It's always a desire of mine to take beautiful on-location photos of a new me-made garment when we go on holiday. Trouble is, I'm always too busy holiday-ing to actually do it. Then, when we finally get the opportunity, it's not even me who gets to pose in an exotic location!
It may not be immediately obvious, but these photos were shot in Japan. We'd been cycling round the island of Teshima, which is a short hop away from the more famous Naoshima, where we'd been enjoying some art. It was a little bit off-season when we went, and mid-week too, so unfortunately a lot of the 'art houses' where artists had taken over derelict locations over the island and created art installations were unfortunately closed, but the Teshima Art Museum (which was incredible) was open, as was the Yokoo house (some cool features but the painting style not to my taste at all).
If you're a fan of modern art and are in Japan, Naoshima is a must and Teshima is worth checking out if you have time. Go at the weekend, or if you can't - just aim to spend a couple of hours there (there are only two ferries back to Naoshima and if you go for the later one you'll have too much time on your hands), rent an electric bike and make the Art Museum your first stop as it is a very special experience. Cycling around the rest of the island is pretty cool too - it's a lot more rural than Naoshima and has rice paddies and birds of prey everywhere! Anyway the reason we have this random boatyard as a backdrop is because we were early for our ferry and had an hour to kill.
Enough about the location, you're here for the sewing, right? So, this is a modified Colette Negroni, with a popover placket. After trying the method out on the Simon Shirt I knew I needed something with a little more ease (to make the actual "popping over" easier), but wasn't sure how I was going to manage the convertible collar/ placket intersection.
In all honesty I'm not sure I really did it in the most elegant way, and I had completely omitted the facing to create the front on the fold and placket but then realised in process that I needed something to anchor the convertible collar to the placket so had to create a mini-facing on the fly. I don't have construction photos of this, but basically I traced off the original facing pieces but curved them in so they're much shorter and connect to the placket halfway down on the inside, then handstitched it to the placket to secure.
The placket is also probably a bit wide - I decided in this plaid the placket looked weird being too skinny and decided to make it wider on a whim. I was actually a bit gutted when I realised this would mean such a wide flat space at centre front - funny how making that adjustment didn't compute in my brain to the effect on actual neckline, but actually I think it looks fine. I had tried to match up the plaids too but didn't bargain on the placket folding screwing up the grid spacing so the vertical lines are way off - but at least the horizontal lines match. Next time I think I'd do it on the bias for interest (as I did with the back yoke), but I felt it would look cleaner to try and pattern match.
The wide placket also means the buttons don't quite secure the top corner, which wants to curl up at the edge, and I'll be adding a tiny nylon popper to hold that in place. The shirt doesn't really look right with the placket undone with it being so wide (and having the improvised facings sewn on afterwards) but that's OK, being in a darker colour it suits cooler weather and being done all the way up.
After all the little challenges in making, another thing that has happened since after the shirt's first wash is that the cuffs have frayed quite badly. The fabric is a linen (from Brixton's wonderful Simply Fabrics, as are the nut buttons) and I must have just trimmed the seam allowances too close! I think some store-bought navy binding oversewn around the cuff edges will have to be my fix as I'm not in the mood sew new cuffs - I'm not even sure if I have enough fabric left!
Anyway I'm happy to have finally gifted this, and completed one of my Make Nine!
Are you good at getting glamorous location shots of your new makes? Or are you like me, full of good intentions but too busy trying to stick to your sightseeing itinerary?
I'll leave you with some photos of Angus contemplating a bird of prey (hawk?) resting on a lamppost.
NorseOtter xx
What a lovely shirt. IvI' been wanting to try something like this for awhile but also found the shirts too feminine. Not much for hacking but now I think illI give it a try.
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