Vogue 8333, a wearable muslin

I have finally finished my muslin of Vogue 8333, a bit late for the RTW jacket sew-along, but meh.  It's done.  I will wear this thing.  I like it with the sleeves folded up like this, and I like the oversized nacre buttons I found for it.  I think it will be even better after a few more washes, to nicely wrinkle it up and settle in those seams, and I am toying vaguely with the idea of dyeing it... what do you think?
Something I've noticed, and you can see it in the picture, the right side lapel has a slight tendency to sit up higher than its roll line, in spite of  (or because of?) the hand-stitched bridles within.  Do you think I should I be worried about this?

I really wanted to make this muslin wearable since wasting fabric, even calico, goes against like just about everything to do with consumerism and using planetary resources that I believe in.  It is finished (sorta ridiculously) to couture standards...  well, I needed to have a go at all the couture techniques that are introduced in this wonderful pattern...
With a few exceptions; I forgo-ed pad-stitching the collar (I figured I'd already practised that one sufficiently pad-stitching the lapels) and just whacked in some iron-on interfacing.  No one will notice that.  I've learnt the thing about couture... done properly, no one should be able to tell couture apart from RTW, without taking the whole thing apart.  
Couture is in the inner details.  
The only reason one might notice a difference between the two at a casual glance is of course if one's hand-stitching is so badly uneven that it stands out on the outer like a sore thumb... but I pride myself on having pretty good hand-stitching if I say so myself.  Another couture exception in this garment is that I machine-stitched the buttonholes.  Will save the hand-finished buttonholes, with properly waxed and pressed silk thread as specified, for the real deal.  Finally, this garment is not underlined, unlike my "real" jacket will be.
Irene warned me that the torso of this pattern ran narrow, and I did check this carefully during the bodice construction bit.  But I am kind of narrow in the torso already, and actually found it to fit me fine.  I might shave a teensy bit off the bust curves but I don't think very much.  One part I had to drastically adjust was the sleeve cap... here is the jacket with the sleeves as per the pattern set in.

See how horribly poof-y and gathered at the top they are?  Even my youngest son, who is remarkably uninterested in details, and clothing details especially, noticed and kindly pointed it out to me unbidden, in case I hadn't noticed the hideousness myself already (I had).
I then reduced the height of the sleeve cap by a good 1.5cm in my muslin (as in top photo).  A bit better, no?
However will I need to adjust this detail in my wool/silk jacket? possibly not, since wool has shrink-ability going for it allowing one to shrink the sleeve cap into the armscye, whereas of course calico has absolutely zero shrink-ability.  Leading naturally to one of my pet peeves with the whole muslin charade in the first place, the difference in material properties; also titled "why the only useful muslin is one made in the exact same fabric as your garment" rant that I am not going to go into here, wishing to spare everyone a massive post.


Details:
Jacket; Vogue 8333, calico
Camisole (under, barely seen); Country Road
Skirt; skirt "m" from Unique Clothes Any Way You Like by Natsuko Hiraiwa, linen/cotton mix, details here
Sandals; Micam by Joanne Mercer, from Hobbs shoes (will be so depressed when these die...)

An un-stylish blogger writes about Vogue 8333

I didn't intend to take a photo of today's outfit, as it was one that I threw together with no intention of looking stylish or put-together.  Purely randomly chosen things.  And I ended up being perversely happy with it.  You know a day where you have a contrary, grumpy, don't-give-a-toss attitude to how you look... and end up feeling sassily funky and pleased with your unglamorous, even weird ensemble.  All these items I threw on today are individually items I have felt ambivalent with lately.  I didn't care what I looked like as I was contemplating a day at home, office-ing, and a little bit of muslin-ing.  Yes, people, I am getting along with my muslin of Vogue 8333 and it is proving a doozy.  Not in a good way.  I've read before about the dangers of OD-ing on your pattern during the muslin stage, and I am in near danger of doing just this... I have nearly finished my muslin, on which I am trying out all the couture techniques explained within that are new to me, and then I will take a short break before starting on my "real" jacket.  A short break during which I will do some quick-fix fun stuff, instant gratification stuff.  Vogue 8333 is emphatically NOT an instant gratification project.


Details:
Shirt; Burda 8497, white cotton, details here
Skirt; Vogue 7303, green velveteen, details here
Tights; my own design, details here
Cardigan; Metalicus
Thongs; Mountain Designs


Thank you so much Donna, for giving me this award!

Now, I'm to write 7 things, supposedly about myself, but instead for something different I'm going to write about 7 of the couture techniques I've learnt doing the muslin for Vogue 8333, which I expect will be a lot more interesting.


1. Bridles.  You could be forgiven for thinking Vogue have inadvertently branched out into horse-riding advice, but no, this is still within the realms of dress-making.  The bridles are a pieces of tape hand-stitched onto the roll line of the lapels in couture jacket construction; to both stabilise the fold and also help create a soft fold.  Giddy-up!


2. Pad-stitching.  Is where you do long lines of running stitches laid out in a grid, or a cross-hatching arrangement.  The result is fabric that is a bit stiffer, like it's been quilted.  Well, padded.  Thus the name,  Methinks. When one does this to thick wool fabric with some body one can hide the pad-stitches within the fabric somewhat, making them almost invisible.  When one is trialling pad-stitching on a calico muslin like I did, it looks.... kind of ridiculous.  I don't care.  I will wear my silly looking pad-stitched muslin with pride whence it is done, you'll see.


3. Taming, (the seam allowances).  If you think that sounds a wee bit kinky, well, in the immortal words of... somebody, the best is yet to come.  Taming the seam allowances within a corner involves folding the two edges of the corner down firmly and closely to each other, pressing into submission and hand-stitching down.  One does not, I repeat, NOT trim triangles away from the corners to remove bulk.  Oh yes, I tell you, we are throwing old ideas out the window in wild abandon with this project, die-hard corner trimmers....  NOT SO FAST with those scissors!


4. Spanking the corner;  ooh, yes, I kid you not, fellow seamstresses.  And you thought sewing was for squares, dried up earnest individuals with no excitement in their lives... well, little did we know about all that "spanking" going on in those couture workrooms!  The Vogue 8333 instructions recommended something called a "clapper", not owning one of these intriguing sounding tools I used a wooden spatula instead.


5. Fell-stitching.  Well.  Having not done fell-stitching before I googled it and found a little tutorial.  And discovered that I had been fell-stitching, like, only all my life, believing myself to be slip-stitching.  Who knew?  A subtle little distinction...


6. Hand-finished buttonholes.  Hold your horses, before one steamrolls ahead and starts hand-stitching one's buttonholes, the instructions specify to first wax, and then press the thread.  Yes, press the thread.  Another first.  Has anyone else out there, and I mean anyone, ever ever pressed their thread before?  Hmmm?  Been using un-pressed thread for your buttonholes?  Faaail...


7. Not necessarily a couture technique, but the instructions recommended that once the collar is turned out, and if you are not ready to sew it to the neckline, in order to keep the roll-line nicely folded and in order pin it to a tailor's ham and set aside.  I couldn't resist giving it a little face...

Now to give the award to 7 other stylish bloggers, (and please, there is no obligation whatsoever to do this... if you hate blogger awards then feel free to ignore this and don't hate me)
Darci, of Darcidoodle-do
Liza Jane, of lizajanesews
Steph, of 3 Hours Past the Edge of the World
Magda, of magdamagda design studio
Patty, of the snug bug
Bernice; of Raindrops and Bellyflops
Denise, of dame design studio