Welcome to the first in our series: Stash Sharing.
What is Stash Sharing? It’s seeing a single fabric or pattern on 3 or more women with different bodies and styles. So many of us search social media and blogs, hoping to see a variety of bodies and styles in the patterns and fabric we look to buy. We want to see ourselves represented in our pattern and fabric companies, and we also look to be inspired to try something new.
This first post is a fabric comparison. We felt it’s less common to see a specific fabric represented side-by-side(-by-side-by-side) on different women, and it would be a great way to kick-off this idea. #sewingfriendsarethebest, right?
This fabric is a gold-sparkle blue-black polyester knit. It has drape, a lot of right-side-facing-texture, 50% x 100% 4-way stretch, and is opaque.
This is what I call a “secret weapon fabric.” It sews up incredibly fast, doesn’t fray (so use a serger or a stretch-stitch on your machine), will survive anything short of an apocalypse in your washer and dryer, doesn’t wrinkle even when traveling in a backpack… Honestly, Gillian has written extensively on knits, so go forth if you need more info. It is NOT biodegradable in any sense of the imagination, and probably not the best fabric if you want “breathability.” It DOES do wonderful smoothing-out magic things that are usually credited to only expensive slips made of power-mesh, if you know what I’m sayin’, wink, wink.
Now that you have the fabric stats, let’s get to the fluffy fun part. Here’s each person, their individual body stats, and the pattern they made/are wearing.
Anne:
Anne is Gillian’s sister and stole her dress — so it’s the same dress as Gillian’s above, but on a different body for comparison.
Height: 5’6″, usually a sewing size 18; bust 45″, waist 40″, hips 47″.
I love this so much! keep in mind we are in three different countries! How did this crazy fabric make it into all of our lives??? I got mine on an ends table in Canada maybe 3 years ago, thinking “this is so weird and crazy it has to be mine!” Then Chloe got some in Australia and blogged it last year… and then she sen her remaining yardage to Becky in the USA!
beautiful. Well done all 🙂
What a fun idea! And that’s pretty amazing that the same print ended up in both hemispheres.
It was really Chloe’s doing! 3 of us were on chat, Gillian & Chloe were talking about having made the same fabric, then Chloe just up and sent the rest to me! Postage from Australia to the US!! Super generous!
Before looking at the stats, and reading that Gillian and Anne had on the same dress, I thought, “Wow! She must be quite a bit taller than Gillian!” It looks so different on both of you (in a good way!). It has that cute baby-doll dress look on Anne and the skirt looks fuller somehow??
I love all of the looks and absolutely LOVE seeing fabric interpreted in different ways. Some years ago someone commented that so many of us buy the same fabric from FabricMart and – it’s true! We do!! But I can hardly tell half the time that it’s the same! Once you put that same fabric in a different pattern — or as we see here the same pattern/fabric on a different body — it takes on new life!
This sharing aspect is truly the best part of the sewing community 😀
Anne is about 4” taller than me… and even though our busy measurements look similar on paper, our bra cup sizes are at least 5 cups apart. I think that’s what makes it look different on Anne – and she has slimmer hips than me, so maybe the skirt seems fuller? I LOVE seeing clothes on different bodies because the littlest differences can make a bit change in how we wear or style things!
oh, I *almost* added bra/cup size to the stats. we’ll have to remember next time! It might help more.
Even then, everyone prefers such a different bra fit! I’m on team “tight band, large cup” myself!
True, true. I don’t like cup spillage, so I think I’m on the same team? We will have to delve into this… 😂
Love this! Sadly my few sewing friends have verrry different tastes (no squabbling at fabric swaps though). : )
This is a superb idea, wonderful post enjoyed reading so much. That fabric ticks a lot of boxes and was a perfect place to start.
Thank you! I hope to do more, but I also hope it takes off as a thing with sewing friends.
[…] the end of last year, we did this fun post where we showed the same fabric in different patterns and on different bodies. We had every intention of making it a regular series, and being this is the second post only a […]