FINISHED! Pollock Peplum

Part of the Charlie Hebo public memorial in Place Kleber, Strasbourg

We are back home from 6 weeks holiday! Back to school and work on Tuesday, so I am profiting from the last few days off to get to know my new sewing machine, my birthday present from last November (yes such a long wait to get to use it) and to sew up some holiday fabric. Predominately the holiday was to visit family but for those of you who follow me on instagram will know that I also managed to squeeze in two fantastic days with sewing friends. Meeting up with sewing friends who I've met through the online community is really like meeting up with old friends. It just comes so naturally. These days were absolute highlights of my trip especially as they occurred after Charlie Hebdo, a time when I really needed a bit of distraction from the profound sadness.

I'll talk about my  sewing day in Paris in another post, but this make is from fabric I bought in Strasbourg, where I spent most of the holiday. Here, I met up with Christine for a day of chatting, fabric, lunch and shopping.  We were also going to meet up with Connie, who sadly couldn't make it at the last minute.  Next time! And in fact Christine has sent me a list of amazing places to go to in the extended area so now I can't wait to go to Strasboug again next year and meet up with Christine and Connie! In Strasbourg centre ville there isn't really many places to fabric shop, but there is La Droguerie, where I bought two pieces,  This make uses a liberty-esqe lawn called Pollock Flamboyant Ambiance. an abstract splatter paint design.  I bought matching binding (genius!).

I'm always nervous about sewing up holiday fabric. It always seems so much more special, but I was impatient to sew and try my new machine and this was the 'easiest' piece of fabric that I bought. I was going to sew another Marthe, but there has been a lot of talk on instagram on the Japanese Sewalong so I thought I would have a look at my Japanese pattern books.

Last year when I was in Sydney for Frocktails, Lizzy  bought  Clean and Simple and I immediately fell in love with the jumpsuit in it.  I didn't have time to go to the book shop in Sydney and pick up a copy but immediately rang the bookstore on arriving back in Canberra and bought it over the phone. I am still super keen to sew up the jumpsuit, especially after meeting Christine, who is absolutely the jumpsuit queen, (making 11 in the last 18 months!), but I was looking for something simple and quick, so after much deliberation settled on the peplum blouse on the cover.  My love for the peplum is well documented and I have been itching to sew a higher necked top for ages,

During the making of this blouse, I fluctuated between loving it and hating it. The peplum is unusual and sits lower than I would normally like to wear it (being on a trend lately of moving peplums higher and higher) and it is elastic waisted. I find I have to be a bit vigilant with the elastic as it can cause the 'ruffles' to be a bit uneven. I love Japanese patterns as they are drafted for my height 160cm (well I'm a few centimetres shorter but when you round..), but I added a couple of centimetres to the 'skirt' to give me some flexibility. I should have added a bit more as I felt the balance would be out if I did a bigger hem and so only managed a very small hem (overlocked and then turned up 1/2 cm).

The blouse has dropped shoulders, which I love and as a result I kept the elastic loose in the peplum as it looked like that was how it should be in the cover photo and I like how this lets the blouse hang. The sleeves are quite puffy and have elastic in the wrist. I took 3cms off the length of the sleeves to assist with balance.  I always like to show the wrist bone when there is elastic in the wrist! :) I might consider reducing the puffiness of the sleeve next time.

There are no darts to sew and the neck is finished with binding and the back is closed with a button - which is self covered as I amazingly didn't have anything that I really liked in my stash.

So my verdict on the blouse. I like it. Ok, it's not exactly a woo hoo make, but I do like the quirkiness of the design and I really like wearing it and can imagine wearing it at different times. I've worn it here very casually but it will also look ok with skinny leg jeans or for work. I wore it yesterday to meet up with sewing friends and there wasn't much love for it there, but I know this isn't a blouse for everyone and in reality I couldn't see any of my friends wearing it so I wasn't offended. So maybe that's why I like it, in fact, that might make me like it more! So that's the first make of 2015 done!