May 13, 2022
Ease vs Bagginess
I probably ought to make this a blog, but this is a subject that needs to be out there, so it will be here first!
There's a lot of confusion and pre-judgement on what is ease and what is bagginess. Since the onset of so much stretch in our garments, ease has been equated with bagginess and therefore not wanted in our clothes.
There was the day when showing every curve of our bodies wasn't a preferred look.
 
These were considered elegant and beautifully dressed women and set apart as a model of how to look. They were advanced in that they wore pants, but in both cases the pants have ease.\
Today if you see this pants worn this is the proper way to wear them:
And yet, here is Governor Christie in a pair of pants that have appropriate ease and fit well and are comfortable, but no one would call this baggy.
These pants are tailored as they should be, starting from the most extruding part (the stomach in front and the fanny in back) with a silhouette that drops straight to the hem with no curving under the stomach.
What's the principle at work here that works on men's pants, but women's clothing manufacturers seem to miss?
The principle is that the silhouette should never fit under an apex point on a person's body - male or female - unless you want that apex point to be accentuated. I did this for a darling debutante who wanted her bust to look like Marilyn Monroe but had a bust size of 32 -A! She looked voluptuous, and it worked.
But most of the time we want to conceal those protrusions and that means drawing a straight line from the apex point to the hem. Here's a perfect example of this:
 
The difference is that we've tilted the version on the left to drape and hang better so that there is a straight line from her tummy to the hem. In draping and correcting the tilt, we marked the stomach protrusion and made the garment fall straight (a vertical line) from the stomach.
That's it. This is so easy and it works so well. What this does is not only conceals the stomach but it also makes the wearer look smaller. Look how thick and heavy she looks in the left photo where on the right she looks like she has balanced weight all over her body.
Not only does this correct the tilt, but it also makes her look smaller by adding fabric to the front and removing that fabric from the back.
So why don't more people do it? Because it looks like it might be baggy, when in fact it's anything but. There is obviously more room in front (in the left version), and it's taken in in back (hence the tilt is corrected), but it's because we've corrected the hang (so it's straight instead of tilted and curved under the stomach), there is the illusion that there is no stomach, plus there now is a waist, when in reality there is no waist.
I know this sounds like we're talking about the hang and tilt of the garment, and we are, but in correcting that hang, we are adding fabric to an area that most people seem to think needs to be fitted and taking away fabric from the back. Usually sewists would take in the front and the back and then you would end up with something like this:
Granted there's more to cure on this dress, but the original on the left is not attractive, while the version on the right is. The left has the silhouette tucked under the hips, which makes them look bigger. On the right, this person looks like she is wearing a well-made, fitted garment. I didn't address the wrinkles at the waist, but just the lower half, and it looks so much better on the
right because the silhouette falls straight from the largest point of the hip to the hem in a straight line. I essentially added more fabric.
This involves personalizing a fit, that the clothing manufacturers don't even want to touch with a 10-foot pole, therefore the preponderance of stretch, which doesn't fit, but you can get the garment on your body - even though it's not flattering and probably will put additional wear on the garment that the garment was not designed for handling. And designers don't like to show clothes like this, however the designers' dirty secret is that when they make those
custom clothes, they are for real figures and plus figures so they do end up on regularly shaped bodies, just not on the runway.
BUT we sewists have a leg up on the world - the whole world - because we can personalize our fit, our hang, our drape, the tilt of the garment and can correct all that. It's not that hard. In correcting that tilt and drape, we end up with a garment that is immensely flattering, fitted and yet comfortable.
And sometimes that means adding fabric to an area that you may not think needs fabric. That added fabric is certainly not bagginess and although it does give more ease of movement it also gives a more flattering look.
This is a beginning guide on what to do with your core pattern after you have fitted and worked on it.
All the work that you have done in your core pattern contains all the information to make a garment that you will totally love. This means you really don't have to buy another pattern for making skirts, pants or leggings. Variations on your core pattern makes it possible for you to have the styles you see in a photo or on Pinterest without having to look for the pattern that looks like it might work. You can now simply trace it onto your core pattern and
you're done.
This resource also contains some other important resources at huge discount because they are so important to this creative process of varying your core pattern. It also contains some downloads that aren't available in the Resource Library at all, but are vital toward making good design.
In this world of crazy, illogical fashion, we sewists are having to turn into designers. That sounds really hard and foreboding, but it's not. Unlike designers, we simply haven't had all the experience they have, most of that experience they got when they went to design school. More than anything I wanted to make this process encouraging, empowering and enlightening without having to worry about whether or not you could vary your core pattern.
You can! It isn't that hard. It is knowing some guidelines and charging out into the unknown. That's what we sewists do and we do it very well most of the time.
This is the beginning of the series into variations on core patterns. I wanted to start with something basic, so that you wouldn't feel so intimidated. It takes a while to write these up, cause I'm an idea factory, and coordinating and organizing these ideas can be monumental with the sewing muse yacking in my ear 24/7.
The resource is available now at a discount so that you can enjoy it before spring starts in full force. Right now, I'm thinking happy, colorful and pretty. Those are all fresh looks for future clothes. When things seem upside down, it's great to have something to make us happy and often bright, springtime and summertime fabrics are just as much as drab, dark and somber fabrics. I'm ready to be beautiful, comfortable and look flattering in my clothes and
I'm dying to share that with you.
Skirts, Core Pattern Variations, Part 1 (but there's more than skirts in here)
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