatigan, so you knew what you were doing, but also why you were doing it. I was giving her an extra headache, with my pattern-matching. But again, she was able to explain it really well, and make it make total sense to me. I’m definitely going to be practising this more.

The morning part of the session was all about tracing off the pattern, and cutting and marking the pattern pieces. The afternoon part was for the sewing. Sure enough, we all had our brand new coatigans ready by the end of the afternoon. I wore mine on my way back to the car.

I managed to organise myself to take pictures while it was still daylight

This coatigan is SO COSY!!!!

I have to be honest, the effect of the cosiness, together with the big checks, and the unlikeliness of being out and about much this winter is leading me to think this might become more of a dressing gown than a coat!

I was thinking about how I could reuse this pattern, and I’m half thinking of adding a triangle side panel to make the shape a bit more swingy, get a slightly 40s vibe to it.

… And as I intimated above, I did indeed cut frugally, and even with the pattern-matching, I was left with about 1m 20 of the fabric to make something else with. It wasn’t that much to play with (especially with the pattern-matching again), but I thought I could make some sort of boxy sweater. I turned to my trusty Simple Sew Shannon pattern. I’d drafted a sleeve pattern for it about a year ago, to make the top/dress winter-wearable. I gave my pattern pieces an extra centimetre of width, to make the top a bit looser, and take into account the thickness of the fabric. I created a wider neckband, and made the top slightly longer (because no-one wants a chill on their kidneys).