At the Brisbane Sewist's High Tea I managed to score a copy of the Megan Nielsen Briar top. I decided to make my 'wearable muslin' from a sweater knit as I loved the idea of the long length in a sweater. I bought this gorgeous orange sweatshirt fabric from Spotlight and went for it.
The first issue (and probably the major issue) is that the sweatshirt fabric has very little stretch. I cut the medium size which corresponds to my measurements and the only change I made to the pattern was to shorten the sleeves slightly, a very usual pattern alteration for me.
First up I discovered the fabric was not going to have enough stretch to use the fabric for the neckband. I was kicking myself as there had been matching ribbing at Spotties but I hadn't thought to pick it up. However a stroke of genius and a bit of searching, I found I had a small piece of ribbing left from making my Stylearc Maggie jacket. It is a grey/charcoal stripe and I really like it with the orange sweater fabric. The piece I had was actually a bit shorter than recommended but this ribbing is from Crafty Mamas and is great quality (similar to this one), so stretched and sat beautifully.
I had a fit issue in that the sleeves were very tight and the top was tight across the bust. I let the side and sleeve seams out and that helped but it is still a bit snug and you can see I have a classic need a fba crease happening. However the fabric does not have much stretch so that was part of the problem I think. I will have to look at again if I make another one.
I wanted this orange fabric as I wanted to wear it with my knitted honey cowl on the cold week-ends.
Well I love this for casual week-end wear. It was nice and warm around my hips and bottom when we went to the Hampton Food and Wine Festival recently and my DH even noticed how many other people had 'imitated' me by wearing tops with the high-low hemline.
I will probably make this pattern up again but will need to consider a FBA and look at the stretch of my fabric. A quick simple sew that gives a cute result. Ciao for now kittens!
