Cardi to Vest

Before

After

(or Vogue 8839 to Vogue 8982)

Last week I made up Vogue 8839 in a gorgeous red-orange polar fleece. It was pretty on the model, and great on my dress form. And it was soft. And I love the color. But I did not like it on me, partially because it was too tight in the sleeves. But there was also the frump factor.

It needed to be reconstituted, resurrected. But of course, each time the fabric is cut, its potential shrinks. I cut it apart and spread it on the floor like a bear rug to see if that generated inspiration. Hmmm...nothing.

Then Marcy's newest jacket/vest/top pattern arrived in the mail - Vogue 8982. I understand it is sold out over at clubbmv and that it is the #2 best seller there*.

Well, no wonder! This is a truly fabulous pattern. And it is really 4-5 patterns, IMO. View A/B are the knit jacket versions. View B has a smart vent in the sleeve and some suggested hand-stitching. Otherwise they are the same. View D and E are the woven versions (jacket plus undershirt).

Just finished View A/B as a vest, so without sleeves. Now you might think, hey, that's really view C. But view C has different pattern pieces in order to allow it to layer under the jacket as a top. I just love that. Cannot wait to make a jacket and top combo.

You can see that it is nicely shaped here in this pic of the back

My extra vertical lines are visible here.

This is how I will wear it though without houseshoes.

Not too bad from the back.

It closes but I won't be putting closures on this.

The cardi conversion was not without its hiccups. And I was very lucky to have enough left over fleece to cut out the vest back and front facings. The vest fronts and the vest side backs were cut from the spread eagle cardi. And I have enough left over to make more mittens for the grands.

As a result my vest has additional vertical lines in the front, but I kind of like that. I did have to release the vertical bust dart. It was bunching up where my vertical lines intersected the dart. That was a bit of a nail-biter as the stitches, even at 3.0, sink into this fleece and are hard to rip.

The arm holes were simply turned at 5/8 inch and top-stitched.

This is a wonderful pattern, a canvas for artful touches, and a flattering style, I think. The neckline is one that frames the face and draws attention up. Lovely. Ready for some sashiko, perhaps.

I'm so happy, as you can see here:

Vogue 8975 appearing in Jungle January! ( Petty Grievances)

*Marcy's dress is number 1. And I love that too, as mentioned in my previous post. So have you ordered these two wonderful patterns yet? If not, I really think you must.