Oh Stitch, Please!

Oh Stitch, Please!

Friday 31 July 2015

MonStoriaDen: My Astoria/Linden/Moneta mash up...


After a trip down to Geelong in early July - I came back with a stash full of fabulous fabrics from Joy's Fabric Warehouse (FYI - I have also had some pretties delivered following a phone order).. All of which have now been sewn up - excluding some gorgeous white, navy and red light wool coating. My purse is still recovering after I nabbed the delicious wools, stretch cottons, rayon knits and other bits... But I did grab some grey and black softer than butter ponti. 

bottom L-R: Stretch bottom weight cotton (now a chardon skirt), navy/purple rayon knit (now a copelia cardigan), The offending striped ponti, Top L-R: quilting cotton, checked coating.

top: rayong knits (now copelia's and mandy boat tee's). Bottom: french terries Yellow is now an Astoria and the blue is a Linden - Stay tuned for posts on these babies!


Full disclosure. This dress is slightly more than inspired by the gorgeous Renay - over at The Long Winding Bobbin - she posted a shot on instragram of her own Astoria dress mash up  in this same striped ponti- and my poor fabric never had a chance to become anything else... 

feat. Zoidberg.

The mash-up comes about by popping in my favourite features of my current favourite sews. I have been loving the Astoria and Linden jumpers to death recently, and have been merging a few of my favourite features. This dress takes the mash up cake. The bodice and skirt are the Moneta. The sleeves and neckband are a feature from the Astoria, which smoosh in together perfectly with zero adjustments, and finally the cuffs from the Linden by Grainline. 

Windy As F.

The fabric is really soft under hand, and handled very easily. The whole make took me about 2 hours (or two episodes of misfits, netflixs why you ruin my life!?!?!) and this was including cutting time. I have knocked up a few of each of these patterns now (at last count, five moneta's, three lindens, and another five Asotria's). So I sometimes need to stop and make sure I am not rushing a quick make like this, BUT I JUST WANT TO WEAR IT THIS VERY SECOND - despite half finished hems.....



My most recent versions of the Astoria have the added cuffs. I was originally using the cuffs from papercut patterns copelia cardigan, however, have found them slightly too long and the Lindens a much smoother fit for the cropped sweater look. The ponti had just enough 4 way stretch to cut the cuffs off grain for contrasting stripes. That said, it took some muscle to pin and sew them down. I do like how they have finished up though. The cuff finish is also a bit nicer than just a turn of edge seam.

Cuffs from the Linden pattern.

The Astoria neckband piece stretched easily into place into the Moneta bodice pattern, which makes sense as I have a sneaking suspicion the Astoria is drafted from the same block. Colette had a tutorial on how to turn Moneta into a sweater which I pinned on pinterest before the pattern came out. And as i had never gotten around to actually following the tutorial, as is the way with anything that comes from pinterest, I was very happy to see the pattern released in Seamwork!
Neckband from the Astoria pattern.

After a wear out and about, the fabric has dipped a bit on the bias, so will need a bit of a trim and tidy up along the hemline, which I am hoping won't make my stripe matching look awkward....

spot the ginger fur ball...

For the first time ever I am LOVING winter sewing. I think this may have something to do with all the soft cosy knits being snug as fuck when they come out of the dryer after a pre wash and I just want to roll about in them. Cosy. Toasty. Warm. Melbourne Winter. Go Away. But seriously. Wintery snug sewing for the win.



It's business time...

Fabric: 2m of striped Ponti from Joys Fabric Warehouse in Geelong.

Pattern: Colette - Astoria & Moneta, Grainline Linden

Size: mash up between a L & M.

Alterations: Toooo many. Basically just stretching all the bits to smoosh them all to fit. I think I may have trimmed my sleeves to short in hindsight, they sit just on my wrist and I usually prefer them a bit longer.

Other bits: Belt, C/O Heli (thanks mum) and boots are Merchant and Mills.

See Also: Rach (also check out her awesome Astoria cropped cardi tutorial), Melissa, Cut Cut Sew.


Is anyone else relishing in wintery sewing or are we all ready to move into the spring frocks and light weight cottons and linens? xx



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