Having identified several pretty printed viscose fabrics, I decided to use part of a 5+metre length remnant of the ‘Golden Palm Leaves’ print viscose challis purchased from Rainbow Fabrics at a cost of £14.18 for the length. An absolute bargain!
Golden Palm Leaves viscose challis from Rainbow Fabrics
I used a ‘new to me’ pattern – New Look 6731with a simple hack of full length sleeves with placket and gathered into a cuff. I have previously used this sleeve pattern on other blouses and dresses. I cut a 22 at the shoulders and bust, grading out to a 24 at waist and hips. Cutting out took just 1.8 metres (x 140cms wide) which still leaves a generous 3+ metres remaining to make a dress.
This project reminded me of why I prefer to use my personal bodice block and then hack different designs onto it. There were several adjustments that I had to make.
- Slope shoulders x ½ inch at the shoulder point which also raised the underarm.
- Reduced shoulder width x 1½ inches and re-draw the armscye front and back.
- Make a 2 inch sway back adjustment and then add 2 inches to centre front bodice (and facing) length grading to 0 at the side seams to allow for full bust.
- Ignore the front body darts but use shallow back body darts to insert the narrow ties.
- I added a full sleeve into buttoned cuff which is the type of sleeve that I prefer.
Construction of the collar and facing was straightforward and I used French seams throughout. The only other change to construction was to omit the back neck facing. I simply turned in the seam allowance at the back neck and top stitched into place.
This fabric was very fluid and that made the construction a little like ‘herding cats’ but I got there in the end. The nature of the fabric also made machining buttonholes more ‘trepidatious’ but again persistence paid off. I applied fraycheck to the reverse of each buttonhole as I could see they were very fragile.
New Look 6731 
Conclusion: Whilst I like the shaping and construction of the shawl collar I am not enamoured with the blouse itself. I intend to transfer the collar design to my TNT bodice, add the back tie feature and make a shirt-tail shaped hemline on another blouse in the future.
Project #66 completed 7th October 2021