Doing Me Made May last month, I saw lots of people posting pictures of the Morris Blazer from Grainline Studio. I liked the look of it, a casual-ish blazer that's more cardigan than jacket, a nice shape that can be dressed up or down, so I decided to jump on the blazer bandwagon. Just a pity that my iron decided it didn't like the bonded lace fabric I used for it.
This is what less than a second of pressing the front of the blazer caused. Apparently the black thread used for the lace can melt. Of course it didn't do this when I pressed the seams while making the thing, or when I attached the interfacing, only when I wanted to make sure it was nice and neat for my photos. So in all of these photos I've studiously made sure that the front right is at least partially obscured so my iron's attack on the blazer can't be seen.
I played around a bit with where to place the sleeves. Deciding which of the shapes should be in the centre of the sleeve piece, and whether to have it at the top and bottom or in the middle, had me pinning and repinning a few times. In the end, I chose the ovally spoked shape over the solid black, because I thought it looked more interesting. It also matches the placement of the centre back.
The fabric was a little tricky to place correctly, because it's a thick ponte-style knit with the bonded lace over the top. Folding it evenly took a lot of time, and even so the back pieces slipped a couple of millimetres out of place when I cut it, which you can see in the middle of the centre back seam where the lines don't quite match up. I unstitched and restitched it, but wasn't able to get it quite right so the unevenness can still be seen if you look closely at the seam.
I decided to do french seams on the blazer, so it took a bit of extra time to make but has a cleaner look. The only exception was at the armscye, where I did normal seams and then used bias binding to cover the edges. I then stitched all the facings down by hand so that the stitching would be invisible and not interfere with the print of the fabric.
This was the first Grainline Studio pattern I've used, and I really enjoyed it. The instructions were clear and easy to follow, and the inclusion of a few extra notes to explain potentially confusing steps was really great. And the copyshop size download meant no need to sticky tape together a million different pieces of paper, which has put me off buying PDF patterns in the past.
So while my iron has tried to attack this make, I really like it. I'm not sure exactly how I'll fix the iron's injury yet, but think I might try to use black thread and almost redo the lace embroidery. It won't quite match, but hopefully I can at least get it so that it doesn't look obviously damaged.
I was told that this is a pattern that most people want to make again and again. I'm thinking I agree, and probably will make another one myself. But hopefully next time my iron won't attack the fabric I choose!
