This Girl’s Got Curves! Who Knew?

Ok.  I will be the first to admit, I’m not what you would call a curvy girl.  I have a more rectangular silhouette with my broad, square shoulders (from hefting bolts of fabric all day), and almost non-existent waist.  In fact, there is only 10cm or 4″ from the bottom of my ribcage to the top of my hip so there is not alot of room for any kind of indentation to happen!  I have enough padding on my rear end to provide cushion when sitting on hard chairs, but there’s certainly no mistaking me for Kim Kardashian!

I’m extremely lucky to be able to make most Burda pant patterns without doing any alterations (besides shortening the leg length).  Another reason why I like Burda pant patterns is because they have a 2 piece waistband in that there is a seam in the centre back waist.  If I fluctuate in my waist measurement, it is easy to adjust.  This feature is often found in men’s pants.

In keeping with the current trend of narrow legged pants, I purchased Burda 6534.  The description for these jeans is “Skinny low-rise jeans with front pockets, back pockets and a back yoke. They are the ideal coordinate for a wide array of tops.”  For the record, I didn’t find them to be low-rise.

With this being the first time trying this pattern, I dug out some black stretch woven cotton from my stash.  I always like the idea of a wearable muslin!  Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. I was even too lazy to change the thread in my serger so I actually have white serging on my black pants.

With a 2 piece waistband pant, there is a slightly different order of things.  First, you sew on the front pockets.  Then the back yoke.  Add the back pockets.  Then the side and inner leg seams are sewn.  Putting one leg inside the other, you work on the crotch of the pants by sewing from the bottom point of the zipper opening to about 1/3 into the seat of the back seam.  Leave the remaining back seam open.  Put in the zipper.  Sew the open waistband onto the pants.  Fold over the waistband and sew down just enough to finish the center front with the buttonhole and button.  Now you can try on the pants to judge fit.

This is where I found I had more curves than I realized!  This has not happened to me before with other pants patterns.

There was gaping from my backwaist to the high curve of my butt.  Some customers suggested a sway back adjustment.  When I looked up that, it involved making a horizontal pleat just below the waistband.  In some people, the S-shaped curve in the spine is more pronounced so that the back length is shorter than the front.  But as you can see from the picture, the waistband is fairly level.  There was just too much gap in the small of my back.

The quick and dirty method I did was to simply pinch out the excess.  I sewed straight down through the waistband, then did a dramatic curve out to the back seam.  Boy, did it look weird!

But it worked!  I did have to move the back pockets as by taking out the excess from the back, the pockets ended up too close to each other.  I moved them outward by 2.5cm or 1″.

Sometimes you have to be careful using this method.  By pinching out the excess, the waistband can end up dipping down into a V (so that it is no longer parallel to the floor) But this is easy to adjust by slightly lengthening the center back seam.

Another more complicated method of taking out the excess, is by pleating the back yoke.  Because I had to take out 3.8cm or 1.5″ on each side, it would be better to divide this amount up over 2 or 3 places across the back yoke versus taking it out over one spot.  By spreading out the pleat amount you have less of a curve readjustment.

Then you would have to make a dart in the back of the pants from the yoke seam to the top of the butt curve.  Because stretch woven cotton doesn’t mold softly, the bottom of the dart can poke out.  So make sure to put the dart where the bottom of the dart is actually hidden by the pocket!  This is what they do in RTW.

See?  Much more complicated than simply pinching out the excess.

Well, I had such success with this pattern, I promptly sewed up another 2.  I love it when my trial garment works!