Yellow bow shirt... or how to make an easy shirt impossibly hard to make (New Look 6808)

Project number two of the fall wardrobe contest is COMPLETED!! I moved on to New Look 6808, a cute little shirt with basic shaping and a nice little bow... here's the finished version!

I picked this pattern because I thought it looked pretty and basic, but still had a shape. I don't have a lot of shirts in general, being drawn to stretchy tank tops in the summer and ribbed turtlenecks in the winter. I wasn't quite sure about this one - I thought it might make me look blocky. I'm reasonably happy with the results.

I had a particular problem with the fit. I made three muslins. The first was alright, but needed more room across the hips and needed the bust/darts dropped about an inch. The second was better, but had a serious puddling in the small of the back which caused a lot of confusion. The back was just one piece with two two-ended darts, and the puddling was BETWEEN the darts - it looked great when I cut a straight line up the center back from the hem to the widest part of the darts. To fix, I decided to add a center back seam, so I could add in a wedge where I needed it. The finished product lies very nicely -

The real focus of this particular project was details. I wanted to learn a few new things and make the inside look perfect!! For seam finishing, I used french seams on the straight seams - sides, shoulders and arms. I pinked the horizontal darts and just sewed some double fold bias tape around the sleeve seams (where I connected the arms to the bodice...)

I ended up using the gold brocade I've used on other projects for the sleeve and arm facings and on the underside of the collar.

I also put a little button right at the point of the little vent on the sleeve - I couldn't get it to turn cleanly (bad sewing skills, again) and had to snip the stitches and then sew the seam with a couple of hand stitches. It wasn't perfect looking, so I found these little covered buttons in my stash to hide my sloppy work.

For the hems, I did a blind catchstitch on the shirt hem, and a slipstitch on the sleeve facing. I'm not sure what I think of the results, especially with the sleeve facing. You CAN see it from the outside, and I don't know if I thought sewing it on the machine, like the instructions suggested, would be TOTALLY home-made looking. Jury's still out.

The detail I spent the most time on and was the happiest with was the zipper! I used Gertie's method of inserting the hand-picked lapped zipper - I used the same gold brocade to make the placket and LOVED the results - I didn't realize how much it would show! I also wanted to do an underflap - partially because I think they look cool and partially because I kept having a visceral reaction to my wild imaginings of zippered up side flesh! To make the underflap, I cut a piece of grosgrain ribbon I had on hand (7/8" wide) the length of the zipper. Then I cut a piece of the brocade about three and a half times wider than the ribbon - between three and for inches. I folded over one edge and ironed, then sewed the unironed side to the ribbon, wrapped the ribbon and the just ran the sewing machine over the folded over edge. I turned under the ends a couple of times for a finished look and sewed down with the machine. I also stabilized away - I did a couple of strips of iron on interfacing on the edges of the garment before I even started. I used sew-in interfacing on the placket. Here's a picture of the zipper to get an idea of the finished product...

So now for a few different looks - not all so different, I actually think the shirt could be a little more versatile if I shorten it by a few inches. But here it is a few different ways!