Avery Good Place to Start

Avery tunic top, Style Arc, made from a very small piece of fun koi carp printed jersey, plus some stretch white poplin.

Simple, clean lines, as ever from Style Arc.  It looks enormous on the table, but seems to fit me fine as a cool summer top [yes yes, I know, but I did cut it out months ago, then just never needed any summer clothes.  maybe next year]

Cutting this out was a beast of a job.  As mentioned in the post about retail therapy [linked above] the koi fabric was a scant half metre of extra wide [180cm] French terry fabric from Kailuna fabrics, pricey but irresistible [£8/HALF metre, jeez].  I had to ponder long and hard on how best to feature it.  This pattern suggested itself, and I JUST managed to squeak the front yoke and sleeves out of it.  The stash yielded up some stock off-white stretch cotton for the body and upper back, and then it sat, cut out but neglected for several months.

I’m determined to clear as much of the current sewing pile as I can before going back to work next week, and having cleared all the dark clothes, I re-threaded the overlocker and cracked on with the white pile.  This looked like the quickest job, so I took a look at the instructions, because, faced hem and exposed [optional] back zip.  It clearly wasn’t going to NEED the back zip, but I haven’t really jumped on the exposed zip trend at all yet, and the back looked so DULL with all that plain white fabric, I decided to jazz it up a bit.  The zip stash obligingly regurgitated this ancient harvested red zip with bold metal teeth, so I picked all the old thread off it, pressed it, and decided that the red looked fine as a ‘match’ to the koi orange.

I stared some more.  Still too plain.  Topstitching!  But I wanted a bold contrast, and we all know my topstitching is a bloody disgrace, so I opted to hand stitch for a more decorative look.  [This came to mind because I was wearing that Edwardian bolero jacket last week, and I’d hand finished the ribbon trim on the collar…and it looked nice, so why not?]

I rummaged in the thread stash, and found an ooooooold wooden reel of coral/salmon pink thread, badly faded on the top layer…to exactly the colour of the koi!  Huzzah for old stash dipping!

I got stitching.  And stitching.  All along the yoke seams front and back, then twice round the hem, once on the outside edge, then again at the inside edge of the hem facings.  I think it adds enough to lose the bedsheet look.  Maybe.

Things I did my own way- I inserted the sleeves flat, because, well, jersey.  I could not fathom the instructions for the zip and facing [why not?  no clue] and it just wouldn’t play nicely, so I applied the facing and turned it, then just stuck the zip on the back with wondertape, and stitched it in place.  Not so pretty inside, but hey, it’s for me and I don’t much care-it covers the red tape better anyway!  And I bound the neck edge so that the binding shows, rather than turned to the inside, because colour at the back, and added a button and loop at the top.  That’s it.  Shimplesh.

The sleeves were a bit long [unusual with my monkey arms] so I chopped about 1.5″ off them.

Anyway, a cool, comfy tunic for summer, which may also get some wear at work when the heating goes on and we are forced to sweat all day!

PS That’s 2/3 of the ‘menagerie’ fabrics sewn up, happy elephants and cool Koi…now to decide what to make of that moody monochrome…