Belcarra Disaster

At last! A real post! This has actually been sat in my queue for a while because I was too bone-idle to upload the pictures… Whoops!

I finally made the Belcarra by Sewaholic! Annnnnd I’m not in love with it. At all.

I ordered the pattern from Trixie Lixie’s ebay shop, and was so excited when it arrived! I had a really pretty green floral crepe type fabric that I’d picked up from The Knitting and Stitching Show in March that draped really nicely and I thought the simple shape of the top would make the most of the pattern.

I graded sizes from 14  to 16 as per measurements, and it was just a sack. I don’t really know how to deal with a swayback adjustment on a garment that doesn’t have a waist seam so I just added darts at the back to reduce how much fabric there was, but it didn’t help much. It just hung off me! I also took 2cm in total from the seams on each kimono sleeve to reduce the amount of fabric around my chest and it helped a little but it is clearly just too big. I was so disappointed! I had a look online to see if I had picked the wrong size, and I read that I should choose the right size based on bust measurement, then I read it should be by the hip measurement, then the high bust… I was clueless. I like the length of

JD and Turk weren’t keen either… (image from Google)

the top too but in the fabric I used, I just look like I’m wearing scrubs! Not quite the lovely floral tee I’d hoped for. I finished the to
p but I’m really unhappy with it. The fabric is lovely and fluid but surprisingly thick when worn so gravity doesn’t really help improve the shape. The only way to save it is to add some darts in the chest area and on the sleeve – it’ll create some interesting structural lines but it’s the only way to make it wearable.

The pattern itself was great – the instructions were clear and it stitched up really quickly. It was also nice to know that the pattern was already catering for pear-shaped ladies like me, which took a little bit of the stress out of the fitting. But now I am at a loss at what to do – I don’t want to give up because I have seen so many lovely versions of the Belcarra, but I don’t really know where to go from here. Does anybody have any suggestions on how to make this fit properly? I wonder if cutting a smaller size and doing an FBA is the way forward? All suggestions gratefully received!

PS: does anyone have idea how to use new WordPress?! It’s so hard to edit anything now and I can’t make my pictures clickable anymore 😦

 

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