Colour in Thirds – Tessuti competition

It’s that time of the year again!, The annual Tessuti competition, and this year the competition theme is Colour in Thirds. The fabric is a Japanese polyester crepe de chine and comes in three colours.

Entry guidelines are to sew whatever style you want, that’s sympathetic to the fabric. You can either sew an original design or use a pattern. You can also use one, two or all or all three combinations in your creation.

I can’t resist a competition, especially one where the prizes are great! $1000 cash for First prize,  $500 voucher for Second and Third place is $250 Tessuti gift voucher.  Competition gets my creative juices flowing and I love the challenge especially in a fabric I normally wouldn’t work with.

Pinterest is a great source for inspiration on runways, ready to wear and sewing patterns. I spent a fair bit of time researching and pinning and finally came up with a McCall’s pattern. The pattern is M7692 designed by Nicole Miller and is an asymmetrical top with a drape over one shoulder, teamed up with semi-fitted pants with flounces at the legs.

I bought both the Khaki and Black colourways of the crepe de chine so decided to use both and try some colour blocking. It’s hard to drape the pants so to make sure it was going to look somewhat interesting, I coloured in the tech drawings on the pattern instructions with some pencils. The pattern is perfect for colour blocking as there are plenty of interesting design lines in both the top and pants. After I was happy with my colouring in, I coded the pattern pieces with either B for black or G for green so I wouldn’t get confused when cutting out. It made a massive difference when it came to cutting the fabric as there are quite a few pieces to cut out plus the lining.

Construction was relatively simple with great pattern instructions that are easy to follow. When it came to the fabric it wasn’t so easy. As with all the competition fabrics, the quality is not the usual high quality that you get from Tessuti.  It is 100% polyester and relatively cheap at $ 14 pm (cheap for Tessuti) The pins mark it easily so I made sure I was very careful when I pinned the seams together not to pin in areas that would be seen. As the fabric was so slippery, I  finished all of the hems with basting first before topstitching to make sure it didn’t slip around too much when sewing.  It took me about an hour just to baste the hem on the frill of the pants, they are huge! The fabric also fray’s like crazy, so the overlocker came in very handy.

The only downside to the appearance of the pants is the curve at the front. The fabric slightly wrinkles in this area which I couldn’t really fix. At that point on the curve, the fabric naturally falls on the bias so perhaps a slightly heavier fabric would work better on the pants but the top is just perfect! It is slightly too long in the crotch for me too, so I would change that for the next time I sew them but otherwise, I love the fit of both the top and pants.

Overall, I’m very happy with my frilly, colour blocked outfit and can’t wait to organise a  girls night out with a bit of dancing so that I can swirl around in all of the frills!

Annie x