I bought a vintage pattern or two from Nicole of Circa Vintage but she couldn’t find one of the patterns I had bought so she sent me two in substitution (great customer service, or what??). This is one of them – a 1950s blouse

This is a quietly elegant blouse, but is a size too big so I thought I’d make a wearable muslin out of some fabric that my sister destashed on to me. The pattern actually outlines how to adjust it up or down one size, so I went down the one size but could probably go a tad smaller.

Of course the picture has the blouse tucked in to a skirt and I think that’s a nicer look, but it looked daft tucked into my jeans, so I’ve left it out, which makes it look a bit more contemporary.

Some interesting things about this shirt is that the collar and revere is sewn as one piece rather than being separate pattern pieces and the cuffs have hand-made cuff links with double button holes, rather than a button and button hole. Making cuff links is an interesting exercise. This was my first effort – a bit of a mess.

To make the cuff links you just join two buttons with thread and then blanket stitch along the thread. Doesn’t sound too hard? Well, it wasn’t that easy for a clumsy person like me. I realised that the linking part should not be too long because otherwise the cuffs wouldn’t sit together neatly, and also the amount of blanket stitch needed would be too much to tolerate. I still have a mess, but I thought these would do until I can find some heavier yarn (topstitching yarn will work much better) and have another go.

Not sure I should be posting these less than perfect items, but in the interests of honesty I have to show you my terrible workmanship!

I think that the front pattern piece had been cut too short because I found it to be shorter than the back and facing. The power of the muslin, because I’ve now rectified the pattern for the next time, but the blouse is a bit shorter than I would like. I am going to make the whole thing longer in the next iteration.

One of my major disappointments is that I had no appropriate buttons in my stash. I really wanted purple with mustard spots, but knew that would be impossible. The only purple buttons of the right hue that I could find were these small ones, so I decided to go with them, but they really should be bigger (and I had to buy them – gah!). I might look for some vintage ones and risk redoing the button holes – eventually!

I might make a longer sleeved version of this for winter. It would be terrific to wear under a loose fitting jacket. Or I might make a lighter version for summer… hmm, the possibilities are seemingly many!

Pattern is Women’s Realm from the 1950s, fabric is a brushed cotton given to me by my sister from her stash, teamed with NYDJeans. Everything is from my stash except the buttons.

I am participating in Me-Made-May 14, so will do some reporting…