After a week of Leona being with me due to croup, i was in a severe time crunch to start and finish Andy’s birthday present. I imagined to loop him right in into our Pop.Art Top row and create something with this Liberty fabric appropriate for him. I was contemplating a jacket at first, but changed my mind as he’s not really a jacket wearing type. So i settled on a shirt but wanted to make it extra special and wearable for him. You need to know that he is the type of guy with a rather specific taste. I usually don’t have a hard time buying clothes for him that he likes, but making something myself he would be comfortable wearing was a different ballgame. I got this pattern from Shelly – Thanks Shell! last minute at our sewing extravaganza (would highly recommend, was so much fun!) where 7 girls (and one virtual on Skype) met up at Shell’s house and sewed, chatted and got stuff done. Great time!
I used Burda 8417 as the base and tried a couple of new techniques on this guy. I also studied the shirts in his closet. All seams on his new shirt are french seams (even the sleeves – quite a fiddle game) and i did a lot of hand basting using 10 year old basting thread i found in my stash from Germany. I also ended up changing some pattern pieces, the pocket was just faaaaaaaaaar to big for modern taste and the original collar was plain hiddeous. I used an Alexander McQueen shirt as a guide. Bless him! It took me 3 days to complete and it was finished just in time.
And he loves it! He wore it already and after i asked him if somebody noticed something he denied. He said: ‘that’s a good sign as it looks real, doesn’t it?’
Yep, real it is…
