A few weeks ago the lovely Sheona from Sewisfaction announced that she would be running the ‘one week, one pattern’ challenge. Affectionately shortened to the #OWOP17 hashtag, it is a challenge to wear a different item of clothing each day for a week, made from using just one sewing pattern. Lots of lovely prizes were on offer throughout the week, and I knew that it would be a lot of fun to take part in.
I chose to use the Grainline Studios Scout Tee. I had chosen this pattern from Fabric HQ about a year ago when I had won a voucher to use at their shop, and it’s a great basic woven t-shirt pattern with cap sleeves and a scoop neck. I decided that this simple shape had the potential to be changed into all sorts of variations.
Day 1.
To kick off the week I wore the first Scout Tee that I ever made which was sewn in a beautiful floral crepe de chine from Material Magic in Leicester. If I’m honest it’s a little on the large side for me now as I have lost weight since making it back in March, but I do still wear it quite alot so thought that I would still include it in the challenge. It is also the only version of the Scout that I made exactly according to the pattern.
Day 2.
For the version that I wore on day 2, I made a couple of small changes. I lengthened the sleeves to approximately elbow length and added a deep frill. It’s not too tricky to do this at all, and changes the look of this top completely I think. I didn’t want the frills to be too ‘poofy’ so cut my frill strips 1.5 times the length of the sleeve opening. This elephant print fabric was already in my stash – I had purchased this from Fabric Land in Bristol a couple of years ago.
Day 3.
It’s never too long before I can be away from a dress. So it was only to be expected that I would make this pattern work into a dress. For a little while now I have had my eye on a loose fitting gathered dress pattern from I Am Patterns. It’s called the Cassiopee dress and although it has kimono/raglan sleeves, I hoped that I could make my Scout pattern into something that looked similar. To do this I basically shortened the length of the Scout Tee (making it into the dress bodice), keeping the slight hi/lo shaping, and added a gathered skirt. To make the gathered skirt I needed two rectangles – a front skirt piece and a back skirt piece. To calculate the dimensions of the fabric that I would need for each skirt piece, I tried the bodice on and decided how long I wanted the length to be, (taking into consideration that the bottom of the bodice was not perfectly horizontal), and the width was determined by the width of each bodice piece multiplied by 1.5 to allow for the gather.
Because the bottom edge of the bodice kept this lovely hi/low shaping, the hem of the dress needed some serious work to make sure that it was perfectly level. It is at times like this that I am grateful to have my super Adjustoform dress form.
Ooh and of course it has to have in-seam pockets. Using my favourite pocket template (is it possible to have a favourite pocket? – yes), which happens to be the pocket from my Colette Peony dress, I worked out at what point on the side seams I would need it, and simply added them in!
The fabric was in my stash, and was a purchase a few months ago from Stuarts Fabrics on Leicester market.
Day 4.
Back to a top again today, and I kept it pretty simple by making up the basic Scout Tee exactly according to the instructions, but then simply adding a pretty lace edged zip at the back neckline. Don’t be too shocked when I admit that the zip is purely for show and is simply stitched on the centre back of the top so that we can all admire its lacy beauty!
The fabric that I used for this one is a recent purchase from The Sewing Cafe in Hinckley. Its a pretty teal and mustard floral viscose and is just dreamy.
Day 5.
Another top today, with a little twist. I have a ready to wear top in my wardrobe which is really cute as it has a little frill around the bottom, so the challenge today was to recreate that. I tried on my RTW top to get an idea on how long I wanted the length of the top to be (not including the frill), and then cut the length of my bodice front and back to this length (allowing for seam allowances). I measured the depth of the frill on my RTW top and again allowing for seam allowances cut a strip to make the frill with this depth and with the length 1.5 times the length of the bottom edge of the top to allow for a little gather. Super simple and a really nice little alteration I think.
I used a pretty oriental print mint cotton poplin from my stash for this one.
Day 6.
Back to a dress again and I used exactly the same template/technique for this one as I did for the version that I wore on day 3. The pictures I have for this version give a better idea of the hi/lo waist seam which I love so much, and the gorgeous fabric that I used was something that I picked up in the fabric swap at The Sewing Weekender this Summer. Thank you to whoever was kind enough to bring that along. Lucky me!
Day 7.
For the final day, I wanted to add a Peter Pan collar to my top. I had seen a really great tutorial on the Harts Fabric blog and I followed this to make my own. It was fairly straightforward and I am delighted with the result. Again I used fabric from my stash – this red cow print fabric was from Material Magic in Leicester bought some time ago, and the black quilting fabric I purchased recently from The Sewing Cafe when I was there recently celebrating Sew Saturday.
When I first began sewing for this challenge, I really wasn’t sure that I would ever want 7 versions of the same sewing pattern in my wardrobe, but I am really surprised with how many different looks that you can make from just one basic pattern.
Thank you to Sheona for the incredible amount of work that she has put in to ensure this challenge was an amazing success, and for organising ( and donating) such lovely gifts for the daily winners. If you would love some #OWOP17 inspiration, then do head on over to Instagram and search this hashtag – you will be blown away by so much creativity!
Take care, and I’ll be back soon,
Kathy x
