Nearly New Trousers...

 What a tedious week this has been - I've been working on these trousers.  I'm making up McCalls 5239- I've done several quick renditions that weren't a very good fit but served their purpose.  This time I want to tweak the fit and the saggy seat area.  I'm making these in a stretch cotton sateen - I've never used this for trousers before, so there was lots of learning ahead of me at the beginning of the week.  Lots of frustration but many of you have been encouraging with this project, so I kept going - and - as you can see - the pants are nearly finished.  The band is attached but just needs to be turned in and stitched down.  The hems are pinned up, ready for hemming.

  The pattern was retweaked and this was the muslin:

 Lots of sag under the bottom, so an alteration was made to deal with this - I used a technique that Sandra Betzina writes about - take 3/4 of the back leg hem, add 3/4 to the back side seam, and stretch the inner back leg seam to fit the inner front leg.  We'll see how it goes.

 This is the trouser made up out of stretch cotton sateen - I machine basted all the seams so that the pants can be taken apart again for the proper seam stitching.  The pants need taking in at sides and the inner leg:

The back view - less sagging than I normally have, so moving in the right direction:

Needs taking in:

Discovered that for some reason the CB waist was too low.  Trousers were going to be uncomfortable.   A remedy was needed, so I decided to make a yoke piece (I have said I will end up having to draft my own jeans, so this can be a trial attempt...).  Making a yoke piece is well within my capabilities though, even if making trousers hasn't been :-)

Fold out darts and trace pants back, add extra at the CB (left hand side).

Place on pants and open up back seam:

Yoke sewn on and trim away the old bit of pant with the dart in:

New back sections ready for sewing the back crotch seam.  The yoke pieces were finished with a flat fell seam (won't  photograph as the seams won't show up in black fabric).  I can tell you (with pride) that my yoke pieces match perfectly at the CB. 

Zip inserted - somehow had to disguise the fact that I made a bit of a hash of the fly front (I don't know why, I have done plenty, but there you are...)  It looks nicely finished now though.

These pants provided lots of trials and tribulations- machine basting for fit, undo machine basting, machine pants outside leg, topstitch, everything rippled, undo topstitching, redo topstitching, machine inner legs together - front inner leg now looks puckered, undo, redo the seam and take the ease over a longer distance...machine baste crotch and check fit, undo and sew.  It feels like I've sewn five pairs of pants (and yes, there is enough sewing for five pairs) but I only have one nearly finished pair to show for it :-).

Some garments just go like this unfortunately. But I could not admit defeat to all of you :-)

And here is the result - nearly done.  I've got the waistband attached, as I said above, and hems ready to go.  I'd love to finish them today, but by the time you are reading this, I will be in Sydney - we are going down for the weekend, and will see Bell Shakespeare performing Henry 1V.  John Bell is playing Falstaff, so that should be a treat.  For those of you overseas, John Bell is now in his 70's.  He started Bell Shakespeare as a young man, and toured in the UK where the company was a huge success.  His company always does brilliantly energetic performances, drawing on a lot of the older theatrical conventions, including those of
Commedia del'Arte.  (Bell Shakespeare also does Commedia del'Arte peformances from time to time,  and they are a real treat...) - here is the link to find out more about this company, for those of you who may be interested: http://www.bellshakespeare.com.au/

Anyway, back to the pants.  So, I can't finish today, but I will have them completed by next weekend for posting then :-)

Front

Back

Wishing you all the best for your weekend,  wherever you are...

Sarah Liz