New Look 6943 Rust Waistcoat

The New Look 6943 Rust Waistcoat is finished. It may be one of my tops in the Timmel SWAP 2008 as it can be worn alone (not sure that I would as that's quite an avant garde look).

The last item I made from this came out too big, so here I used a 14 back and a 12 front and it fits neatly. The fabric is rust herringbone wool from Abakhan fabrics in North Wales, UK and the lining is a remnant of satin from TP Textiles in Warrington, Cheshire, UK.

The wool is very soft and lovely to sew, though it ravels and does not press to a crisp point. The satin is polyester and frayed badly. The satin was pretty horrible to sew, especially where the side front lining attached to the wool interfaced front facing on a princess seam. I chose it because the soft peach tones went so well with the rust, although the fabrics were not a dream match from a sewing perspective. The buttons are soft edged square buttons in antiqued silver tone metal. The idea is that it would help the waistcoat 'connect' with darker toned bottoms.

I started this on Wednesday 2nd January and finished it on Saturday 13th January 2008.

New Look 6943 Waistcoat

The New Look 6943 Waistcoat is completed. This is a old pattern from the early 1990s but the style seems to be back in again.
I sewed a size 16, but as you can see of the shot of me wearing it, it seems to be a bit big. I think the easiest way to alter it would be to cut the side seams down a little, and I hope to get to that quite soon.
I finished this over a week ago, but with getting ready for Christmas I have not had time to photograph and review.
I've currently also mislaid the pattern envelope but when I find it I will update the entry so you can see the pattern.
I will make this again in a smaller size for the 2008 Timmel SWAP, probably in bitter chocolate or maybe coral wool.

The waistcoat is made with dark charcoal pinstripe menswear fabric - scraps from the cropped pants - and as well as being lined in silver shimmer lining, the back in made from lining too (due to lack of fabric). Although I cut tabs out of lining, I didn't like the texture once it was fused to the interfacing, and suddenly remembered the dark grey ribbon remnant, and used that instead for the back tie.