Remember the vintage blouse pattern of a couple of posts ago? I made another ‘wearable toile’ directly from this pattern with only minor adjustments.

What probably cant be seen from the pattern envelope is that it is essentially a shirt. A shirt with four long body darts at the front and back. These can probably be seen better from the pieces layout.

It has a collar stand and separate collar and without the darts makes a fine shirt. So that is what I did ~I decided to eliminate the darts [which were a bit exaggerated for modern taste ~and size!] and make up a toile. The fabric I used was actually once a single valance sheet – almost new ~ I think it is 100% cotton, it is nice and soft anyway and a freebie, so nothing lost if it didn’t come out right.

My first intention was to dye the finished blouse navy blue because it looked very plain and a bit so-so and I thought the darker colour would be more interesting. Then I thought of adding the pockets and red buttons. The red buttons were really a matter of necessity – with the working buttonholes on the pockets I needed 10 identical buttons and red was the only colour I had enough of that would be suitable. I left the colour as it was and this is how it turned out.

I am really quite pleased with the finished article. Far from vintage looking I’ll admit, but fits well, is extremely comfortable and ideal for everyday wear about the house.

I’ve now made five blouses since the beginning of January – during a quick look around M&S on Friday, I saw that their similar simple tops/blouses started at around £29.50, I make that a total of £147.50 for five. Using stash and only two new pieces of fabric, my total comes to less than £20 – perfick! as Pa Larkin would say.