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Itch To Stitch Crystal Cove Cami. This is a PDF only pattern and it includes sizes 00 to 20 with cup size choices.
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There are no sizes marked on the cutting lines of the pattern pieces. You have to use a guide. It gets confusing on multi-sized patterns, but most indie patterns do this I have found.
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Just in case, I tapered down from a size 12 to size 8 at the hem. It's a usual alteration for me. This pattern has a huge hem circumference and I am an inverted triangle. That's the opposite of a pear shape!
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I usually sew a size 14 in patterns, but here my size 12 muslin shows that the there is gaping under the arms and a too wide hem for my body type and liking.
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My muslin shows the dart point to be too high. Because this cami has a looser fit and thin straps, when the cami shifted, so did the darts! I finally decided to lower the darts only 1/2".
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Back view of muslin. At this point I am not sure why there are horizontal lines because it does not feel too tight. Perhaps it's because I used a sheet for fabric or because I didn't use facings in my muslin. My real fabric is a stretch woven.
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I took a deeper seam under the arms to eliminate gaping, and transferred 1/2" to both the front and back pattern pieces (makes a total of 1" under each arm). I needed to leave some room for the interfaced facing, which I did not sew on my muslin.
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If you take in the side seams under the arm, don't forget to trace the amount on the front facing too or it won't match up.
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Do the same trimming on the back facing that you did on the front facing, using the back piece as a guide.
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I ended up using my markings to decrease the hem circumference. Here I'm cutting it off my muslin as per my markings on my pattern tracing.
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This is my muslin after reducing the arm gaping and hem circumference, but before moving the darts. I made the straps wider to hide bra straps. I may still need to take more under the arm, but I will determine that on the real fabric with facings.
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I moved the bust point down 1/2" by using the method of cutting a rectangle parallel to the grainline and cutting out the dart.
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Move the dart "box" to the position you want (up, down, different angle, etc.), add paper to the underneath, and tape in place. Trim off the excess paper, fold the dart down, and true if necessary.
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After folding down the newly positioned dart, I did not have to true the seams. Depending on the pattern or how you positioned it, sometimes there is a bit of excess to trim or to add. I checked to ensure the back piece fit the new front.
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This is how the front piece looks after moving the dart box down and patching underneath. Not so pretty but effective!
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This is my muslin after lowering the dart. In this pic it looks slightly low now, but I adjusted the straps a smidge and it looked fine. The final garment fits a little more snug than this and the dart was in the right place. Yay!
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Not only am I marking the wrong side of the fabric with sticky dots, I am labeling them FF for front facing and BF for back facing. I love my sticky dots!
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I used Pellon tricot stretch interfacing because my fabric has some stretch. Make SURE you cut your facing pieces with the direction that has the most stretch on your interfacing. It's needed because the facings go around the body horizontally.
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Silk organza is the perfect press cloth! It takes intense heat and you can see through it which is nice especially for fusible interfacing. Mine is from Joann Fabrics, made by Dritz.
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I used my Curve Runner to measure the front hem and overlapping back pieces to determine how much bias tape I needed to make.
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Instead of sewing a rolled hem, I made bias binding using the continuous method. From a square of fabric you get a ton of tape that does not have to be pieced! After pulling my strip through the bias maker, I folded it in half lengthwise and pressed.
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Place the binding on the hem edge so that when you fold it over, it will lie on the right side of the garment. Place right side of binding to wrong side of bodice hem. Stitch in the far right fold of the binding. And edge stitch foot makes this a breeze!
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For trimming the seam allowance (SA) of the binding and hem edge, I moved a pattern weight as I went along. This kept the rest of the binding out of my way.
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After trimming the SA turn the binding to the right side of the garment and using an edge stitch foot, sew along the edge. I did not use any pins both times sewing the binding.
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The hem is very long, as it goes from the top of the overlap in back, around the front, and up the other back flap. I figured if I tried pinning all that I would be continually moving the pins due to the curves.
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Instead of spaghetti straps, I cut mine 2 1/4" wide and used 1/4" seam. I pressed the seam open, positioning it in the center and turned them right side out with a tube turner.
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Now right side out, I pressed the straps so that the seam was in the middle underneath. The finished width is 1", enough to hide bra straps.
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By trying on the cami I determined where the strap seamline should be. I wanted to make sure the two straps would be exactly the same so I measured and chalked a line on each strap.
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The pattern has 1/2" SA throughout, so I marked that on the bodice and lined up my strap lines. After sewing the seams I cut the excess off. My finished straps were 9 1/2" long, but everyone's will be different.
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When you use a wider strap like I did, you can't use a 1/2" SA. I went part way up with 1/2", but marked lines that went just on the outside edges of my strap. I had to unpick a little bit of the 1/2" out, but in the end it worked!
