My Liberty-Print T-Shirt

For my birthday in December last year I was given a lovely piece of Liberty Fairford tana lawn by my boyfriend (sorry, my fiancé!). He even chose it himself – I am beyond proud!

I’ve had a stack of Simplicity/New Look sewing patterns hanging around for a while – most of them I bought just before Christmas when they had a half price sale online and I just couldn’t resist stocking up! One of the patterns I had was for this t-shirt design (New Look 6895) which, for a still-beginner seamstress like myself, looked like a great place to get going.

The techniques needed to make the pattern include bias binding around the neck, gathers at the front and then a simple double-folded hem around the sleeves and arms. All things that I’ve donebefore, so what could possibly go wrong? Turns out that learning how to get the fit of a garment right is so, incredibly difficult – and this is just a t-shirt!

The neck of the t-shirt is scooped and, for a little person like me, comes down way too low. I only learnt this after I’d sewn in all the gathers and attached the bias binding – why did I not think to check this before? Anyway, after a bit of thinking and Twittering, I decided that my best option was to try and sew in a few more make-shift pleats where the gathers are so that it brings the neckline up a bit and isn’t too obvious. Here are the pictures of my finished top – do you think I did alright for a Seamstress-in-Practice?