New dress is ‘sew’ much better
(Originally published May 2023)
“No offense,” Mark said, “but you look like you’re wearing a tablecloth.”
I could see why he was confused; I was, in fact, wearing a tablecloth. It had only recently retired from a long career on our kitchen table.
But it wasn’t really clothing; it was a mock-up—or “toile,” as the sewing people say—of a linen summer dress I was planning to make.
You heard that right. I have found yet another time-sucking, all-consuming pastime: I’m learning to sew my own clothes.
Unlike you, whose body is no doubt proportioned for the way retail clothes are designed, I have trouble buying off the rack. For you, sleeves are always the right length; the waist and hips of your pants match your shape; you don’t have fabric straining here or gapping there. Congratulations on being perfect. I’m not so lucky.
I first realized buying clothes in adulthood was going to be a problem when I was 22 and getting fitted for a bridesmaid’s dress. The seamstress ran her tape around my hips, waist, and bust and jotted down some numbers. Then she rechecked her paper and said with a sigh, “It’s too bad. If you had a little more up top, you’d have a nice figure.”
I managed to reframe that as a compliment (two out of three ain’t bad, after all). But from a strictly sartorial perspective, she had pinpointed just one of several issues that would dog me forever, especially when wearing dresses: whatever fits me below the equator will be falling off me in the northern hemisphere.
I try to compensate for this disparity with stretchy fabrics. But in the summer, I’d like to wear cool cotton and linen tops and dresses, not smothering spandex blends. So I decided to teach myself to sew.
Technically, I’ve known how to sew things like curtains and quilts for a long time. But with my general approach to life—“If a thing is worth doing, it’s worth doing hastily and carelessly”—I’d never made anything wearable.
I was going to have another go at sewing, but this time I’d do it the recommended way: I’d read the instructions more than once, measure and cut with accuracy, and take my time. None of this sounded right to me, but so far my method—winging it—hadn’t worked.
“Over the next few weeks, I devoured dozens of YouTube videos with titles like ‘You Can Make Buttonholes’ and ‘How to Sew a Neckline Facing.’ Crazy, exhilarating stuff.”
Heading to YouTube, I found hundreds of videos on how to sew and, critically, how to customize sewing patterns. The big moment came when I learned that my particular fitting issue had a solution: the “small-bust adjustment,” or “SBA.”
If the term was common enough to get an abbreviation, I wasn’t the only person whose sundress straps were always too long, whose blouses sported enough extra fabric under the arms to smuggle puppies, for whom bust darts were a cruel joke.
I called Mark at work to share the exciting news: “There’s nothing wrong with me!” I shouted. “It’s the clothes that are wrong!” The line went dead, indicating he had dropped the phone with relief.
Over the next few weeks, I devoured dozens of YouTube videos with titles like “You Can Make Buttonholes” and “How to Sew a Neckline Facing.” Crazy, exhilarating stuff.
Once I had practiced on the toile, I was ready to start sewing for real. Working precisely and slowly like a serious sewist (the word looks pretentious, but you can’t really use “sewer” in print), I made an adorable linen dress with a buttoned bodice. And when I put it on, for the first time in my life I felt like I was wearing something that had been made for me. Talk about an epiphany.
I skipped into the kitchen to model the dress for Mark, who briefly looked up from his work.
“It fits,” he said, gushing (at least on the inside). “I know!” I squealed, with the enthusiasm of the first person to decode the entire human genome.
I finally got it: My clothes could—and should—fit my body. Maybe someday I could learn to make shirts whose cuffs reached my wrists and, in my highest aspirations, pants whose waistbands didn’t get all up in my ribcage.
I had spent decades blaming my imperfect proportions for the ill fit of store-bought clothes. But all this time, I’d had it backwards.
I don’t need “a little more up top.” My dresses just need a little less.
