A Great Piece For Your Fall Wardrobe

I made the Style Arc Estelle Ponte jacket last week and I love it! It’s a great piece for your Fall wardrobe or your transitional wardrobe. I also like that that this ponte knit jacket has pockets, which you don’t always see in knit clothing.

The Pattern

Style Arc Estelle pattern and line drawing

As you can see, this pattern is rated “easy” to make. There are only four pattern pieces (front, back, pocket, sleeve) so it’s also a quick pattern to put together. The styling, like many Style Arc patterns, is modern yet classic all at the same time.

The Fabric

For my jacket, I used double-faced interlock in the color Auburn/Blue. It is one layer of fabric that has two “good” sides. I got this from https://www.angelawolfpatterns.com/. But I don’t believe there is any more available.

This is a medium weight fabric that has a bit of stretch, but not too much. It washes and dries great (always prewash you fabrics).

My Jacket

Because I only had 2 yards of this fabulous fabric, I really wanted to make sure that I would have enough. The yardage chart does show 2 yards for the size I made, but I usually like to have a bit more just in case. I shortened the jacket by about 1.25 inches. The sleeves I shortened by about 1 inch. Sleeve on patterns are often a bit too long for me. And, this pattern doesn’t have hems, so you will want to make sure that you don’t have to hem it if you don’t want to.

Style Arc Estelle-a great piece for your Fall wardrobe

I did use my serger to make the majority of this jacket. If you don’t have a serger, then use your regular machine with a zigzag stitch. That will work just fine!

Since I used blue thread in the serger, I used that to serge all the edges once the jacket was complete. So, from the back it shows contrasting thread. This is a great jacket for your Fall wardrobe because it can be very versatile. If your fabric is a solid color, then your jacket will simply be the same color on both sides.

Here is another project I made with a different ponte knit. It’s a stable knit fabric that is very comfortable to wear.

If you are a beginner to sewing with knit fabrics, be sure to sign up for my knit sewing checklist. I give some tips to make things easier.

Style Arc Estelle front-a great piece for your Fall wardrobe

Love Notions Arlington Sweater

The Love Notions Arlington sweater is one of those things that came across my Instagram feed a few weeks back. If you aren’t aware, Love Notions pattern company does what they call “$5 Friday”. That means that whatever pattern is the feature for that week, you can purchase the PDF for $5. This is one of those that I wanted and bought.

As you can see from the drawing above, the Love Notions Arlington sweater is very versatile. I love having patterns that have many options available without me having to alter or “hack”. I do love a good hackable pattern too (here’s one of my favorites).

For this one, I made the cowl neck with the elbow length sleeves. The fabric I used is a textured stretch knit I was gifted from Minerva Fabrics. You can take a look at it here and read the corresponding post on their site as well. The fabric is warm and weighty (it’s considered a medium-weight knit). It sews easy and washes and dries very well.

The pattern is definitely beginner friendly. I didn’t have to make any adjustments to it for fit. And with the PDF, you can get it and print it up. Because the pattern has layers, you can just print the size you want. And best of all, you only need to assemble the pages you want to use. This helped me a lot because I didn’t want to put the entire pattern together to make this top.

Love Notions Arlington sweater side view

As cooler weather approaches here, I’m happy to have some Fall tops that I can wear to stay warm and comfortable without overheating. I can wear this under a jacket (or shacket) and it’s quite comfortable.

Changing Up RTW and Wardrobe Planning

Lately I’ve been planning on (or at least thinking about) what I want for the upcoming Fall/Autumn season. summer sewing is now complete. Not all the things I wanted to make got done, but I’m ok with that. Several tops did get made this season. So this post is about how I’m changing up some RTW and how I’m wardrobe planning.

Plans

Now I want to focus on making some pants. One pattern that I’m about to start is this one from Seamwork (you can sign up for the online magazine using my link, if you like).

These are a tapered pant which is a little different style for me. But I’ve already gotten the PDF put together, so now it’s time to make the mock-up and take it from there.

I’ll decide on some other types/styles of pants as time goes on. And I really want to make a classic black dress.

Changing up RTW pjs

As for changing up some ready-to-wear (RTW), I made some changes to some short pjs I bought from the Nordstrom anniversary sale.

Here is the original I bought:

Because they were so short , but so comfortable, I wanted to keep them. I needed to make them a bit longer for my own comfort level. So, I added about a 4″ insert into the shorts. Here’s what I did:

I cut the bottom hem/band off of each leg with a bit of seam allowance (1/2″)
I cut 4-4″ strips of the fabric I wanted insert
Using a narrow seam allowance, I attached those to each leg
I had to “remake” the crotch because the shorts were so short, there wasn’t much room
Then I reattached the bottom hem

The original shorts are knit fabric. The insert is a woven fabric.

Here is the result:

Now I have a truly unique pair of pajamas! And they fit the way I want. Sometimes we have to use our sewing powers to make RTW fit the way we want! 😂 ✂️

You can keep this process in mind to change up something you might have in your own closets.

Until next time…

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