Andrea Whitrow, Author at The Design the Stitch and the Wardrobe

Posted on March 27, 2015April 22, 2015 by Andrea Whitrow — Leave a comment

The Bateaux Garden Dress

Part of the reason that I always seem to have the latest patterns before many sewers in Australia, is that I often put my hand up to ‘test’ the pattern. For those of you not in the sewing world it is a process where someone is chosen to sew each size (sometimes more than once), to check the fit on a model of the size ( or close to the particular measurements given on the chart) , clarity of instructions and general process.

The most recent pattern that I tested was the Bateaux Garden Dress from Winter Wear Designs.

I love it when designers make patterns that include older girls sizes. I always figure it is those girls that are missing out. As many of you know I don’t have any daughter’s, but I do feel for the mothers that have to buy clothing for any girl over the age of 6. It’s terrible! You can still find cute classy clothes for younger girls in the stores, but it goes drastically downhill for the tweens and teens. I’m not prudish or conservative by any means, so I’m not going on a rant about showing too much skin. Even the fabrics and prints used are usually awful. Offering clothing for 8 – 16 year old girls is high on my to- do list.

The Bateaux Garden dress by Winter Wear Designs is perfect. It’s fun, pretty, classic and comes with several options (different backs views, lengths and skirt types).

The pattern is available to purchase from the wonderful Suzanne at Winter Wear Designs:

https://www.etsy.com/au/listing/227710488/bateau-garden-dress-size-1-14-for-girls?ref=shop_home_feat_4

Or as always the complete garment can be purchased made to your measurements at my Etsy store:

https://www.etsy.com/au/shop/DesignStitchWardrobe?ref=hdr_shop_menu

Posted on March 26, 2015March 26, 2015 by Andrea Whitrow — 1 Comment

Sam Spade and The Maltese Falcon

This post was originally posted on http://patternrevolution.com/blog/2014/10/10/halloween-extravaganza-day-5-vampires-and-detectives

Every now and then my husband-like creature takes on a ‘fetish’of sorts…..no, not like that get your minds out the gutter, at the moment he is really into 1940’s, film noir type movies. At first I was reluctant to join in (some of his hobbies are just tedious) but decided to give it a go. We watched Double Indemnity, Key Largo and the Maltese Falcon. Humphrey Bogart is an actor that I had always heard about but had never seen him in action and I really enjoyed the movies. He is a very suave character, that and the 1940’s style just reminded me of my 2 year old. He is a boy that loves to accessories, vests, hats, ties you name it he loves to wear it it. So I decided that we could combine my love of these old movies with his stylin ways and dress him as Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogarts character in The Maltese Falcon).

I had seen the Peek-a-Boo ‘Little Gentleman’ range and toyed with buying it a few times but we never really had the occassion to wear such a dapper little outfit, so this gave me the perfect excuse. The Little Gentleman jacket was far easier to put together than it looks….I will be making more, and I just added a second row of buttons to give it that 40’s look.The vest again was super easy to construct and is fully reversible so I added a navy and white star print to the lining side so he can wear it as a casual piece with jeans.

Here is where I have to admit some cheating. Time just didnt allow for me to sew up the pants as well so he is wearing a pair that we already had but I do intend to make them so he has a lovely matching suit. I could have chosen to sew the Peek-a-boo Oxford shirt to complete the outfit, it truly is one of my favorite patterns but once again, time was agaisnt me. I found a great free tutorial to make his tie here http://www.sweetshopsewing.com/2014/04/16/free-mens-neck-tie-pattern-and-tutorial/ .We found some great vintage relics to decorate his desk and he had good fun plaing with them all as we did the photoshoot.