Postcards from Sewing Camp – Part 1

Sew, here we are in Florida at Louise Cutting’s Oh2Sew Sewing Intensive Weekend workshop, which we refer to as Sewing Camp. Liz C., Nancy, Tina and Wendy spent today making a comprehensive measurement chart and creating a “working muslin” of One-Seam Pants. Louise calls it a “working muslin” because we are making the pants out of a lovely black linen/rayon blend fashion fabric, not workhorse muslin. Over the next two days, we will continue to refine its fit to our individual bodies, hence the idea that it is a working muslin. We will be able to wear these pants at the end of the workshop.

Tip Alert #1: When measuring your upper arm girth (your bicep), have your measuring buddy put her hand (fingers toward your elbow) on your bicep and include this into the measurement. This automatically adds the upper arm sleeve ease.

Tip Alert #2: You should date your measurements and include your weight, so you can keep an accurate recording of your measurements and how your weight affects those measurements. Need a worksheet of what measurements to take? Download the worksheet from Keyka Lou that we mentioned in the User-Friendlier Measurement Worksheet post.

Nancy and Liz start their One-Seam Pants

One of the first things you notice about Louise’s patterns is the sizing is more realistic. A small is not a 21″ hip, which would normally put me somewhere between “put that donut down!” and “Do you need two airplane seats?” Louise’s patterns also have the measurements for the important areas that you would normally adjust, such as the hip circumference, crotch length and unfinished hem length. We learned how to proportion these areas in addition of how to adjust the “dip” or “see-saw” needed to accommodate a fleshier front-midsection or seat. This prevents the saggy baggies in the lower pants area.

Liz and Wendy make pattern adjustments	Louise demonstrates the importance of adjusting your pattern
Louise explains fitting to Nancy and Tina	Tina is perplexed - Was I supposed to subtract or add

The next two days will be filled with learning a whole host of techniques that promise to take our sewing to the next level, including how to determine where is the best placement for 3/4-sleeves and bracelet sleeves using the Rule of 3’s and where a tunic length should best lie. More on that in our next postcard.

Until tomorrow!

Read our other postcards from camp:
Postcard #2
Postcard #3

P.S. Here’s a little camp memory for you: