Roll up! Roll up!
The circus is coming to town, in form of this bright bold jersey and lace top!
This colourful circus-ey top wasn’t the intended September make -originally i chose the navy colourway of this fabulous stripey jersey but when it wasn’t available I saw an excuse to go bolder and I do love circus stripes so I went with the red colourway and kept with my original choice of turquoise stretch lace – here is my version of the Simplicity Ladies Easy Sewing Pattern 1463…
To be honest I wasn’t 100% sure whether these fabrics would go together and it’s a very different style for me but I’m so happy with this top, sure it does somewhat remind me of a certain sporting team but as I’m so unsporty I’m not even sure which team that is so therefore I don’t care and will wear it with pride, circus pride!
Here’s my kit from the lovely people of Minerva:
I chose the Simplicity Ladies Easy Sewing Pattern 1463 because of the lace really – I love lace and wanted to try combining fabrics- I think of jersey and stretch fabrics as still a hurdle to overcome so I threw myself in the deep end with stretch lace and jersey. I also wanted to have a go at something casual and loose fitting as everything I’ve made so far is fitted and somewhat formal, well not everything but you know what I mean! As I’m planning to make jeans soon I am thinking about tops to go with them so this will happily join that pile.
Both these fabrics are great – the jersey is a lovely medium weight Thick ‘n’ Thin Stripe Stretch Jersey Dress Fabric is so cosy and has the perfect drape for the this top with it’s triangular hem. It doesn’t curl too much so a joy to cut and sew and the red is so vivid it really pops! The 61″ wide Stretch Floral Lace Dress Fabric is very pretty with a lovely floral pattern going throughout. It’s a bit slippery and likes to move but as long as you pin pin pin it behaves well to sew with.
I had planned to whiz this one up with my overlocker but went and forgot the power supply for it for a week of housesitting/sewing so I had to make do with my trusty sewing machine instead – which is shame as I’m not a huge fan of how zig zag stitch looks – even when using a stretch needle it always looks a bit messy – maybe that’s just me? Anyway it all holds together nicely and jersey gave me the added bonus of not having to hem which I totally went with- especially as I was already happy with the length.
OK I admit it’s not all the joy of fair here – for some reason this top hasn’t turned out much like the pattern – the shoulders are meant to be in lace (really not sure what happened there) but if anyone asks – I wanted it to be like that. And as you can see- I have some issues in the back… enough said! I will fix the back if I can soon. I think I got a bit confused with where the raw edges of the lace are and attached the neckband to the wrong bit but I am so behind with making this, it is literally the day before the blog comes out so I had to make it, get piccies and write it up all in few hours! Any amendments will happen tomorrow which is too late for this post!
This top will get a lot of wear it really brightens a dull day and is so so comfortable. I love the sleeves and the mixture of classy with wacky oh and for once I’ve been left with quite a bit of fabric to play with so I’m going to make some pants with the rest!! Thank you Minerva!
Until next time – happy sewing all,
