Give me Liberty!

Oh, the joys of sewing with luxury fabric!  I mean, sure, a Ralph Lauren bedsheet is nice, but Liberty of London is a whole other animal.

From the minute I started ironing it I knew this was something special: the iron glided along the fabric's smooth surface like Santa riding a Norelco razor.

I decided to use McCall's 6890 for Michael's shirt -- the same one I used to make my club-collared shirt last month.



So how's it going, you ask?  He likes it!



A few surprises.  When I stitched a sample with my polyester thread (and readers, shame on me: I've been using serger thread in my sewing machine for months now) I realized it was too thick and coarse for this project.  David Coffin recommends using fine cotton thread, so I hightailed it over to the notions store and picked up two cotton threads, one Gutermann and one Coats.



The Gutermann is on the right.  It's a little bit finer, so I ended up using that.



I cut this very carefully, due to the pattern, which is directional (i.e., there's a clear up and down).  And like a plaid, it also has to match side-to-side.

I'm proud of this button placket, which matches nicely.



Here's the collar:



I toyed with the idea of splitting the collar in two so the pattern would be perfectly symmetrical, but it reads fine; it's not like it's arrows or numbers that scream runs from left to right.  (Does that make sense?)

By day's end I'd sewn the collar on:



So I should have this finished later today with a final "reveal" tomorrow -- perhaps a glossy spread with Michael himself! 

I must thank Grace once again for sending me this beautiful fabric.  (Grace, Grace, Grace..., right?)  I bet a lot of you are sitting on some all-but-forgotten good stuff, huh?  (hint, hint)

OK, kids, time to put the pedal to the metal...or is it the other way around, I'm never sure.

Happy Wednesday everybody!