Back to Sewing with Vintage Sheets

When I first started sewing men's shirts, I made them out of vintage cotton/poly percale sheets I found at the thrift store.

In retrospect, I should have listened to the many Pattern Review commenters on my early reviews who told me that I'd have a much easier time working with 100% cotton fabric.  It wasn't until maybe my 5th or 6th shirt that I decided to spring for cotton fabric, which made shirtmaking a much more pleasant experience.  It also resulted in shirts that I actually wanted to wear.  Because no matter how playful those 1970's shirts looked, they felt clammy on the skin and smelled bad when I perspired.

Here are a few of my early efforts (from summer of 2009).  Maybe you slept on some of these prints in your youth.








 
This weekend I had to make a shirt muslin for a male client who wears a size Large or thereabouts (16 1/2 - 17" neck).  I headed to my vintage sheet stash for fabric.  I found a 50/50 cotton/poly blend I'd bought recently at the Salvation Army (pictured at the top of this post).  I like the print but, working on the muslin, I was reminded of some of the challenges of working with these sheets: they don't press sharply and tend to droop, plus they're tough to ease.

But I do like the way my muslin turned out! 



On me:



 I used Simplicity 8541 from 1988. 



The only change I made (unrelated to fitting) was to narrow the collar an inch or so.





This shirt went together quickly.  If you don't flat-fell your seams or bother with sleeve plackets (the pattern calls for just binding a "v" slit cut above the cuff, aka, a continuous lap placket), you save a lot of time.

In other news, I passed on a vintage Singer 301 at the flea market yesterday.  It had a few issues (no attachments, no case, no original foot, among other things) and I certainly didn't need it.  It would have been fun to play with but not for $50.



In closing, I think if were to advise a beginning sewer, I would no longer recommend sewing with cotton/poly sheets.  If you can find a 100% cotton sheet, that's another story.

Do you agree that it's better/easier for beginners to start with all cotton?

Have a great day, everybody!