Sewing: SWAP 2013

It's SWAP time again!

This year's Sewing With A Plan contest on Stitcher's Guild requires two coordinating "capsules" of clothes, each of them containing either three tops and two bottoms, or two tops, one bottom, and one dress. Plus a "bridging" garment that links the two capsules.

I normally join the SWAP, babble a little, and then drop the whole thing on the floor. When I started typing this, I mistyped the site's name as "Stitcher's Guilt"--apparently I'm feeling bad about not finishing my SWAPs.

But here I go again. The above rules require nine to eleven garments, depending on how you use the dress option. One garment can exist before the SWAP. So that means that I need to sew at least eight garments before the end of April, to finish a SWAP for the very first time. Will I make it? Suspense!

I'm going with maximum predictability. I've already made four Liberty Shirts, so I have that pattern down. I've made two of that Burda six-gore skirt, so that's pretty reliable too. I have a lot of linen and a little wool that's been waiting to be made up in those patterns. And I would be perfectly happy to own a closet full of them. So the lowest-ambition SWAP for me would be:

First Capsule:

• Liberty shirt: Yam-colored medium-weight linen
• Liberty shirt: Grass green medium-to-light-weight linen
• Gored skirt: Chocolate medium-to-heavy-weight linen
• Gored skirt: Brown-sugar-colored lightweight glossy linen, plus lining.
• Tank or, if there's enough, Liberty Shirt: Same linen.

Second Capsule:

• Liberty Shirt: White medium-to-light-weight linen
• Liberty Shirt: Black wool blend
• Gored skirt: Black wool blend
• Liberty Shirt: Black linen (preexisting)
• Gored skirt: Small-scale black and white houndstooth.

Bridging Garment: 

• I have absolutely no clue.

This still isn't totally predictable. I'm not quite sure that the brown-sugar linen is going to work for that skirt; it may be both too lightweight and too crisp, and therefore may crumple like tissue paper. And I'm not sure about an Asian shape like the Liberty Shirt in a houndstooth pattern. But the yam, green, and white shirts, and the chocolate and black skirts, are perfectly straightforward, so that's weeks of sewing before I need to think about the less certain garments.

And two of them are cut! I cut out the green shirt and black skirt before I even remembered the existence of the SWAP. And the Serger of Majesty and Wonder should make the skirt, in particular, far easier than it would have been on the regular sewing machine.

So it could happen. This year. Really. Maybe. It's not completely inconceivable.

Are you sewing? For winter? For summer? For crafts? Needlepoint? Tell!

Image: Wikimedia Commons.

So. That sewing with a plan concept. Let's start with analyzing my recent plan-free sewing:

What I made and I wear:

Black linen Liberty Shirt
Red linen Liberty Shirt
Black linen gored skirt
Pink silk crepe cowl neck top

What I made and don't or rarely wear:

Two white notched-collar blouses
One green notched-collar blouse
Red and white polka dot cowl neck top
Green and white polka dot tunic.

An obvious pattern is the Liberty Shirt versus the notched-collar shirt. The Liberty Shirt is easy to make and feels satisfyingly solid when done. It's terribly comfortable and doesn't need any fussing or rearranging when worn.  It does need pressing, but that's just to smooth it out, rather than fighting with recalcitrant facings and twisted bits.

The notched-collar shirt is more fitted and shorter, so it takes more fussing. It's designed with loose facings; I stitch them down but that always involves a little arguing. I don't like the sleeves with either cuffs or a turned hem. The collar (it's that HotPatterns notched collar) always involved a moment of "will it work?" suspense.

Oh, and the Liberty Shirts are all in pure linen, while none of the notched-collar shirts are.

So it appears that the sensible thing is to make more linen Liberty Shirts, and meanwhile to lengthen the notched-collar shirt, give it sleeve vents like the Liberty Shirt, and audition it in some linen to see if I wear it. I do love the faintly retro feel of that shirt, but apparently not enough to wear it.

Moving on, what I expect to make and likely succeed at:

Black wool/rayon gored skirt
Matching Liberty Shirt
Grass green Liberty Shirt
Chocolate brown gored skirt
Cream linen Liberty Shirt
Amber/pumpkin Liberty Shirt

This seems sort of plannish, in that all of the Liberty Shirts (black, red, black again, green, cream, pumpkin) should go with all of the skirts (black, black again, brown.)

Fun plans with lower odds of success:

Cassis gored skirt  (Cassis, you ask? OK, OK, purple.)
Matching Liberty Shirt with dark cassis silk facings.
Sewing Workshop Haiku Two jacket in a tweedy green cotton flannel with green silk facings
An improved version of the notched-collar shirt pattern, in a pink Japanese cotton with green polka dots

Plannish? The cassis shirt should work with its matching skirt, both black skirts and might play nice with the brown skirt. The cassis skirt... um...yeah. It would probably work with the cream shirt. Maybe the green shirt. It wouldn't actually clash with the black shirt, but I think all that visual weight on top will be weird.

The green jacket should work with all the skirts, but I'm not sure if the shape pairs well with the shape of the Liberty Shirts.

The Japanese cotton shirt has no friends other than maybe the black and brown skirts. I think that it's part of another, so far unplanned, family/capsule.

Hmmmm.

Image: Wikimedia Commons.

Joining yet another sewalong: Make all my clothes for a year

So I make sewing plans--for the Autumn 6PAC, for a SWAP, for the PatternReview Mini Wardrobe contest--and then I do whatever I darn well please. Not that that's a bad thing; it's my sewing time and my wardrobe, after all. But I am sold on this whole planning concept and I'd like to actually carry out a plan or two.

I've joined yet another sew-along, one with more flexibility: the Make All Your Clothes For A Year sewalong on PatternReview. My definition of "all" is not going to include underwear, hosiery, raingear, or, really, most accessories. Oh, and I will likely buy the 2013 OSF souvenir tee and the 2013 Daedalus Project tee and possibly another souvenir tee or so. Otherwise, I'm planning to make every new clothing item that I acquire, from 9/2/2012 to 9/1/2013.  Bwaha!

Now to figure out the planning part.

Image: Wikimedia Commons