The Pattern Review Mini Wardrobe Contest - Anchor's Away!

Nothing like a challenge to inspire one. Well I decided to enter the Pattern Review Mini-Wardrobe contest. The idea is to make five pieces that can be combined into six outfits. I've never tried sewing with a plan for more that maybe three pieces before so I thought this was a really good time to challenge myself. I chose some very tried and true patterns from Bernina My Label.

What I chose was:

A sort of camp like shirt made out of the anchor fabric I found at Grey's Fabric and Notions on a recent trip to Boston. This was based on the My Label tailored shirt but without the vertical darts with the sleeves widened and cuffed. I also put a pleat in the center back. I could not resist the buttons I found at G street for this:

A black T shirt but in a really nice knit and with 3/4 sleeves - perfect for summer air conditioned DC area offices. The fabric was knit with a light terry underside which feels great.

Same T shirt pattern with white but with a boat neck and slightly ruched sleeves. This fabric came in a bundle from Michael's Fabrics.

A skirt made of a khaki colored cotton twill. This has side pockets sort of like jean pockets and a fly front. I kept the original slit in the back per the pattern. The fun part was making belt loops with my newly aquired Baby Lock cover stitch machine.  That fun little machine also made short work of the two knit tops.

The last was a nautical inspired skirt using the same basic pattern of the khaki skirt but with a faux flap on the front, welt pocket on the back and invisible zipper as the real closure. The flap was actually two shallow pockets just about big enough to put buttonholes and then buttons on the under portion. I also kept the slit in this skirt as well. This is made of denim and once again, could not resist the buttons I found at G Street:

I wanted a water backdrop for the pictures but I also needed a place to change. I realized that the town of Occoquan which is literally just down the street had a visiter center. I asked the nice guy in there if I could leave the clothes there and use the lady's room to change. He said of course!

The first was the combo of the khaki skirt and black tee:

Then I put on the anchor shirt over the khaki skirt:

After that it was the white shirt with the khaki skirt:

The over to the naval inspired skirt, first with the white shirt:

Then with the black shirt:

Then with the black shirt and anchor shirt over it. And the goofy captain's hat I found on Amazon:

So there are all six! This contest has a lot of fiece competition but the real winning felling was I actually finished and have quite a few pieces of new wearable clothes!