Captain's Log, Supplemental: Failtastic top, red alert!

The title of this post is because the top I failed to sew successfully this weekend turned out to look pretty much like what I imagine Starfleet issue to pregnant crew members. I am sure it's possible to make many pretty variations of this top, but between my slightly shiny tactel knit and the black and white colour blocking, and then the way the weird drapey bit at the front hung on me: weird Star Trek pregnancy cosplay look is a go!

Or, rather, it's not, because this top is a big old FAIL! in all-caps and I won't be wearing it anywhere.

Fail: Simplicity 1063 in black and white

The pattern is Simplicity 1063, in which I was absolutely RAPT when it first came out back in August or thereabouts. Admittedly, I was never going to wear views A and B with the weird back cape swoopy thingymajig, but I was mad keen on views C and D. I was so keen, in fact, that I got someone in the US to buy this for me and mail it to the UK so I could make it as soon as possible rather than wait the 6 weeks until UK pattern sellers get the new catalogues. Of course, I then got sick (again, still, whatever) and I had to shelve the immediate make, but it's been right at the top of my list nevertheless. This week I decided to get stuck into the pattern and decided to make view C with the sleeves from view A.

I am kind of overwhelmingly disappointed with how it turned out.

Simplicity 1063

What was my problem? It's a bit hard to tell from the photo above -- or, you can only just see the problem -- but basically, EVERYTHING about the neckline is FUBAR.

On the positive side, some things did go well:

• After measuring everything and doing a certain amount of baffled approximating on the pieces of the front drape, I decided to make a straight size 14 with basically no alterations except my standard square shoulder adjustment. There is a LOT of room in this top because of the bust and the "finished bust" measurements on the pattern are a GIANT lie. I got to the point of having the bodice done, pinned the sides and put the top on and I was, well, I was taken aback by how much I looked like I needed a Star Trek insignia on my shirt, but I was actually quite pleased! The fit was really nice, even though theoretically a 14 is rather too small for me.
• Despite the fact that the front drape does make me look kind of pregnant I actually really like it. It's quite cunningly constructed as well, and so the major feature of the top was a win for me.

I got to this point and went to bed patting myself smugly on the back.

That lasted until I tried to finish the neckline.

See how Simplicity have a big old dramatic KNITS ONLY text on their pattern envelope? Doesn't that make you think, oh, this will be a really modern knit pattern? Except no, not so much. At various points in the pattern the instructions are all about finishing all your edges with zig zag and setting in the sleeve woven style with easing, which is so VERY VERY far from what I think of as modern knit garment construction for home sewers.

The instructions for the enormous facing

The big, BIG problem though is that the neckline is finished with a HUGE interfaced facing that flaps about in the neckline like a mad flapping thing. It's at least 5cm wide, and you sew it on as a single pieces around the neck and down into the V of the neckline and it's HIDEOUS.

I absolutely HATE facings. HATE THEM. I especially hate them in knits, and I triple hate them when they are ENORMOUS. So really, I was not at all excited to see that I was going to have to sew one. However, I felt like I liked the top enough to risk it, and also, OK, I am willing to admit I can be wrong about facings! I just made a knit top with a facing and it was well-designed enough that it worked out fine! So, I was going to give this a chance.

I genuinely don't know at this point whether the result I obtained was more because of bad design or more because of bad sewing on my part or some non-replicable combination of the two. I really REALLY tried to sew the neckline/facing seam perfectly, and then I trimmed it and understitched as suggested. HIDEOUS. It makes for such a horrid lumpy finish all the way round the neckline and then again 5cm out from the neckline where the facing ends. It also does NOT stay put, even with the understitching. I put the top on and the facings puffed out of the neckline like I was wearing a ruff. I fiddled with it to get it all nice and lying flat, went downstairs to look in the better lit mirror in my hallway and by the time I had ambled from my bedroom to the front door, the facing had rucked up and popped out of the neckline again. ARGH.

Taking a hint from my recent Ottobre top I therefore stitched the facings down. This made them stay put but UGH, the seam remained lumpy, prone to flipping up a bit and overall ugly, and the facing edge is visible where it ends over the shoulders (not helped by the fact my facing was black and my shoulder yoke fabric is white). It was basically unwearable for me. I therefore decided to take the facing off around the actual neckline, even though this meant unpicking black thread from a slippery black knit that absorbed stitches beautifully -- a big plus until you have to unpick -- and decide then what to do next.

Today I sat down again and tried to decide how I could fix it. I decided to leave the facings on for the V, and bind the neckline by attaching a normal binding strip, turning it to the inside and then coverstitching. This does look a LITTLE better than the faced version, but the process of sewing, unpicking and then binding stretched the back neck all out of shape, and it gapes away from my neck horribly. This looseness at the neck has the overall same effect as the original facing: the edge of the neckline flips up and looks lumpy. I'm not saying it wouldn't have worked if I'd done it that way the first time, but as a second fix: no.

I can't think of a single other way to fix the neckline and I've overworked the fabric now to the point where I think it's unfixable, so I have given up and trashed the whole thing. I am really very fed up about this. I hate throwing perfectly good fabric away, I hate that a pattern I was really excited about sewing turned out to be such a dud, and I am currently questioning whether I should even bother to TRY sewing my own clothes since I have started to think I can't sew anything successfully!

This despondency is not helped by the fact that I then trashed another 2m of fabric trying to cut out a very simple pair of PJ bottoms. To be fair to myself, the fabric was so horrendous and off-grain that it's no wonder I struggled to cut it properly. I ended up with pieces that bore no relation to the pattern pieces they had allegedly been cut to, and that I would have to be suddenly HIGHLY asymmetrical to wear. I am not sewing with fabric that ridiculous, and I didn't like the print much which was why it had been relegated to PJs, so whatever, good riddance to bad rubbish.

Still though. Not a good weekend for sewing.