Frill sleeve blouse from Dresses and Coordinates Lesson

Remember the book review I wrote a couple of weeks ago? I made one of the tops and wanted to show you the results.

The book I am talking about is this one. This book is all about dresses and coordinates that can make you look slim. I wanted to test it out ;P

I made this top A3, but instead of using eyelet/lace fabric for the frills, I used the same fabric throughout. I also sized down as I was going to make it out of knit fabric.

This was the actual top. I made size M when the size chart said I should make L, that’s because when making tops out of knit fabric, expect a lot more ease due to the stretching of the fabric. However, I still found it too baggy for my liking. In the photo from the book, the lady wears it tucked into pants, so the waistline is defined by the waistband, and therefore it doesn’t look so waistless. I will bear that in mind when coordinating with bottoms. Although tucking in shirts is not really my thing.

Here’s a back view of the sleeves. Can you tell that there is no separate sleeve piece? There is some bagginess in the underarm area because of that, but also because I think this size is too large for me. However, it is really comfortable to wear and allows for lots of movement, something that I really need in daily wear because of my super wriggly toddler.

To demonstrate how it would look better with a more defined waistline, I clipped up the back of the top, and I think it looks so much better! What I can do is to take in the sides a little bit more, since it was such a quick and easy sew using my serger. I do think that this pattern is a winner if I size it down for the next top. I did a rough muslin with some wovens using the same size and true enough, it was a little hard getting it on and off. It was not tight once worn, but I needed to add some slits in the waist line and probably add a zip