McCalls M7575 x M7980, Cowboy Shirt

Vinted fabric skort all ready to go for our last gig, I came a bit unstuck as to what to wear on top. Cue contents of wardrobe exhumed, and bedroom floor looking like I'd been burgled. In the end, a quick trip to the charity shops in Hillsborough found me a perfect stretch tee with cinching side ties (see previous blog post for combo), but the crisis left me wanting to be better prepared for next time. 

This got me thinking about what features my perfect gig shirt should have, and I came up with the below:

• Shoulders-> because as much as I love a strappy vest, when you're halfway through your set and sweat-sticky, guitar strap and sweaty shoulder can lead to increased friction, and this can make guitar swinging less effortless. In general, Shoulder + Fabric + Guitar strap = Reduced friction (+ better dance moves)
• Sleeveless -> Less sleeves = More movement + Less sweat
• Cropped -> Because I don't work out every day to hide my waist, and as much as I love tucking in a shirt for work, I don't want to have to be worrying about my shirt hem escaping my waistband mid-way through a track. Also less fabric, again = Less sweat
• Easy to get off-> Because after the show I'm sweaty, and don't want to have to wrestle my way out of my outfit 
• Black -> Because I've tried wearing other colours on stage, and regardless of how good I think they look at the time, whenever I look back on the photos I think 'Why on earth did I wear that?'
  
  
  

So with this in mind, and fabric left over from my Vinted re-fashion, I started to dream up a gig shirt that would team up with my skort and tick the above boxes. 

I had enough Vinted fabric left over for panels of some kind, and with this Aztec-type embroidery, it made sense to utilise it as a statement yoke on a cowboy-style shirt. With no front-yoke or piping expertise in my arsenal, I knew I needed the help of a good pattern. I chose the McCalls M7980 as I have good experience in the past using McCalls shirt patters, and this one had the double whammy of being both suitible for men or women. I got the pattern for my birthday and began tracing it off soon after (wehay for Birthday annual leave). 

Once I'd traced the pattern pieces, I thought it a good idea to compare the size to a shirt pattern that I know fits well. Come to the stage M7575, my trusty old friend. What became very obvious straight away was the M7980 was much larger, and featured no bust darts. The plan all along was to knot up the front at the waist so it sat cropped on me, and the extra length would be helpful for this, but the bagginess would lead to likely gaping arm holes (I planned to finish the arm holes with bias-binding instead of inserting sleeve so that I could be sleeveless as planned). 

The resolution for me was clear, I would cut the M7575 pattern, omit the sleeves, draft front yoke pieces by using the M7980 as reference, and extend the front piece so that the placket could be better tied at the waist. Without any real plan for how long to extend the placket, I made the shirt front pattern piece 10cm longer, adding a curve to omit extra fabric and make more of a tie-shape. I extended the placket pattern piece by 10cm to match this, and will admit it was by total fluke that the front piece of the shirt graded out to a point so nicely. 

I made a slight change to the collar piece, making the collar points a little more, er pointy. I have had these collar tips in my stash for how long?! Feels good to finally install them onto a well-deserving shirt. 

All my life, I have thought that the front yoke on a cowboy shirt was attached to the bottom half (like a traditional back-yoke) of the shirt via a seam, NOT that it was a piece installed over the top like a patch. It all makes perfect sense now after thinking about it, and reading some hand hints on the Sneum Shirts Website, which explained the yoke was to reinforce and add durability to the areas of the shirt likely to get worn out when yipikaye-ing your way around the wildwest on horseback. 

So with yoke pieces cut perfectly symmetrically (utilising the centre back seam of the origanal skirt on the back yoke piece), it was time to investigate something else new to me: Piping. 

I bought this silvery piping from my go-to stall at the Sheffield Market (is there nothing they don't have?! I don't think they have ever let me down!). Initially I was looking for something more of a satin-sheen grey, and was a little worried this silver was going to look a bit fancydress, but I think it's come out really well, adding just the right amount of pizazz to link up the silver collar tips to the buttons, to the white embroidery and the glammy beads in the matching skirt. 

I enjoyed applying the piping. I was nervous, but with the use of the zipperfoot and the changeable needle position on my machine, I was able to get the stitch line really close to the er, pipe(?) and the result looks really effortless. The back was a little harder, as the back yoke is faced with another piece of fabric, and when you attach this you can't see the edge of the piping at all. The machine does a lot of the hard work though, with it naturally using the raised edge as a guide. At least it was a nice straight line- the front pieces did take a little more concentration to get around the curves, especially while trying to ensure complete symmetry! 

I used the exact same linen to make the plain areas on the shirt as I used on the skort. I found out at hem time that linen hems curves like an absolute dream! The hem is quite curved at the side seams, and the new front tie piece I drafted also curved, but linen has magic powers and seemed to enjoy being told what to do. 

It behaved nicely when attaching the collar too. I was slightly worried the interfacing in the collar and placket would make the shirt a little tooo sturdy and not relaxed enough, and it does feel a little more bulky than other shirts in my collection, but I think this was required to help support the weight of the heavier, embriodered yoke pieces. With a bit of wear any rigid areas will loosen up nicely. 

I added bias binding to the arm holes and slipstitched this down by hand so the seam line wasn't visible from the inside. I managed to buy the exact amount of binding, down to the millimeter (hmm someone measured the raw edge of the arm hole not the stiching line before going to the shops....), which I think stressed me out a bit when attaching the second band and maybe caused me to stretch it into the arm hole more than I should have. The back armhole kicks out a little bit. I think this gape could have been avoided by taking a little more of the seam allowance off before attaching the binding (I took off 1cm, allowing for the 1.5cm seam allowance which would have been used if inserting the sleeve). I think due to the sturdiness of the fabric, when I first put the shirt on this gape was a little more noticeable than after I'd had it on all day on one of the hottest days of the year and the fabric had started to relax into my body. 

I wondered if the buttons were a little understated against the jazzy silver binding, but there was nothing with any more character grabbing my attention at the market stall. Once they were on though, I thought they worked quite well with the yoke pieces, adding a bit of a nod to work-wear style (or practical wear for lassooing cattle on your ranch if that so happens to be your line of work). 

The buttonhole function on my machine played nice, I had my heart in my throat as this was the final hurdle and arguably the one most likely to cause unreversable damage. It was essential the button at the bustline lined up exactly with the start point of the piping either side of the placket... the most central and visible area of the shirt! It was a pretty hot day in the studio, that got increasingly hotter during buttonholing! Hey, my fray-stop glue dried pretty quick though! 

The shirt is a winner. I had toyed with the idea of making the back piece shorter so there was less fabric to accomodate when the front is knotted, but in the end I kept the length, as when the front is not knotted, the shirt can still be tucked into jeans and function as something slightly more formal. The additional length I added to the front for ties also doesn't look too weird if I'm wearing it buttoned up and untucked either. Options! 

I was absolutely delighted to get this combo all stitched up before the Chris Isaak gig in Manchester this July. The man himself is known for his western style tremolo and his fantastic suits, so it absolutely made sense to debut the two-piece at his show. It seemed to do the trick - I was invited up to dance on stage with him for Baby Did a Bad Bad Thing!!! He is my ultimate fave, so it was a total honour to dance with the king in a me-made that had so much 'me' and considered design in it. Check out the Youtubes below and see if you can spot me! 

x

Location: Holme Lane, Sheffield
Currently listening to: Loser, Tame Impala

McCalls M7575, Geometric Yellow Shirt

Originally drafted 2024 

Production has been slow and inspiration has been low of late. Have I finally got a full wardrobe? As much as I love all the lush dresses you guys are making that are popping up on my feed day in day out, I find I have very little cause to dress up fancy, and when I do, I generally already have what I need. I spend half my life at work, and a quarter in the gym and the rest of the time asleep - and now that I have identified that it has allowed my sewing plans to become more streamlined and made me feel less guilty about returning to patterns that I know work for me and my life. 

McCalls 7575 is THE one. Never was there ever a shirt pattern so versatile and so user friendly. M7575s are my work wardrobe staple. I have on occasion been known to wear them on dates and to art workshops too, like I said - lovely and versatile! So when this geometric yellow georgette had been sat untouched for a few months in my stash, it made sense to use it for something I knew would get a lot of wear. 

There were a few things I had to take into consideration with this fabric, and a few things I should have considered further. Looking back - why on earth did I not decide to use French Seams, specifically on those side seams? This fabric was begging for them, but it had been so long since I had french seamed anything, that they just seemed to have disappeared from my repetoire until it was too late. The alternative was some rather scraggy-if-you-look-too-close overlocking that I wasn't overly proud of, and was also a little worried would be crazy visible through the fabric, though I needn't have worried too much - the end result giving no hint to any wobbles that were lurking inside. I do feel like I have to be delicate when handling the shirt, particulary where the sleeves join the cuffs as this is where the finishing is most vulnerable. 

With such a delicate fabric, I knew interfacing for stability was important. In the past with sheer fabrics I have inserted an extra layer of the fabric in place of interfacing. I played around with some options, as I knew the moment I fused interfacing, the sheer quality of the fabric would become opaque - was this something I wanted? As it turned out - I quite liked the contrast of the sheer panels against the more blocky areas- the cuffs, yoke and collar, and once against my body the contrast wasn't quite so stark. 

I was worried that the 'uninterfaced' piece of the collar would be as sheer as to reveal the inner workings and wobbly, fraying seam allowances. I was super cautious to keep them neat and tidy! Despite the shirt certainly having a sheer quality and being borderline 'what-can-I-get-away-with-at-work', the inner workings stay quite nicely hidden between the fabric. 

In an attempt to change things up a bit, I altered the collar tip shape for this pattern, making the points a little er, pointier. From the look of the pattern piece, I thought this would look more exaggerated and 70s-looking than the end result did. In factm if you didn't tell me, I don't think Ive have noticed the collar was different at all... And how familiar am I with this shirt pattern now!!? I would like to see what the pattern piece of an actual 70s exaggerated collar looks like so I know what I'm aiming for next time. 

One cute quirk I am very proud of on this shirt though is the button choice. Pearly, soft and geometric, these little cubes fit the brief perfectly. 

I absolutely adore this fabric, so of course the shirt came out looking pretty cool, but I do find that the weighlessness of it does stop it from hanging quite as comfortably as my other shirts, particularly where you can feel the weight of the buttons are having an effect. More sheer fabric practice needed (I'll remind myself of this next time I'm in Abakhan thinking do I really neeeed this fabric...? A: YES) 

x
Currently listening to: Bernard's Boogie, Donny Benet
Location: Crookes, Sheffield 

Clothes Clone, Panel Skort

True to my word, I'm on a mission to build a full wardrobe of mini skorts now that the band are up and running. Can't be wearing the same one twice when then photos come out right?! 

In all seriousness, it's great to have an excuse to make clothes that aren't for sitting behind a desk all day. I sometimes see patterns and think- thats lush or looks fun to make, but when the hell would I wear it? Between work, gym and sleep, and any time off I have always seeming to be freezing cold or pissing it down, its been easy to talk myself out of making fun things with the fear that they will just sit unworn in the back of the wardrobe. 

We played a sold out gig in Sheffield this month and have another big one in April. I wore my new denim skort for the last show and it felt really good to play in, very liberating, smooth fabric so there was no weird friction from my guitar (think pleathers and leathers) and easy to move in. In my mind there is just no other option for what to wear on the bottom half now.  

I wanted my next skort to go a step further, and really wanted to utilise the way the panels are layed by using different fabrics. I wanted the base colour to be black, simply because it's easier to find something that matches to wear on top, and always looks classic on stage. I did however want the panels to make a statement. 

The great thing about this pattern is it uses very little fabric all in all, so I felt quite free to search for unconventional panel fabric. I knew I wanted somthing embroidered, a denim or a linen or a soft cotton with a bit of body to it to keep its shape. Recently I have been really interested in Eastern Europe and was hoping to find some fabric that used emboidery motifs that nodded towards this. 

So naturally I hit up Vinted, and my algorithm became a frenzy of embroidery, peasant tops, Persian rugs, Eastern cookbooks and Russian trinket trays. I was routinely browsing cushion covers as a nice pair would likely be just enough fabric to utilise for panels, and the fabric would have a good structure to it to allow the corners of the flaps to look really crisp. 

Eventually though, I was drawn to this more Aztec-looking fabric, which was orignially a linen skirt from H&M. The fact that the motif didn't totally cover the fabric meant that it could blend nicely into the areas of plain fabric without it looking like I'd just mashed to items together. I liked the blue and white stitching, and the beading was an added bonus. 

Using the reverse image search function in Vinted (this blog's new best friend), I searched for all the listings of the skirt, filtered out any I thought cost too much to be cutting up, and selected the largest sizes so there was as much fabric as possible to play with. I ended up spending about £7 plus postage for the two skirts. I will be able to use the linings and the zippers for future projects too 🙌 

They'd arrived within a week, which timed nicely with some annual leave so I could get making. It was worth taking time to lay out the pattern, as it was really important to me that the fabric motifs didn't look higgledy-piggledy and result in the skort looking more jumble sale than chic. Luckily the embroidered design has a lot of linear elements to it, so it was easy to find the centre and to line up the grainline so the panels looked considered not random. 

I knew I wanted the lower panel to be in the patterned fabric and the top layer to be plain, thinking this would visually enhance the cut and the flap design, but I thought only using the patterned fabric here a) Would potentially look a bit random and b) Would be a damn shame not to use more of it! I thought about how I could use other panels or trims, but decided the best way to incorporate more of the fabric would be to use it on the back piece that attaches at the side seam to the lower panel, and hopefully result in the motif looking like it wraps around, with the plain black fabric wrapping around from the other side. 

Due to fabric restrictions, there was no way I was going to be able to match the motif at the side seam, so I decided to cut the back panel 'upside down', to help the two pieces look visually different, and therefore less 'disappointing' that they don't match, even if thats only subconciously. I used the arrow-y style motif on front panel to point 'up' where the upper flap slopes down from (did I explain that well?), essentially making the pattern placement look really well balanced. 

I was a little worried that the embroiderey band that was orignially along the bottom of the skirt would look 'off' at the top of the back piece, as it is intersected with the dart, and cuts off at the waist at an angle. There wasn't enough fabric to just move the pattern pice over a little to avoid the band, so I didn't have much choice in the matter... However, on completion, I really love this feature. It's like a nod to the fact the fabric was something before, without giving away what it was. A lovely bit of thrifting there I would say. 

Before sewing I needed to remove a few of the beads from around the seam lines and the dart to save anything getting jammed in the machine. I saved all these and attempted to stitch then back on where necessary. Don't look too closely and you won't notice which ones it was that I reapplied 😅

The base fabric is a linen from Hillsbrough Fine Fabrics. I think I must have touched all the black linins in South Yorkshire on the hunt for a linen that was a good black-match, not too starchy, not to crease-y, and not too see through! Luckily with warmer weather on the way, I think a lot of fabric shops have been stocking up on the linens and I found what I was after. 

The fabric pressed well and matched nicely with my contrast fabric, I'm really glad I shopped around a bit for it. 

Overall I'm super happy with the skort. I do feel like I would still be keen to make one with a more Eastern European theme, but I'm also getting excited about all the Aztec style jewellery I'll be able to pair with this one. It's also given me the perfect excuse to stock up on source books about embroidery so I'm a little more educated in what I'm looking for. 

See you on the front row. 

Big thanks to @the_yorkshire_croc_hunter for lending me the bike ! 🏍️💖

x
Location: Kelham Island
Currently listening to: Lie To You, Franc Cinelli