What else was in the scrap bin... the safari themed panty
This was another thrift store find, a cute little camp shirt with a safari themed print. The fabric is a heavy weight silk jacquard, with woven dots. The underarm, shows some yellowing, as well as the inside collar. Silk and oils are not a happy combination, so it's really important to wash those silks after wear. Some of the older silk items were made out of a heavier weight silk in general. They stand up to washing, and wear better than most of what we can find today. I thought the print was adorable.
Look at that pattern matching, very impressive.
The shirt won't render a lot of yardage, and it hurt to carve up the print, but what am are we saving it for?
Manufacturing observation.....
I like to see how these shirts were made, note, the lighter weight China silk yoke piece. This makes it cheaper and has the benefit of not showing through the other side. They've saved money by not using the more expensive fashion fabric, and it's good design. I haven't seen many pattern instructions that suggest this, and it's a good way to go, especially if you just need a tiny bit more to get that shirt cut out. You might even have a scrap already that can be used for this very thing.
The first item that will be made from this shirt is... yes you guessed it, a panty.
The Safari themed panty
These used the last of the precut pattern pieces found in the pattern envelope, left over from a long time ago (when I thought I would make a collection, but then realized I had no elastic and had to wait and moved on to something else), the center front panel was doubled up, because I thought it looked better and it matches the weight of the print fabric better. The elastic was super soft, so it curled quite a bit while sewing (especially where the fabric is doubled up), however, once on the body everything flattens out. I left the black thread, because I wanted the black zig zag to show, I don't like how it looks in the pic, but when you are wearing it, you only see the zig zag on the outside, which looks fine.
Since the back piece is on the bias, I needed to piece it, so it wouldn't be one continuous diagonal black stripe. I wanted chevrons, but it also created new unexpected animal combinations.
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