Hand-sewing a linen top from my own pattern
My previous sewing projects have not yet involved drawing up a pattern from my own measurements. There are many ways to make clothes without creating your own pattern, such as the ways I have. I have used clothes I own to copy a pattern from, I have copied a simple pattern for a cat toy, I have used simple circle math to cut a pattern straight out of final fabric and I have tried inventing a pattern on the fly as I cut into fabric (not recommended!). To make a wardrobe of clothes that truly fit my own body, one needs to do it the old-fashioned way... by taking many exact measurements of my body and making a personalised pattern.
The flax plant
The common flax plant, also known as linseed, is a species of the Linum genus, the later which includes many species of wild flax.
Flax has potentially been used by humans in some manner for at least around 30,000 years.1 The first uses might have been for creating cordage rather than clothing or food. In this instance it was likely to be wild flax. It is thought that the first domesticated flax was grown around 10,000 years ago.2
Direct evidence for linen, woven fabric made from flax, has been found around the Dead Sea area that date to around 6,000 BC (~8,000 years ago).3 It is assumed that clothing and fabric (different from fibre and cordage) was created by humans much earlier than this, the evidence however is indirect, such as weave imprints in clay and figures of women wearing ites on their bodies.4,5 The physcial fabrics might be harder to find from these early periods due to degradation.
Making a sewing pattern
Fist made it with just measuring and then drawing a rough top on the page for a pattern. Forgot that a quarter of my waist measurement wraps around the side of your body, but still draw the pattern as if it was just my front.
Made my top. Fits and I like to wear it but it could be improved. There is bulk in the bust, extra fabric on the sides and is quite high under the armpit.
Made a sloper (according to these instructions on this website). Put it into fabric. Wasnt perfect so marked on the sloper as it was on my body: shoulder seam was too far back. (I think in future use little stickers to measure yourself so you have consistent points), armpit armsyce a bit too high, sloper instructions made bust dart too high.
Measurements needed: waist, bust, distance from shoulder to waist and shoulder to bust, neck width (to remind me not to put the straps too towards the tip of the shoulders!)
Made new sloper with these changes and put it into test fabric again.
understand a bit about shapes of fabric on bodies, so used my sloper to redesign the top pattern pieces.
put it in good fabric.
References
1
Kvavadze, E., Bar-Yosef, O., Belfer-Cohen, A., Boaretto, E., Jakeli, N., Matskevich, Z., & Meshveliani, T. (2009). 30,000-year-old wild flax fibers. Science, 325(5946), 1359-1359.
2
Sanders, D., Grunden, A., & Dunn, R. R. (2021). A review of clothing microbiology: the history of clothing and the role of microbes in textiles. Biology letters, 17(1), 20200700.
3
Muir, A. D., & Westcott, N. D. (Eds.). (2003). Flax: the genus Linum.
4
Hyland, D. C. (2000). Textiles, Basketry, Gender, and Status in the Upper Paleolithic1 by O. Soffer, JM Adovasio, and. Current Anthropology, 41(4), 511-537.
5
Adovasio, J. M., Soffer, O., & Klíma, B. (1996). Upper Palaeolithic fibre technology: interlaced woven finds from Pavlov I, Czech Republic, c. 26,000 years ago. Antiquity, 70(269), 526-534.
