McCalls M7472, Raglan Shirt

Everyone needs a basic black shirt for work. But who ever really has the inspiration to make a basic black shirt? I keep telling myself I could be one of those people, but my eye is never drawn to plain fabrics in the fabric store. Once again my stash ended up replenished with a quirky print, this time in the form of this spooky cat-adorned viscose challis by Minerva! 

The fabric has a halloween-feel, with subtle spooky staring kitties emerging out of the darkness. This is probably about as close to plain black fabric as I was ever going to buy! I absolutely love the print - their little yellow eyes really add an extra PING to the shirt, and give me opportunity to accessorise with yellow. I love it when I can find a fabric that speaks to my inner goth and can be filtered into my daily outfits. Also having a kitty shirt only felt right after making my pooch-themed one 2 years back. 

To sew with, the fabric feels quite delicate, in that one dodgy pin could cause snags. I would advise using fresh pins and needles if possible to reduce any chance of pulling the threads. I held my breath when I made the button holes and had the fray stop close at hand when I sliced them open. 

The viscose challis is so lovely and light to wear. It's slightly prone to creasing, but this has just been encourging me to stop slouching at work! It was easy to press so made it easy to be accurate when making the cuffs and front band. Pressing the pleats at the sleeve before attaching to the cuff was an absolute game changer! 

The fabric can be slightly wibbly when cutting out (you all know what I mean by that!), so cutting out on the fold you just have to be extra sure that both layers are flat and straight so that there is minimal shifting around and you end up with symmetrical pieces! The print does make it easy to cut on the fold though, as the abstract element of it means you don't have to spend 2 hours working out your pattern placement before cutting. 

The pattern itself was a tried and tested for me. I love how wearable it is, and how easy to make! I used the size 12 as I like a bit of overhang when I tuck into my work skirt but I think the size 10 would work just as well for me. 

I omitted the pockets on the pattern as I thought they might be a little disruptive to the print even if I pattern matched them. Looking at the shirt I wonder if piping the front band and cuffs would have made the kitties pop even more, but also seemed a bit risky that we could have ventured into Pyjama territory! With this in mind though, I would like to add piping to my sewing to-do list for this year... I make plenty of shirts to give myself the opportunity! 

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