Made By A Fabricista: Workwear Ready

I'm excited for my first post in 2023! At the beginning of the year, I recently went back to working in person so now I am looking to make and wear pieces that I can wear to work. The goal is to be functional but also very fashionable since I am a fashion design professor.

I saw this blue denim fabric and knew I wanted to make some pants; I just wasn’t sure what kind. I decided to make Mimi G x Simplicity S8985 View B pants. I liked the oversized flare look, I just made one slight modification to them by adding a pintuck along the front. This was easy to add since the waistline was called to be slightly gathered to fit. The fabric had a hand closer to linen and was very lightweight which was great and very satisfying to sew. I lengthened the pants by 3” and finished with a 2” hem.

The top I used Simplicity S9707. It’s an oversized partial button down top. I decided to create a high low hem by combining two different views. I loved the print of the fabric but honestly as simple as it looked this fabric was a bit tricky.

The fabric is a poly blend with stretch going along the selvage. Most times with woven fabrics it has give along the cross grain with it being more taught along the straight grain. This one was opposite which caused some issues especially since certain pattern pieces had to be cut a certain way with the grain.

I ended up having excess in some of my pieces when trying to match it up with other pieces. For example, the back yoke was to be cut along the cross grain which didn’t have stretch in the material so matching it with the back piece I had to adjust my pleat to fit. If I were to do it again, I would probably cut them in the opposite direction to get more of a true grain. The fabric overall was a pleasure to sew. I did use a very low heat when pressing to avoid melting the fabric.

I love how both pieces came together for this look; they also look great worn separately with other pieces.

JASMINE | @sewmuchjazz