Broderie Anglaise Blouse - Vogue 8927

I thought I'd write about how I make an 'inspired by' kind of garment.  Mr B said it was "really interesting" when I explained what I was doing to him.  I guess he has to say that though, he's stuck in with me at the moment!

I saw the Duchess of Cambridge wear a eyelet blouse to the Chelsea Flower Show last year and it has stuck in my mind since then.  It's a guilty pleasure following what she wears. Mr B is definitely of the opinion that the royal family should be replaced by cats.

Lots of people find out where the clothes she wears are from so it's really easy to track them down.  This one is the Mabel Shirt from M.i.H Jeans, the description even included handy size information.

   

I'm not really into floral patterns so it was more the idea of a white broderie anglaise blouse. I like to think about what it is exactly that I like about the garment, in this case the simplicity, the stand collar and slim but slightly puffed sleeves. I had some eyelet fabric already, I thought I'd like to make a white eyelet dress, got everything ready and then changed my mind, so I just needed to look for a pattern.  I made Vogue 8927 last year and thought that would be a good start.

The sleeves aren't quite what I had in mind, I thought the ones from New Look 6107 would work but when I compared the pattern pieces I realised they would be way too big so only used the cuff piece. I did use the New Look sleeve as a guide for length and shaping at the edge.

Then I tried on my original blouse to check the fit, which was fine, and think about the length. I decided to cut the pattern piece at the scallop line for view A. I also remembered that I didn't like the shape of the collar stand, it's really square, so I used the one from Vogue 9029 (which I used to make my Alex Chung inspired blouse).

After all these decisions were made it all went smoothly, I found a little bit of cotton voile to underline the collar, cuffs and button band with.  I love making blouses, the pattern pieces aren't too big and there's lots of little steps so you can make progress every time you sit down to sew. I'm getting better at collars each time.

The only buttons I had were 11mm ones to cover, so no decisions to make there! I made the centre of the pattern a feature of the button.

I've bought some shirting from Fabworks 'originally used by a top British designer famed for his iconic striped designs' to make Mr B a shirt "Maybe you could have it ready by Christmas?".