I’m just going to go ahead and start by talking about the fabric. Fabric Mart had a bunch of this large scale floral chiffon by J Crew for $2-4 per yard a while back, and despite the fact that no one needs that much poly chiffon I got it all. As in four yards of each of the four fabrics (two different prints, two colorways each). This fabric is the stuff of my dreams. Despite my shy nature I love large scale florals, especially when they are broken up by pleats and seaming, and the colors are fantastic. This colorway may be my very favorite – gray background with peach roses, dark purple irises, olive leaves, and flashes of yellow in the irises.

The design is pretty good too. This is Vogue 1247, the Rachel Comey pattern with that great skirt that everyone has made. I bought the pattern for the skirt, and actually planned on making both pieces at the same time. That would have worked except apparently I forgot how to sew by the time I got to the skirt. Despite having just made a fiddly chiffon top the cotton skirt bested me. Of course it’s totally fixable but I threw it in my scrap/UFO bin last weekend and figured I’d better just get the top up by itself. It could be a while before that skirt gets finished…
My favorite feature of this design is the way the pleats form a bit of a sleeve cap in an otherwise boxy style. I tend to live on the edge and not look at Pattern Review before diving into a project, so that was a happy surprise. Otherwise the top went together as expected. I used quite a bit of hand stitching on this garment – the pleats and the neckline are secured by a running stitch and the hem is hand rolled. It may an Alabama Chanin influence, but I’m finding myself using hand stitching in visible, intentional ways lately. I’ve never had a problem with stitches showing, it’s sewing after all, and in this case it would have been hard to make machine stitching look good. Maybe I should strive for perfection on the machine, but eh, I don’t really care.
I didn’t even think about pattern matching or not matching, but I should have because, ugh, that back. It’s not even the same flower, but it’s too close. Oh well, what’s done is done. The back view isn’t terribly flattering, especially on my stationary dress form, but the chiffon is sheer enough to show there is a shape underneath. I’ll probably wear this with a tan or gray camisole.
All in all I’m very happy with this top. Lightweight and loose floral tops are part of my work uniform, and this one is a favorite already!
