Tattoo Flowers Macaron Shirt (Colette Patterns)

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

I liked my Colette Patterns Macaron Dress so much, that I made a top from the pattern. Initially, I was going to make this T-shirt-like, a la Emma's Favourite Things, but midweight cottons don't drape particularly well. So instead, I ended up with a shirt more like Erika Made It. Unlike the Sorbetto Top, the Macaron pattern has a much more tailored fit, so medium-weight fabrics work fine. I used Marqueterie in Ginger from Pat Bravo's Indie Collection and a Quilter's Showcase gray and yellow dot fabric.


Fit - SBA, etc
I followed all of my previous adjustments from the dress, as described here. This includes the SBA, yoke slimming, and removal of back bottom darts. Having put together the bodice and yoke, I realized that the bust darts were all overshooting the apex, so I ended up shortening all four darts by about one inch, and shifting the armscye darts down about one inch as well.

Construction - Matching Midriff
I varied slightly from the pattern in that the midriff/belt piece was done in a matching fabric, to prevent the top from visually chopping my torso into too many tiny pieces.


Construction - Skirt Piece
After attaching the yoke, bodice, and midriff pieces, I laid the WIP-shirt on top of the Sorbetto Top pattern pieces, lined up the armscye, and traced out a shortened skirt piece from the size 6 Sorbetto pattern (for both the front and backs), with the length of a size 18 (the Sorbetto top is quite short). An extra 5/8" needs to be added to the skirt piece, for the seam allowance. The Sorbetto top piece is still much wider than the Macaron midriff piece, so I inserted four 2.5" long pleats on the front and back of the shirt. To determine the width of the pleats, I just measured the difference in the Sorbetto top piece and the Macaron midriff piece and divided by four. I initially was lazy and just tried using gathers instead of pleats, but the midweight fabric poofed out too much, making me look pregnant. The pleats create a much slimmer silhouette.

Construction - Rearranged Assembly
Rather than following the construction instructions exactly, I waited to sew the armscye->hem seam until after attaching the invisible zipper. Inserting an invisible zipper is a pinch easier when the sides aren't yet attached to each other. I used a regular zipper foot for inserting the invisible zipper, as before.

Construction - Finishing
As usual, I finished all seams with either a French Seam or a zigzag stitch, when French seams were too bulky. I also finished the bottom hem of the shirt with a rolled 1/4" hem as instructed in the Sorbetto Top pattern.


For Next Time
Next time, I really really really need to remember to cut about 1/2" off of the bottom of the back yoke and add that 1/2" to the top of the back midriff piece. Or else I'm just forever going to be encountering mismatched side seams.