A Shirt to Match the Clouds

I wonder if you're not sick of looking at Archers... They seem to be everywhere! I'm not sick of making or wearing them though, so please bear with me :) I loved making my first Archer but it needed some serious adjustments to become the shirt I had envisioned. I wanted it big and slouchy and boyfriend-shirt-like, not preppy-office-shirt-like. Travel gear has to be comfortable! I ordered the fabric of this one straight after I made the first one, at the same store (guess where...). Before we hit the road back in December I cut our three projects and this was one of them.




So a couple of things needed to be done in order to achieve the fit I wanted. First of all I cut everything a size bigger. My first one was 6-4-8, this one ie 8-6-10. I needed more room around the shoulder and the hips, not the waist but for the sake of the style I went one up there too. Then I needed to fix the diagonal pulling lines from shoulder to bust, by doing a square shoulder adjustment. I think I only took out half a cm (1/4") but it made a big difference. Then I needed some more length: I added 7,5 cm (3") to the bodice and 2,5 cm (1") to the sleeves. Phew! Quite some work all in all but the result was there in one go. I really wanted to put in the work on this pattern instead of looking for a different shirt pattern. Most of these adjustments I would probably have to do with any pattern anyway.



The fabric is a charcoal wool flannel, and I hoped it'd be perfect for winter. And it really is, it's very nice to have something warm to wear that is not a big sweater. I still feel kind of dressed up when I wear this shirt, even though it's big and slouchy. I wanted a boyfriend-shirt, but it's even been called a Grandpa-shirt, so mission accomplished :). I also really love the way it turned out sewing wise, it went together pretty smoothly. I used Andrea's collar attaching method and I can really recommend it.



Pretty dramatic backdrop right? I haven't edited these photos at all, the weather was perfect like that with sun and the rainclouds in the background. The view here is amazing and we're enjoying it every day. We're still in Italy at the moment. Circumstances messed with our plans: Stef broke his collar bone a couple of weeks ago while mountain biking. He's been quite uncomfortable the past weeks and not been able to use his left arm (while he's a leftie), but he's getting better now. We should be on our way to Slovenia in a few weeks, as soon as he feels able to travel. And I've got a mint coloured batiste Archer cut out, so I'm ready for a summer in the Slovenian hills!