Pattern Review: StyleArc Courtney

StyleArc’s Courtney is a great top that deserves love and attention.  It dresses up, it dresses down, it lends itself easily to all sorts of colour blocking fun, and it works great for t-shirt upcycling.  The design lines in the front mean it would be easy to tweak the fit for a larger bust (though it fit me right out of the envelope so I didn’t have to myself).  The difficulty is rated medium, but I think it might be a bit easier than medium.  I’ve made three of them now, all different, and I’m really pleased with all of them.

For the first one, I had a remnant of argyle print cotton knit, not quite enough to do anything with, but I had to buy it because I have this unholy obsession with argyle.  By combining it with another remnant, I was able to get a whole top and make it look like I’d planned it that way.

 

Next, I decided it was time to do something about the shirt I bought to commemorate an awesome concert I’d been to (VNV Nation’s 20th anniversary tour).  A standard men’s XXL t-shirt, and the fit was terrible:

I cut the center front pattern piece from the front of the t-shirt, and pieced the back from the back of the t-shirt plus some other fabric.  I was able to squeak the neck and sleeve bindings out of the concert t-shirt, and then I used other fabric for the front side panels and the yoke.

Super happy with this one!  Now I have a stylish shirt that I’m proud to wear!

And finally, the pattern is described as suitable for a knit or a woven, so for completeness sake I had to try a woven.  This fabric – sections of ruffles and pintucks, joined by lace insertions –  had been in my stash for about ten years, waiting for something suitable.  I decided to bust it out and give it a try.  Courtney works great in woven too!

The Details

Style Arc patterns come in sizes 4 – 30; a 30 is 58B/50W/61H.

My body

I’m 5’3″; I don’t know what fruit I am.  I describe myself as looking like the Venus of Willendorf.  My measurements are 50B/48W/53H.  My high bust measurement is 46″.

How this pattern worked with my body

In a nutshell: great!

I didn’t know what cup size StyleArc drafts for when I purchased the pattern (turns out it’s B), so at that time I bought the 22-24-26 grouping of pdf’s from their Etsy shop.  I might have gotten an even better fit if I’d used a size 20 (B46.5″) and done a FBA, but I started with a size 22 (B49″) because that’s what I had on hand.  From measuring the paper pattern, it looked like there would be plenty of ease in a size 22, without doing any adjustments.  So, for maybe the first time in my adult life,  I made this top right out of the envelope without any changes.  And it worked!!!

Construction Process

The pattern is beautifully drafted, and everything lines up perfectly.  A real pleasure to work with.  I guess that’s the upside of the pattern coming with one size in one layout, rather than the sizes nested: there’s lots of space for lots of markings and no confusion about what notch or circle is for what size.

The instructions, though… very, very sparse.  There’s a diagram showing how the pieces fit together, and a couple sentences about finishing, and that’s it.  You need to already know roughly how a top goes together, or be really, really good at assembling Ikea furniture from their pictograph instructions.  I’m both, so it was no problem for me, but a novice would definitely need help.  It doesn’t say anywhere which pieces to interface, or where to topstitch, or anything like that; I just used my judgment.

One thing I did differently for the knit tops (but not the woven one) was, I did a double-layer yoke and attached the front and back using the burrito method, rather than doing a single layer.  It gives a nicer, more professional finish.  I would have done it with the woven, too, but I didn’t want to mess around with lining up the lacy bits across the layers.

The Verdict

Size Range (1-5) – 5
Instructions (1-5) – 3
Construction Process (1-5) – 5
Final Fit (1-5) – 5
Overall Rating (1-5) – 4

This is a really great top that I think would work on all sorts of different body types.  The only reason I don’t give it the full five stars is the instructions, and the lack of nested sizes on the pattern sheet.