Finished! Belcarra Blouse

When Tasia gave a sneak peak of the Belcarra with the Gabriola, I was pretty excited. But then the pattern came out & I was really unsure about the wide neckline. With my narrow & sloping shoulders it seemed like a recipe for disaster. Not to mention the fact that I'm not so good with wovens. Where most seamstresses fret over sewing knits; wovens make me nervous.  Anyway, Tasia had the Belcarra PDF on sale for awhile there so I bought it.

I've had this silk/cotton blend in my stash for a long time. I originally bought it to sew the Pendrell (the muslin proved difficult due to the fabric choice but I feared it was the pattern) and that was 3 years ago. Since then I had decided to stop using black as my "go to" so in the stash it stayed.  But, really, who DOESN'T need a versatile black top, right??

Pattern: Sewaholic Belcarra blouse

Fabric: Silk/Cotton blend from Hart's Fabric. This was a dream to work with. It pressed nicely & has a really nice sheen without being crazy shiny.

Notions: Just thread :)

Size sewn: 8 & it's a bit big (but not big enough to need to take it in). Next time I need to sew a size smaller. (Do you hear that, Jenna?! SEW A SIZE 6!) I never know what size to sew in any pattern because I'm very small boned but I'm also quite curvy.

Alterations/Design Changes: I narrowed the neckline according to the tutorial found on the Sewaholic blog

Likes:  The pintucks are so simple construction-wise, but they really pack a huge punch.  My hubby makes a habit of telling people I made stuff when they compliment me and everyone was like "You sewed these little tucks?!" LOL. I also really appreciated Tasia's little tips within the pattern when it comes to sewing on the cuffs.

Also, this PDF printed out so nice & straight. Tasia was thoughtful enough to have 1" (I think they're an inch) grid marks on the background so it was easy to make sure everything was lined up. I loved that!

Dislikes: Hmm, the pattern doesn't instruct you to stay stitch the neckline & mine stretched out despite incredibly careful handling.  It was stretched out enough that the binding was a tad too short, but not enough that I could actually gather it as a design feature, so there are some wrinkles at the neckline. I also think the neckline as drafted is too wide. But a contributing factor to that is my sloping shoulders. I'm just really glad to be able to  change it...I don't even try wide necklines on in RTW because they always fall off my shoulders!

Time to Complete: Very little! This sewed up so quickly.I could probably make it start to finish in 2 nap times if I needed to :)

New Techniques: Binding the necking. I'd never done that on a woven.

Total Cost: It's been forever since I bought the fabric, but I know it was more spendy that what I usually buy. I'm guessing it was $12-14 a yard. But I'm not counting it because it was eons ago. As in like, one whole child ago :)  And I bought the PDF when it was on sale for like $11. I think this top definitely would have cost way more if it were RTW.