I guess when you consider taking flat, two-dimensional fabric pieces and getting them to shape and contour to a very three-dimensional body, things are bound to go awry.
I don't necessarily have a hard time buying RTW pants, but the pants that look half decent on me are expensive, e.g. Ann Taylor, Banana Republic. When I was slimmer I lived in Gap pants. Now? They aren't meant for me. I do still love Old Navy jeans. I have to buy a size larger and get the waist taken in, but for the money, it's so worth it.
When I made my Simplicity 2700 pants, they came out okay, after lots of work. I wore the finished pants to work and realized:
- The pants were slightly too big
- The flared leg was NOT for me
- They need to be shortened
I love (LOVE!) the wide waistband on those. They remind me of a decent fitting pair of slacks that I own already. But, I wanted a style that was slightly more sleek and fit like my absolute favorite pair of RTW pants (black Worthington slacks from JC Penney in a 10 Curvy). I tried to buy more of these but none of the other pants fit quite like these...even other "10 curvy" pants. But now, I can sew! Yay me!
I fell for the RTW styling in Butterick 5908 - kinda because they're red (EVERYONE should have red pants) but I really liked the clean line.
My observations:
- she has excess width through the leg
- the leg opening is slightly narrower than I'd like (slightly)
- the pants are not contoured through the thigh/knee/calf. They're straight
- she has a little front crotch bagginess
Because these are similar in styling to my RTW pants, I took all the crotch/waist/thigh measurements from my black pants and automatically transferred them to the pattern. I am also sold on picking up old sheets (queen or king are best!) to use as muslin!!!
I initially thought I needed a larger size after making this muslin:
So I made some changes based on suggestions from PR and got this:
Well THAT isn't attractive!!
Then I made a tuck to get rid of the back wrinkles:
Ok, 'now we're cooking with fire' as Papa would say! It's a little tight (diagonal wrinkles radiating from the butt) but it's getting there. Then I transferred the tuck (and added an inch to the waist)
Ut-oh. That's not good. After reading a TON of blogs, posts, etc, I realized that I took too much out of the tuck. It made the problem WORSE. So I slept on it and read more and researched more and decided on these changes to the original pattern:
- add 1/2" to the back crotch point
- add 1/2" to back by slashing and adding 1/4"
- added back 1/2" (originally took 1/2") of tuck from CF seam
- took a 3/4" tuck under the butt, steam pressing this length back into the inseam
- tapered from thigh to knee and knee back out (to calf??) to shape the leg
That sounds like a lot but it really isn't. I'm done. There are a few wrinkles but the pants look pretty dang good. I could use a tad more back length - like seriously 3/8" - to get rid of the wrinkles at high hip. And I took back that 1/2" from CF, it's a little baggy.
I'm happy. I'm going to sew the pants up tonight in my fashion fabric!!!
