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Saturday, 11 March 2023

Some more everyday shirts

 I made some more everyday shirts (last year- I'm still very behind on blogging), and they're all so similar that they don't need individual blog posts. (I really need to make an updated shirt construction post but here's the most complete one I have right now.)

The first two are both made from Summer Breeze weight linen from Pure Linen Envy. The first one is in Flint Grey.

I usually do thread buttons for my shirt collars, but this time I used mother of pearl because I had a couple of blue tinted ones that went well with the blueish grey. (Not historically accurate for 18th century shirts, but neither is the colour or the machine stitching, and it's for my everyday wardrobe so it doesn't matter.)


All 3 of these shirts have cuffs that take sleeve links.
I used light blue crochet cotton for the buttonholes because my local store has absolutely no grey crochet cotton. The bar tack at the front is done with grey linen.
I've gotten pretty good at doing the heart shaped reinforcements by machine. (With hand basting first, of course.)

The second shirt is in Spruce Green, and I was able to sew both it and the grey one in the same thread, because I had a medium grey coloured thread that worked with both fabrics.



I did my usual Dorset wheel buttons for this one, and all the buttonholes are in the same cotton pearl, which was the closest green I had in my stash.


And this last one is an off-white linen I got from my local Fabricville quite a few years ago. It's a bit of a heavier weight than the other two.

Here it is with my monster print waistcoat.





For this one I made a couple of bird's eye Dorset buttons using the Gina B. Silkworks tutorial, but I don't think I did my stitches tight enough around the little ring of rolled up fabric, because they got a bit squishy after a while. They worked just fine, but I found the squishiness unpleasant to touch, so I replaced them with Dorset Wheels a couple weeks ago.
I'd like to try making the bird's eye buttons again, and try to get them more firm.
I had to cut the body in 2 pieces because I had an odd shaped remnant that didn't fit the entire body on it, but you can't tell because it's under the shoulder strip.

The left cuff turned out uncomfortably tight, and I was hoping it would loosen up with wear, but it didn't. I ended up unpicking one end and adding a longer piece on.

 

2 comments:

  1. I have a question....
    Do you use a strap across the top of the shoulder for your 18th century shirts? I've seen some without, most with but don't understand the difference.

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  2. The neckline reinforcements are so neat! I've only just gotten back into sewing in the last year. Loving this blog and going through it! -J

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