As a matter of principle I do very little apologising on this blog, however today I have to say a big sorry for the terrible quality of photos in this post. There is only one room in our house that allows for half-way decent photography, but the recent miserable weather has still produced murky pics, even after tweaking the brightness. PLUS, there's nowhere to get shots that include below the knee with a white background so you get a boring door in the frame instead. Ok, apologies and explanations over. Don't get used to them though... Not that my photography is ever that great anyway so you'd probably not have noticed anything if I'd just shut up!
Back to the project in hand. I made a thing! This pattern is totally not something I'd naturally gravitate towards. It's way too trendy for me. In fact the Hudson pants pattern by True Bias is so trendy that my sister-in-law-who's-an-actor-and-has-been-on-the-telly has a shop-bought pair almost exactly the same as this pattern. 'So why the hell are you making them, Zoe?', I hear you ask. Well I signed up to a free mindfulness-yoga course (don't judge) and after the first session I realised I had bugger-all appropriate to wear since my awesome charity-shopped leopard print leggings got a bleach stain on them. I already had the pattern from participating in the blog tour for the Perfect Pattern Parcel #6, I had some vaguely suitable fabric in the stash, so it was ON.
Pattern:
So, as we've already established, this is a trendy sewing pattern. You could also hurl 'contemporary' and 'urban' at it and I'm pretty sure they'd stick. The waist sits low and the ankles are fitted and the legs kind of carrot-shape their way between the two. I didn't even monkey around with altering this pattern in anyway like I usually do, I wanted to see what it was made of.
According to my measurements, I should have gone for the size 10. I know all sewing pattern companies have their own unique sizing scales, and that one of the awesome reasons many of us sew is to escape the tyranny of clothing sizes, but I just couldn't accept I could be a 10, so I cut the size 12. This was also in part because I wasn't sure how my weird fabric would behave. Guess what happened? They came out a size too big.
To be fair, the ankles are the right size, if I'd gone for the size 10 they would have felt too tight. Also, I wanted to have room to get in to the sphinx position at a moments notice. Pluses? I really like the pockets and the logical way the whole garment is constructed. The instructions are clear and generally excellent.
However, sizing mishap aside, I'm just not sold on the fit. They feel as comfy as you could wish for around the waist (obvs linked to the fact I made a size too big!). Although they look fine when I'm standing up straight, the minute I sit down with my legs tucked under me (my preferred position, FYI) or bend my knees generally, they feel too short and kind of pull annoyingly. I've checked the pattern and they are designed for someone who is my height or an inch taller (can't remember exactly), so it shouldn't be that. Unless the fact that I'm quite short-waisted (my natural waist is a bit higher than 'standard') meaning I have slightly longer legs than the average 5ft 5" lady... But I still feel I'd like to add perhaps 6 cm to this pattern if I were to have another bash. Although that might look a bit baggy and generally terrible and frumpy. I dunno. I'm tempted to cut these down, create a new pair of cuffs and make them into the cropped length option to have as loungewear in the summer. Maybe I'm just not hip enough.
Fabric:
I can't remember the exact turn of events, but I have a whole load of maroon synthetic double knit/interlock (not sure which) in my stash. Like, A LOT. It's not what I would class as 'my colour' but it's nice enough for sports/loungewear and it feels pretty soft and nice quality. It has adequate stretch with a good recovery so it seemed a good choice for this project. I like the contrast waistband, cuffs and pocket binding on the True Bias version pictured above, but I wasn't sure I could be arsed to go down that route with mine. I bought matching cord (meant for soft furnishings, nice) from my local haberdasher, but I didn't like the way it formed a lump through the waist band so I ended up cutting off a smaller length and threading it through the buttonholes at the front only, rather than round the whole waist. I used my overlocker for most of this project. The seam allowance was already 1 cm, so I didn't need to trim much away as I constructed them.
Thoughts:
Well, it's hard to have many thoughts when you're getting photo-bombed as hard as I was that day! But if pushed I would have to say they are kind of a fail. I like the general look of them, I'm happy with the construction, and not even that bothered about the looseness. But the fact that they feel too short (without looking like it) and pulling when I bend my knees means they don't really work for yoga, which is what I made them for. Others have made wonderful, successful versions of these. Winnie of Scruffy Badger Time, for example, has made multiple pairs so she must be into them (here's one of them). So maybe it's just me. Initially I thought that I'd have another try at this pattern but I don't think I can be bothered seeing as my yoga course is almost over. If I sign up to more yoga in the future, I'll probably have a go at some leggings, or a more conventional type of trackie/yoga bottoms.
