Purple Seagull Trousers

This is version 3 of my first RTW rip-off. You can see more detail on the fitting in this post where I've grouped all 3 versions together to show the progression.

The jeans are fully-fledged jeans and I'm proud to say that I can just about complete a pair in a day (6-8 hours). This includes all of the cutting, fusing and stitching with a good level of detail. If only jackets took that long!

While my dream of bright pink trousers still hasn't been realised, these are the best possible alternative. The fabric is a beautiful burgundy/mulberry/plummy colour and it was very easy to work with. It comes from Ditto Fabrics and did have a designer label attached to it, though I'll be damned if I remember which one. Thankfully it has lost a little of its sheen in the wash, at first it looked a little shiny under artificial light.

I've been wearing them practically non-stop since they were first made. The fabric is being broken in and I think these will become perfect once they've been laundered a few more times. The fabric is also quite dense and is fairly wind resistant and warm - which is a relief as we're heading in to winter.

The pocket lining and waistband facing are both seagulls again. I think this'll be the last of it. There are two lines of top-stitching, one in a a similar colour, which ends up nearly invisible, and one contrasting dark blue which pops a little up close. It's quite subtle but draws the garment together quite nicely.

I finally remembered to take a photo of my bar tacks! Yay!

Inseam topstitching

Up until now I've been freestyling a bit with belt loops, for future versions I'll actually measure and cut pieces that look a bit more normal.

Look at how this toptitching lined up across the waistband and the fly facing, yeah!

You know the problem though? By the time I get around to belt loops I'm so close to finishing and so excited to be nearly done that they get forgotten a bit. They definitely don't get the care they need. There's always next time.

I'm still getting my head around waistbands. My most recent pairs have been good, but I may do a whole post on the little nuances that make a difference.

It's probably about time for some normal-looking trousers, don't you think?

K

Blue Octopus Trousers

I'm not sure what to make of these jeans. The topstitching is absolutely adorable - it adds a great pop to the trousers, but they've got a few problems and are already sat on my repair pile.

First of all, I messed up the pattern (no biggie, it's a learning process) and took out too much space. You can read more the nitty-gritty of fitting here.

The plan for these trousers was a summery lime green or bright pink. B talked me out of it and in favour of this sky blue. Now, for all my grumping and moaning about the colour choice, it's actually quite nice. It's bright and goes well with the threads/notions I had in my stash. These trousers got worn a lot during the Edinburgh Fringe as they went well with the staff uniform. They also proved useful when colour-matching my lunch over the summer. The quality of the fabric isn't good, which is quite annoying, and you could tell from a distance that it wasn't great stuff. It has pilled and gone fluffy after very few washes - I should've said something before the guy cut it off the bolt. Too bad. It draped and stretched and bunched during sewing. My bad - it made sewing quite tough and it shows when they're laid out flat.

Colour-matching my lunch

Colour-matching with RIBA's Brutalist Playground

The detail shows these trousers have triple topstitching, bar tacks, octopus pockets, contrast waistband facing and zip fly. You know, I completely forgot to take any detail shots of these trousers, so hopefully you can see some of it in these pictures.

We'll see if they get worn a lot - they're useful as there's no way they'll fall down. I can't correct them without remaking the whole thing, so it's not really worth the effort.

I do need to develop better waistband habits though. This time the edges didn't meet nicely at centre front. For this pair and the yellow pair I also understitched the top edge of the waistband before anything else. So the corners ended up messy. I think it would be a better option to stitch this near the end.

Next up - purple jeans

K