Jenny’s Cute Kitty Agnes

Jenny from Give us a Toile shares the first LSA Blog Squad blog post, and it is cute as a button!!

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Given that I was so late to the indie pattern party after my long break from sewing, I couldn’t go on too much longer without tackling some Tilly and the Buttons. After making her name appearing on the first series of the Great British Sewing Bee, she’s now so famous in the sewing world that she’s even become a drinking game on my favourite crafty podcast Stitcher’s Brew, and I must admit that her Stretch book has become my bible with all the jersey sewing I’ve been doing. Her patterns are incredibly popular, thanks I’m sure to their simplicity, great visual instructions, and high quality paper which you can easily re-fold and get back in the packet unlike traditional patterns which seems to expand as soon as you release them from their paper prison. As I’m on a bit of a stretchy roll at the moment I chose to start with the Agnes top. A great wardrobe staple with a few options to choose from to mix things up.

Usually I would diligently trace off my pattern to allow for alterations but this time I was feeling impatient and I figured ‘It’s Tilly, she knows what she’s doing’ so I just went from my measurements and cut the size 4 straight from the packet. My wearable toile showed up a few issues, namely my age-old problem of having narrow shoulders. Luckily as I’d chosen the ruche sleeved version I didn’t have to faff about adding anything to the sleeve head. Score! it was also just a bit too tight in the body for me. It’s a pretty curvy pattern so I just added a little to the waist curve and hip and it was problem solved.

Being as the sleeves are so pretty it deserved a pretty fabric and this good quality jersey from Like Sew Amazing was the perfect choice.

What’s not to love about the kitsch but wearable qualities of a fabric like this?! Best thing about it too was that it didn’t roll at the cut edges which made the process of constructing my Agnes a whole lot easier.

My one top tip for anyone making the ruched sleeve version is to allow more elastic than Tilly tells you to. She gives you an extra bit to hold onto at the bottom as you pull to get it through the machine, but if you also allow yourself a bit extra at the top you avoid potentially back-tacking off the end and you get a much more robust starting point for all the tugging it takes to get a good result. See the difference?

Just a little snip of the excess at the top and you have a far nicer effect.

Given the kitty print I couldn’t resist a little extra cuteness with a feature bow at the neckline. Some good quality cream scuba gave the perfect spring-back to make it hold it’s shape. Do you think Tilly would approve?