Vogue 9005

Pattern: Vogue 9005, view A

Size: XS in the shoulders, medium at hips (for reference, my measurements are: 33-28-38)

Fabric: Lightweight rayon jersey from Fabric Mart

Alterations: I lengthened the tank portion only by 2 inches, and I reduced the armhole depth by 2 inches in order to combat stretching.

General Notes:

I always seem to be attracted to the strange tops.   Although I am perfectly aware that this looks a little bit like I’m carrying around a spare napkin, I love the style anyway!  I’ve been wearing more pants this year, particularly skinny jeans, and because I’m both pear shaped and have a long torso I have a hard time buying tops that are long enough and which fit in both the shoulders and hips.  Plus, as I mentioned, I like weird, arty, drapey things, which aren’t always in abundance in stores. I was attracted to this design right away, and I have an abundance of knit fabric, so I knew I had to make it!

Pattern instructions for knits don’t always make sense, as they are often written as though the fabric were woven.  This one wasn’t bad, really, although the tank does have darts, and I don’t like darts in a t-shirt.  The binding instructions were a little crazy – I opted to edgestitch my binding from the front and then trim it close in the back – you can’t tell, and bindings on knits are a pain.

The pattern piece for the drape is enormous, and I had to cut it on the floor.  It was actually rather simple to construct, although the directions had to resort to saying things like “sew as in drawing” when it was hard to explain.  All you are doing it creating the top and drape separately, and then binding them together at the armhole and neckline.  I didn’t copy the matching symbols because my fabric would not mark, and it worked out fine.

The drape, as you can see, hangs freely:

I had to shorten the armholes by 2 inches due to the weight of all that fabric.  The neckline is also rather deep, although I don’t have much cleavage so it works ok for me.  Anyone larger would probably want to adjust that.  I did lengthen the tank by 2 inches, and I did not hem anything.  I do wish that the bottom edge of the tank could be hemmed easily, but this fabric doesn’t take hemming well.

The drape continues onto the back:

As you can see, it tends to hang off to the side.  That’s ok, but I don’t think the back view on this pattern is the greatest ever.

I think this is an interesting pattern, and it was simple to make – I recommend it!