Hot of the heels of my recent “What to sew for Spring?” article, here is my first completed project: my off-white, 100% cashmere, Trendy Cape by Vanessa Pouzet.

The inspiration for this cape comes directly from Veronica Popoiacu’s Bittersweet Colour blog. This is probably the only non-sewing blog I follow – hers is 100% fashion, with clothes she bought in shops, can you believe? Her style is absolutely incredible so do expect many references to her wardrobe in the future. Anyway, here is the garment I wanted to reproduce:

The “Trendy Cape” pattern by Vanessa Pouzet seemed definitely a good option . I had it in stock, already used it once with great success and it is a quick and easy make. Trendy is a full-circle cape with a straight collar. Compared to Veronica’s, it is a bit shorter – but it fits in 2m of fabric, hurrah! It also offers the extra bonus of being able to insert a belt through slits at the back, which I really like as it helps define the waist. Here is the cape worn with and without belt:

If you are looking for this pattern, it sadly seems to have disappeared from Vanessa Pouzet’s website, I don’t know why. But this pattern could be used instead.

As for the fabric, I used an amazing double-sided cashmere from Les Coupons de Saint, which is not cheap but is just the most gorgeous thing to work with. I did not pre-wash it by fear of damaging it, so this cape will be one of my rare garments (along with my Hermes scarves) to have to be dry-cleaned… Its only downside! I lined the entire cape with an off-white textured lining fabric from Amothreads and added four mother of pearl buttons at the front.

I am extremely pleased with this cape, which works really well with the colour palette I have been exploring in my recent sewing, with my full circle silk skirt; my “nearly Dior” dress; and “not so sure about this one” dress.

And hopefully it will work well with all the candy tones I am planning to use for Spring sewing…

With a few glorious days over the past week, blooms everywhere and days becoming longer, Spring is definitely in the air. And after months of sewing wool and adding lining to all my dresses, I just can’t wait to start sewing my Spring wardrobe. So here are my inspirations for Spring sewing – with a little sneak preview on some already completed items, that’s how impatient I was!

Spring outwear: a cape and a trench coat

Since I discovered Veronica Popoiacu’s Bittersweet Colour blog, I basically want all her outfit! Her style is just incredibly beautiful! For Spring 2021, I specifically want to reproduce this beautiful off-white cape (last picture below, taken from her blog, full credit to her amazing style and to her gifted photographer!). It is not a colour I have for mid-season outerwear and I think it would work very well with some of my recent makes, in particular my full circle silk skirt; my “nearly Dior” dress; and “not so sure about this one” dress.

The “Trendy Cape” pattern by Vanessa Pouzet, which I made in the past but never photographed, is definitely a good option to reproduce this cape. However if you are looking for it, it seems to have disappeared from Vanessa Pouset’s website, why?!! As for fabric, I have been eying this gorgeous double-sided cashmere for ages, so when Les Coupons de Saint Pierre confirmed they were still delivering to the UK, I just took it as a sign and immediately ordered 2m!

And here is a sneak preview of this one, which I made a few weeks ago (and photographed, incredible!) – a blog article will follow imminently I promise!

The second item of outwear on my to-do list is the Luzerne trench coat by Deer and Doe. This one has actually been on my two-do list ever since Lise Tailor published this article about hers… 3 1/2 years ago! I literally feel in love and wanted the exact same – in a deep cherry/burgundy colour! (the picture on the right is from Lise’s blog).

It took me a good 2 years (October 2019 to be precise) to find the right fabric in Europe: a burgundy cotton twill by Robert Kaufman, which I had tracked on a US website but finally managed to get from SewMeSunshine in the UK. Amazingly, there is still 9m left at the time of writing – I think because the website picture really does not reflect the gorgeous deep and warm burgundy of the fabric. And then another year and a half to get going… and here we are! Finished yesterday actually and I am over the moon, here is a preview as well, before a detailed blog article is written.

I have just ordered more double-sided cashmere for a second Luzerne; and I have some some powder pink Ventana twill in my stash for a third, so do expect many more to come… in due time, as this is not a quick and easy sew!

And third?… I have ambitions to try and make a toile of the short version of The Princess Coat by Charm Patterns. This one will probably have to wait until Autumn to be honest, as it it a very technical piece…

Trousers and blouse combination… for a change!

You know that I rarely wear anything else than dresses – skirts with hand-knitted cardigans at a stretch. And I actually own very few pairs of trousers, which I mainly use for weekend family walks in the countryside. So these plans will definitely surprise you!

However I have been wanting to have a go at trousers ever since the Loulou trousers pattern by Maison Fauve crossed my path. Cigarette is my favourite shape for trousers; and I much prefer an invisible side zip than any other type of closure, as it makes the silhouette more elongated in my view. Another big plus of Loulou is its gorgeous pockets.

Once again, the stars weren’t quite aligned. First, until very recently, the pattern was only available as paper, not PDF, so getting it to the UK was prohibitive (so says the girls who buys cashmere and silk on a regular basis… no comment). Second I was struggling to get the right fabric, I wanted a semi-weight cotton with slight stretch but it never seemed to appear in a colour I liked.

Eventually we got there. Loulou’s PDF was released and I ordered it. I also found this great baby pink stretch cotton fabric from Croftmill, and… I actually found a more suitable pattern!!! My only reservation with Loulou is that it is quite low-waisted, while The Ultimate Trousers by Sew Over It have quite a similar shape but a higher waist. So here we are now.

And yes these trousers have been sewn too… Here is a picture but much more details to follow.

To wear with these trousers, I (obviously) need a blouse – I am not a huge fan of wearing buttons so no shirt ambitions here. I want something reasonably fitted and short. But I am struggling to settle on the pattern. Here are the different possibilities I am considering: M8147 for it beautiful neck bow; M7542 because I’ve sewn it before and the fit is perfect; V9315 because I love wraps… In any case the fabric will have to be baby blue or candy pink, my colours of choice this season.

Dresses, dresses, dresses!

Of course, I kept the best for the end. As ever, I want to sew load of dresses.

First, a dark blue denim shirt dress with bronze piping is my utmost priority – don’t ask my why! I made a similar dress in a pale blue chambray with silver piping two years ago, which I adore but which is more appropriate for warm weather. I think a darker version would be better for mid-season.

Second, a black and white gingham dress. Here as well the inspiration comes from Bittersweet Colour. I’d like to reproduce this beautiful dress, with a bias-cut perfectly fitted bodice and a midi circle dress. I have found the perfect fabric from Fabrics Galore – fingers crossed 4m will be enough for another fabric-gobbling project! However, I am not sure I want to have a shirt bodice, as I am not very good with pattern matching… So I haven’t chosen the pattern yet, but I may well combine the M7081 skirt with the collarless, raised neckline bodice of V8630 (the best fitted bodice I ever found).

Third, fourth and fifth: lots of flowers! Does a girl need so many flowery dress in her wardrobe? Of course! Here are the ideas, we’ll see how they go.

Conclusion

So nine projects in total, some of which are likely to create an unavoidable urge for immediate repeats… I’d better get going!!

According to the calendar, winter is now officially behind us – hurrah! But temperatures have not quite caught up yet in the UK, which means I will still get plenty of use of my recent knits, namely my powder pink Whitmoor and my off-white Fine Lines sweaters.

Both sweaters are unusual for me. First they are not cardigans – these definitely make up the majority of my knits. Second, they are neither cropped nor fitted, like most of my tops. Third, you can see them worn over jeans – yet jeans! I bet you have never seen a pair of those on the blog! But with successive lock-downs and forever lasting social distancing, walks in the countryside have become our main weekend and holiday activity as a family. I definitely needed an easy outfit for these – so here we are.

Beautiful Whitmoor

• Pattern: Whitmoor Sweater by Amy Lowden
• Yarn: knit in double yarn using Drops Baby Merino 54 Powder Pink (5 balls) and Drops Kids Silk 01 Off White (3 balls), in 4mm needles. This gave me the correct gauge.
• Size: I used the smallest but avoided the last row of increases at the yoke to make the sweater a bit more fitted. Beware, the intended fit is definitely very loose!

Whitmoor is definitely my favourite of the two. The yoke is absolutely beautiful and knits quite easily after the first few rows. I personally really enjoy knitting lace, as I find it quite self-correcting from one row to the next. The sweater knits top-down and fully in the round, which is an absolute pleasure after several flat knits. And if you don’t fiddle with sizing like I did, it is an extremely quick knit. It took me two weeks but would have taken one without all my un-knitting and re-knitting to test sizing (three times, argghhh!).

My only reservations is that is that the original pattern is overly loose for my taste; and the sleeves are a good 4cm too long for me. Nothing that cannot be corrected for the next one!

Not convinced by my Fine Lines Sweater

• Pattern: Fine Lines Sweater by Lily Kate France
• Yarn: knit in double yarn using Drops Baby Merino 01 White (5 balls) and Drops Kids Silk 38 Chalk (4 balls), in 4mm needles. This gave me a slightly larger gauge.
• Size: I used the smallest to compensate for my gauge.

This was my first knit from Lily Kate France and I was absolutely thrilled by the way it’s written – incredibly clear, with my favourite top down and seamless techniques, an absolute pleasure to work with.

Sadly, the sweater did not match my expectations, due to an unfortunate combination of factors. First and foremost, the yarn is not at all the colour I expected. Drops Kids Silk Chalk is a brand new colour and I expected it to be a pure white, but it turned out to be more on the greyish/ dirty snow spectrum – not great! I should also have been careful about my gauge, because the sweater ended up definitely looser than it is meant to be. And I am definitely not convinced by these puff sleeves on me – I have very narrow shoulder and I love it this way, so a garment making my shoulder larger was definitely not a good idea. I also think they really don’t go well with the lines of the body. Oh well!

Not one I will try again I’m afraid… Completely wearable in the woods for weekend walks though!

Conclusion

I am quite happy to have ventured outside of my comfort zone by knitting something a bit different. I am also very pleased with how my Whitmoor sweater turned out. However, that’s it with my winter knitting, as I am very keen to move on to Spring with light cardigans in sight – stay tuned…

If you have been reading this blog for a while, you are well aware that when I love a pattern, I can sew it many many times (as discussed most recently here). However, I think this is the first time I have pushed a pattern a bit too far – let me introduce you to “the dress with the right pattern but the wrong fabric“.

The perfect pattern…

You may (or may not) have recognised the famous V9253 dress. This pattern has been a success for years. Thousands of gorgeous versions can be seen all over the internet and Instagram, and I myself made three versions recently, which I adore. Here are my two summer versions (reviewed here and here on the blog):

…and my winter version (here on the blog):

This pattern is a joy to work with. With very straightforward instructions and a minimal number of pattern pieces, you get a stunning result.

It is also quite easy to hack. For all version, I made a FBA (explained in the article) and shortened the skirt to long midi length (in between the two lengths offered). I drafted a V-back for the summer versions:

For the winter version, I slightly crossed the front neckline to make it less plunging; and I added bands at the sleeves to give them a puff:

… but the wrong fabric

So what went wrong then? Well, I chose the wrong fabric!

I bought this beautiful (and very expensive) silk from Selvedge and Bolts and I was surprised by it stiffness when it arrived. Even after washing, it could pretty much stand on its own! You can see it most when you look at the skirt of the dress – on this picture I was standing still, so the shape of the skirt is not created by movement, it is permanent.

I thought long and hard about a pattern that would suit… I wanted a dress with a high-waisted skirt with as few pieces as possible, to keep the big flower prints intact. Eventually I chose V9253 for the wrong reasons – mainly because I got completely carried away with my winter version, which I absolutely adore.

Not only is the skirt too stiff at the bottom but the front waist pleats were an absolute nightmare – they required a change in direction, lengthening and a lot of pressing… Despite these efforts they still stand up quite a bit…

The bodice is also constructed with pleats, so it does not really fall nicely with this fabric. Not even mentioning the sleeves, which live a life of their own. Oh well…

The back is probably the nicest part of this dress actually:

In conclusion…

At least I learned a few lessons from this dress.

The first is never the get over-confident with a pattern: even if you’ve used it many time, you can still mess it up!

And the second is that if you know from the start that a fabric is not going to work… send it back!! I knew from very early on that I only wanted this type of fabric for a dress, but that none of my dress patterns worked.

This will be known as my “princess dress”, as my sons call it; and will patiently wait in my wardrobe for a big night-out – not a given in forever locked-down England!