sewing clothes

[Carlie Wolf]

I use to do a lot more clothes sewing but not so much anymore. Now just the occasional bathrobe or pj's.

Anyway, I was looking at the J. Jill catalog and I like a lot of their casual loose shirt styles but I refuse to spend $79 for everyday shirts. I'm thinking of buying a shirt pattern and doing a few. I know they don't appear to have the bust darts that we use to see so can anyone suggest what types of fabric works well for those types of shirts? They certainly don't look very hard to make :-)

[bubba]

Re: sewing clothes

They are not hard to make, especially if they don't have a back yoke and cuffs like a mans shirt. I can pop out a dress shirt in about 1.5 hours, and the majority of that is doing the cuffs and yoke.

I don't dress so fancy to sew.....

[Carlie Wolf]

Re: sewing clothes

Bubba, what kind of fabric do you buy for them? What's the fiber content?

[Deegles]

Re: sewing clothes

Chambray and linen are in! And trending! A lot of the expensive shirts out ,there are made from polyester very see thru. and a whole lot less expensive if you sew them yourself.

[bubba]

Re: sewing clothes

I buy shirting, either at Joanns or Hancocks.....they had some nice shirting still at Hancocks last night, but did not buy any. You can usually find it on the flat folds at J's for a good price.

[Iris Girl]

Re: sewing clothes

camp style shirts are quite easy and if its a short sleeve even easier. I like the yoke in the back I think it gives more body to a shirt. I use cotton fabrics or shirting.

[songbird857]

Re: sewing clothes

Also, something with a tiny bit of spandex gives a nice drape, very flattering....

[Carlie Wolf]

Re: sewing clothes

These are all great ideas. I did searches on Chambray last night because I didn't know what it is. I really like the look and I thought the prices were reasonable. I might eventually try something with the spandex too. I am so uneducated when it comes to sewing shirts and fabric types for it. With the improvements in sewing machines I'm no longer afraid of screwing up buttonholes so that puts shirts back on my radar :-)

At any rate I spent hours and hours last night looking at shirt patterns on the internet and bookmarked what I like then did the same with some of the fabrics. Suddenly I looked up and Oh My! It was 11:30!!! I did order one pattern that I thought might be nice to start with and I'll order fabric next week when my check comes in.

Iris Girl what is a camp shirt???

[Iris Girl]

Re: sewing clothes

A camp shirt is a simple short sleeve button down the front shirt. No darts. Think hawaiian shirt style. 4 or 5 buttons and a collar easy peasy to make cool and comfortable

[Hulamoon]

Re: sewing clothes

I love camp shirts. You can pretty much use any fabric for them. In Hawaii (thanks for the reference April) they mostly use Rayon.

[songbird857]

Re: sewing clothes

Carlie wolf, JoAnn's has Kwik sew patterns on sale for 3.99 (last day today). They also have others makers coming up on sale soon. I used to use kwik sew patterns for my daughters' figure skating outfits and found them to be very user friendly

[Carlie Wolf]

Re: sewing clothes

I had seen a few Kwik patterns I liked. Bummer, because now I'm at the point that I have to wait until the end of the week to order.
I wish I could convince myself to drive over to the store instead of on line. I really would like to feel the fabric types too. It's only a little over a half hr away. I just hate driving on the highway though :-(