Another CWC Knock-off Tutorial

Before I show you the new Coldwater Creek knock-off t-shirt I thought I'd show you these. They are pillowcases I made for my co-workers daughter. We just found out she has been diagnosed with Leukemia. It's very tragic especially since she is 12, a time when the only thing you want to do is be with your friends. Since she loves pink and horses, I went to JoAnn's to find appropriate flannel fabric. I found the light pink with unicorns dancing around. They aren't horses, but I don't she'll mind. I fell in love with the flower power print in lovely spring colors. I hope it brightens her hospital room since she will be there another two weeks.


Now for the top. I found this top on the Coldwater Creek site a few weeks ago and shared it with you all along with many others I wanted to try and make. I think mine looks just like the original and I couldn't be happier with the way it turned out.

Theirs was $49.50, but is currently on sale for $23.99 in their "Outlet" section of their site:


Mine cost me nothing and fit me so much better than the original would have. I had the fabric stashed and I drafted the pattern:


Here's how I did it. First I started with a t-shirt pattern that already fit me, KS 2900. After tracing the front with a shallow sort of rounded v-neck, I sliced into the pattern and added for the gathers. I thought about taking my slices to the bottom of the pattern, but decided I just wanted the extra fabric to be at the bust level or above. I didn't want to add too many gathers so I only added in two places. I think it looks just right.


For the collar and necktie, I had to decide how wide I wanted the neck ties and how much wider I needed for the collar fold-over. At the back neck my finished size is 3-1/2" and for the ties, mine are 2" finished. I added 1/4" seam allowances to the finished size. When I cut the pattern out, I forgot that I would need two neck ties, one was for a facing. Good thing I had plenty of extra fabric. For the t-shirt, you may notice that I used sleeves from the Woman's Ottobre Rose Top. They are gathered so I didn't have to worry (or measure) that they wouldn't fit into the armhole.

After sewing the tie to the facing, it looked like this:


The notched out edge is the part I attached to the neckline of my top after gathering the neck edge. I got lucky and made it the perfect length for my knit's stretch factor. Before I applied the neck tie, however, I had to make a slit at center front and bind it. The original had a rather large slit that would have shown much too much of me to my students. Instead, I made a very short slit, just enough to make room for my knot in the ties. You can see the excess binding for the slit in the picture below. After sewing the binding on, I clipped the binding even with the neck edge.


Here's a closeup of the gathers and the necktie. Didn't it turn out great, even if I do say so my self? It still needs to be hemmed. Then I'll take a picture of me wearing it and post it on Patternreview.com

Here's a closeup of theirs:
Here's a close-up of mine: