The Denim Workshirt - McCall's 6613

The work shirt is done. I hope it is the first of several. I like the roomy-ness and casual attitude of it all. I will wear this to death. I hope to make a couple more. The way you see it here is one way I would wear it, with jeans and brown leather boots. There are just so many ways a good ole' boy workshirt can be feminized.

Pattern:
This is McCalls 6613, a Palmer Pletsch Unisex pattern.  It is sized by chest size and I made the smallest size,  34-36 chest, and that gave me a finished chest measurement of 40 inches. So this is very roomy. There are not darts or any fit for that matter. This is not a difficult pattern. I actually never really looked at it. But I did refer to the Zieman Collar and the Colllar Band Tute in the sidebar tutorials.

Fabric:
This is a hundred percent cotton denim from Joanns, nothing special other than I did not want lycra and I did not get any. It's not easy finding denims without stretch. It is relatively lightweight. It is too light for jeans but it is a bit heavier than a chambray, what work shirts are often made of. It washed really nicely and took the topstitching well.

Construction:
I did some changes with the garment fit. I cut down the pockets all around by a 1/4 inch . You can see they are still pretty large. I think I would cut them down a bit more the next iteration. It's a petite thing. I try to make any details smaller to be more in scale with my proportions. I also cut down the collar band by a 1/4 inch width as well as the collar. I am glad I did. I think you'll agree the proportions are good. This is a unisex shirt and they compromised the details toward the male wearer, IMO. Did I "petite" the cuffs? No. I like deep cuffs and actually recut them to the width that I wanted. I felt their cuffs were too narrow. Seams are stitched and serged and topstitched. The topstitching was with variegated "denim" thread. Never again. It looks spotty once stitched and I don't recommend it. Live and learn! I used my monster old Kenmore to do the buttonholes. Facings with graded interior seams and collar band buttonholes are just not anything I even wanted to try with my computerized Pfaff, just too much aggravation. The old Kenmore sails through buttonholes perfectly no matter how many odd layers it has to go over. I treasure that old machine and it is always set up in buttonhole mode, at the ready!

One thing I did not care for but it was too late when I realized it, was the placket for the cuffs. The pattern would have you do a simple seam, ironed open and clean finished. I never would have chosen to do a placket that way and next time won't. I was able to save the situation by lapping one seam allowance over the other and double topstitching. The interior edges were serged. It looked a bit more finished than just a pressed open seam.

All in all, this is a pretty good pattern with some adjustments made to more flatter a small female. I can see myself making this again. I would do the pockets differently, smaller and maybe with a flap. It's a keeper!

Today was a daycation, a sewing one! We are in the throws of , no kidding, an epic blizzard. This area pretty much shut down at noon today and it looks like it will take major digging out tomorrow. We already have a foot and we haven't had the worst of it yet. The storm warning is on till 8:00 tomorrow night. They are talking2-3 feet of snow, temps in the single digits (we are almost there now) and very heavy winds and "thunder snow". Hubby and I are hunkered down and it doesn't look like we will have work tomorrow. 

I managed to prep my pattern and cut out another ITY top. This one is a tunic and a Very Easy Very Vogue pattern. It is oddly cut for fit adjustments. I am hoping my flat pattern measuring will serve me well. It looks like it will fit other than a couple of small tweaks. More to come......Stay safe all in the path of Vulcan...Bunny