Paco's shirt, Vogue 1526, completed!

This is a WONDERFUL design and pattern by new Vogue Designer, Paco Peralta of Barcelona, Spain. Many of us have followed Paco for some years and are thrilled he is now collaborating with Vogue. I have no affiliation here but I am so impressed with this pattern, Vogue 1526. I did take a couple small liberties with his design and will explain that further. This was not done because the pattern needed any improvement, far from it. I just tried to make it do things for my particular fabics.

Let's get started and then I want to comment on plaids, specifically.

Pattern:

Vogue 1526, designed by Paco Peralta. The pattern consists of a lined  jacket with short sleeves and assymetrical collar, a cuffed shirt with dropped shoulders, asymmetrical collar and off angled pocket. Pants are also included in the pattern and I look forward to making those as well. I had no concerns with this shirt other than making it work with a plaid and also lining it. I will wear this a lot and it is perfect for our winter climate.

The directions were divine. You start with a cut on facing, folded and instructed to "sew invisibly" along the long edge, my kind of pattern and directions! In step 2 there is very clear instruction for a unique inseam buttonhole at the very top of the shirt, easy peasy. As the pattern progresses, I found no areas or issues that were not clear and easy to execute. This shirt has details that boost it up to a fine garment yet the directions are clearly written and drawn.

Fabric:

The shirt is made with 100 % cotton flannel in plaid. It was a refreshing change from the dark plaids seen so much around these parts and I felt the lavender and cream gave it a more feminine vibe.

The lining is a very thin poly silky, actually a bit lighter than most linings I considered. By using it on the wrong side the finish was duller and more true to the look of silk.

For interfacing, I used a woven fusible, not sure of where it came from so won't guess.

Construction:

This is where the fun began! and where I veered a bit from Paco's design. My challenge was to make it work with the plaid and I think I did. Let's talk about that first.

Thoughts on using the plaid:

• You have to pick your battles with plaids. You also can make your life much easier with an "even" plaid. The fabric used here  is an even plaid. Each unit of plaid is equidisant and exactly like the other units that surround it. Using an even plaid is highly suggested for your first plaid effort. This PDF has a lot of great info on this. I also found Claire Shaeffer's Fabric Guide to have the best and most information out there. 
• The hem on this shirt is curved and uneven a look I think is flattering for those of us who are short. A decision was made to have  mostly the cream part of the blocks meet the hem. Why? Because  plaid is a very straight line and the shirt hem is curved. Trust me on this one. Uneven hem - don't end it on a bar. 
• Now that the length of the plaid was decided on I need to decide how it would work on the width. I decided to have the cream part of the blocks be at center front. I like the effect. It looks simple enough to line up. Don't kid youself. This was the hardest part of the whole project. This had yet to be cut and I knew that I had a folded cut on facing. And I had to have it match. It was challenging, made me think very hard, but eventually I got it. You can see how I managed it in this post. 
• My length and width are now set. Did you see the half dolman sleeves? They will not match, Don't even think about matching this perfectly. With plaid matching, you have to go for the obvious. Since I am short, maybe lots of people will see the tops of my shoulders but in reality, I don't think it is a focal point like center front and back. So, don't worry about it. 
• Now I had to match the lower sleeve and then its cuff. After A LOT of thinking, I walked away, came back and decided to just cut it on the bias. I centered the bias diamonds with the shoulder seam. I didn't seam it on bars but with mostly the cream centers meeting the dolman edge, the less to emphazise that it isn't matching and never will. 
• For the cuffs I went back to the straight of grain, matching bars with the corner of the plaid which you see in the pic in the woods. 
• Hours can go into placing plaids. Using allover prints or solids eliminates that and the shirt should go much faster than mine did. 
• Bottom line: Straight edges get bars. Curved edges get the cream blocks. Problems get the bias. Placement is important even if you don't match and requires thought. 
• This all needs to be figured out before cutting the first seam. 

With that out of the way. let's get to my next change. This shirt is not lined and that is fine. But a cotton flannel sticks to your clothes and it's cold up here. I had to have a lining with this. I decided on one of my favorite techniques, flat lining which finishes the seams with a Hong Kong finish and lines the garment at the same time. There are challenges with this as it works best on vertical seams. What to do with the underarm curve of the upper sleeve?

I did two lines of stitching in that area, trimmed back to the second stitching and zigzagged the edge. The seam allowances were cut on the bias  and folded under and stitched to make a clean edge as you see above. 

For the hem I faced the area with a bias strip of lining and catchstitched it to the lining. 

The plaid also made me deal with the collar a bit differently. I hope Paco approves. I like it. His collar is an asymmetrical design. I like it but I wanted my plaids to flow evenly where I could and to be symmetrical. I also had planned to used the buttons on the bars. This meant that I did not use his wonderful top buttonhole. I did make it anyway and it's one of those special little secrets just I know about, hiding in the seam! Making the collar symmetrical and lowering the buttonhole causes the collar to open evenly. I LOOOOOVE this collar. I got many compliments on this shirt when I wore it and more on the collar. It has such a pretty roll line and it is so nice and deep. 

 Here is that awesome little buttonhole that makes an asymmetrical collar with little effort, beautiful detail and typical Paco. 

If you have read me for a while, you may remember that I really don't care for long sleeves or any fabric around my wrists. My plan from the start was to fold back these lovely, deep cuffs and that worked well. You can see them on me all folded back but here is what they look like otherwise. 

Parting shots: When I make another I may take a tiny bit of length out of the back waist area. My issue is one of width,  a narrow back and wide hips. I always have this space. I can fit it away but then I have a different look to the garment. I don't want a fitted shirt here. I like the ease exactly as Paco designed it. I flat pattern measured the pattern and found there was substantial ease in a size six to not make any further adjustments. The dropped dolman sleeves also added to the ease of fitting. Since I planned to roll back the cuffs from the get go, they may have been long for me othewise. Other than that I am really pleased with my fit and it was with little effort. 

In conclusion:  I will definitely make this again. With Paco's clear instructions and the beautiful simplicity of the design it would be fine for an advanced beginner if done in a solid fabric and following his directions. While this is a couture pattern, this is doable by those who maybe have never used a couture Vogue pattern. I highly recommend. The design is so versatile and would be stunning in a white linen or pique. A beautiful look for dressier winter wear with jeans would be in  a washed velvet, yum. Thank you, Paco, for a beautiful design!........Bunny

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for some reason the crop didn't work in my editing software tonight. Hopefully it will rectify with shutting down the computer. I will be back to fix it in that case. And, oh, did you notice the winning button? It is the lighter ringed buttons. I really appreciated all your opinions on that. Thanks to all of you.....Bunny

V1526, Paco's plaid shirt #2

I got to work on the plaid shirt today and much was accomplished. Above you can see the pattern match complete for the front bodice. The fourth attempt was the charm! This had a fold over facing along the center front and it made it doubly tough to get the plaids matched.

Just in case someone wants to match a plaid across a foldover facing here is what finally worked.

Plaid matching on 1526 

Cut ONLY the right bodice. In the facing area there are two fold lines and a raw edge. Center front is marked as always. That is critical. You are matching one center front exactly over the other center front on the right and left bodices, NOT the folded edge.You have only cut out the right bodice so far!

*  On the right bodice fold the facing  area out of the way and under the bodice. Your crease is on the first fold line near CF. The rest of the facing is behind. Match that folded line to the fabric on the table.  Make sure it matches vertically and horizontally. Measure it along center front edge. My squares were two inches square so I measured the whole square at the edge that was on the right bodice and  lined it up with the fabric on the table.

* Take a removable marker  and mark that folded edge on the "table" fabric with tiny dots. The right bodice is still overlapping the fabric on the table. Place  the pattern piece on top of the right bodice and table fabric,   lining up the CENTER FRONT MARKINGS, not the edge line. Pin down the pattern now on top and outline the shoulders and neckline on the fabric on the table with the little dots. Remove the right bodice.

* Lay your pattern back on the table fabric again, lining up the edge fold closest to CF with the little dots. Cut it out. Make sure when you lay out on the table there is enough room for all the folds of the facing to be cut.  I messed that up twice, lining everything up perfectly and doing it too close to the edge to have enough for the foldover facings.

* Cut! Yay! Whew!

Flat Lining

This garment will be "flat lined", one of my favorite techniques. The vertical seams end up with a Hong Kong finish when complete and a nicely lined garment. I am lining this garment because flannel is notorious for sticking to whatever is under. I want it to hang nice and smoothly.




The first fold of the facing is shown above. The pattern specifies sewing that raw edge "invisibly" to the bodice before doing the other folds required to make the facing.

For flat lining you will need a quarter inch foot and an edge stitching foot. The edge foot really helps but is not totally necessary if you have a good eye.

Every edge of the lining is cut normally except vertical seams. The CF area of the lining is cut to the first folded edge so as not to add bulk to the facing. It sits underneath the folds.

 There are red arrows pointing to the foldover facing underneath. The side seam is cut one half inch wider.

The lining and bodice are place right sides together. The vertical seams, here the side seams, are matched and sewn with the 1/4 inch foot. It is then trimmed to an eighth of an inch. The lining is then pressed toward the lining and folded over the edge and wrapped around the seam allowance. . It is now stitched "in the ditch" with the edge stitching foot. Hong Kong seams, voila!

You can see much more about this technique in the tutorials page by clicking the tab just under the banner.




I've really enjoyed my sewing time this long weekend. Fingers crossed I will finish this tomorrow. I have not cut out my sleeves yet as I know there will be decisions there for the plaid matching. This is a VERY dropped shoulder so it should be interesting. More coming.............Bunny

Vogue 1526, Paco's shirt!

I am so thrilled to make this Paco Peralta design, Vogue 1526. I, and many other long time bloggers have been following Paco's blog, career, Pinterest, etc for quite some time. I am thrilled he is now one of Vogue's designers and I really look forward to his future work. Paco's designs are WEARABLE. They are not complicated, yet have couture touches that are manageable, like the buttonhole slit in the top of this shirt. They are very polished.

My fabric is purchased and I can't wait to get going. Some of you may have seen Tany of Couture and Tricot's version, a wondeful white shirt much like above. But it's not a white shirt time of year up here in the North Country and I decided to take a bit different tack with my efforts.

I live in the cold and flannel shirts are standard issue, lined flannel shirts, far more practical, are even more common. My plan is to make a lined flannel shirt with Paco's design. I have probably most sewing books written in the past thirty years and decided I needed to study up and refresh on working with plaids. I went through my books and found the best information in the Vogue Sewing Book and Claire Shaeffer's Fabric Guide. Vogue had a brief couple of paragraphs but Claire's book had pages of info. I studied balanced plaids, unbalanced plaids, even plaids and uneven plaids. Claire even had info on uneven balanced plaids and even unbalanced plaids, etc. Yikes!  I doubt you could find more plaid info anywhere else. I studied Claire's book and feel ready to go. I know from Claire that much will not match, something we also learned in the classes I've taken from her. The important parts are the center front and back and the sleeves. The rest you are downright lucky if it looks good, but that is OK per Claire. 

The other thing I have decided to do is to flat line the shirt, all but collar and cuffs. This will provide warmth and stability to the shirt. After looking at many linings I decided on another blouse fabric, a very thin poly with shiny motifs. Well, I didn't like those and will be using it on the wrong side as you see in the pic above. It has much more of a silk look this way as well. All vertical seams will be flat lined. You can find information on this above in the Tutorial pages. Any questions, just ask. Non vertical seams will have the felled seams as per the pattern. The hem will be a challenge but I think I have it worked out. Does anyone else wake up in the middle of the night and deal with how to incorporate changes from the pattern being used? and worrying if they will work? I do this a lot and by the time I start cutting I have it all worked out. I always have fingers crossed. So if you like the exact way Paco designed this shirt, check out Tany's blog.His design is amazing and her results beautiful. I will be doing this more casual look and I hope he approves. 

Did you notice how I chose a more femine color scheme? I am happy with that. I am surrounded with classic plaid designs up here and really like this different one. It is an even plaid and that will help a lot. I look forward to sharing this process with you. 

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Thank you, everyone, for the lovely comments on my apron dress. It is always appreciated as are all your comments. Happy New Year..................Bunny