creation process

I decided for today's post I'd put up some in-progress shots of a top I've been working on. I picked up two remnant pieces at Joann's that were almost the exact same size - one was a black stretch poly with white polka dots and an interesting mix of green thrown in; the other was solid black poly/spandex mix. At first I toyed with the idea of a skirt, and then decided to make a top.

The original design was going to be a fitted V-neck with an empire seam, and then a looser fit below. I started by cutting out the front and back upper portion (above the empire seam). I purposefully offset the line of green a little to the right of center because I thought it gave it an interesting asymmetrical look. I also liked having different patterns running over the two sides of the bust.

The entire garment was going to be made of the two layers of fabric - the patterned on the outside and the solid as a lining. Since the solid fabric has a tighter stretch to it, it is a bit more snug. This acts kinda like a undergarment, in that it provides a smoother base for the outer layer of fabric.

Silly me, of course, I cut out the lower back piece without leaving enough fabric for the lower front piece. So I tried cutting that piece in half horizontally and attaching it to the front and back that way. The result was not very pleasing. Instead of highlighting the empire line, it just made it look very jumbled. Plus it was about 2" shorter than I had intended. If this had been for a skinny girl, the length probably wouldn't have been much of an issue. But plus size gals are different - there has to be enough coverage.

I was almost ready to give up on this one, throw it in the back of the closet where I would probably never look at it again. But I was thinking about a top I own that has a contrast fabric under the bust line and I thought that idea could work here. I had already cut the black fabric to match the lower pieces, so I just recut them to form a solid band. I fit that to the garment and it looked great.

I added a bit of the polka dot fabric at the bust to make the gathering effect, which I thought just made the neckline that much sexier. I finished off the seams and hem and I absolutely love it. It's sexy without being risque, and I think it's a style many women would like. I will definitely remember this if I come into any other fun stretch fabric.