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March 17, 2023
White Pants (and no on green ones!)
Nothing strikes terror in the heart of a sewists more than white pants. I mean really, do they look all that great?...aren't they supposed to project and therefore make an already sensitive area look even larger? Why in the world would a sane sewists even entertain any idea like this?
We all have visions of socialites dressed in white pants.
And that looks all fine and dandy, but this woman probably hasn't eaten anything in days and if she did, it was probably a rice cake or something else as unedible! Bleack!
Or for someone like this:
And that's fine if you don't eat at all.
The the other vision of white pants belongs to the nurses on parade... Nurse Ratchett is on call!
None of these are in the least bit attractive or something we would want to emulate. But the truth is there's a lot of style in white pants and even for we "hippy" people there's hope. There's a way to do this that works.
First, you Rectangles and Apples have it made with white pants and you can wear them anytime you want. As a matter of fact, your shape is perfect for white pants.
This isn't pants, but it makes my point with a familiar Apple shaped movie star.
This is a beautifully familiar outfit from the movie Titanic. Now Ms. Winslet carries her weight around her shoulders and chest, however, because of the dark contrasting lapel, the designer has made her look smaller, in addition to the direction of the stripes in the bottom portion of the garment.
For Apples, wearing dark on top and white on bottom should be a staple in your wardrobe.
The problem comes with Pears and Hourglasses who look positively awful in white bottoms. They accentuate the very area we are trying to hide.
 That's why you most often see this sort of warning for pears in white anything below the waist. It projects and makes this part of our body look even larger.
But there is a way to do this and not look larger.
Case in point
 If I have a smart aleck look on my face, there's a reason for this! 😁 This is one of my most comfy outfits and it's foiling all the information you get on Pears. I'm using a lot of subterfuge and slight-of-hand here. I carry my weight on my very upper thighs, so I can get
away with something "dark" around that area, then immediately below that, I can allow the white to come through. I also keep my pants fairly straight and although I allow a "break" in the pant, I don't like much of one at all.
This really turns into a fairly slim look. But one more technique here that's key - and that's the shape of the leg. This is key (more on that later)
This is a nuts and bolts, straight forward fitting pose. I don't stand like this all the time, but this is the pose that gives me the info I need for hanging correctly. Although there is a slight wrinkle in the lower (my left) leg, this is a break. This is called a break in the crease of the front of the pant because the pant is long enough to make a crease in the front of the pant. I like
this with flats cause this means I can wear this with a heel and the hem won't be at my ankle (which looks terrible.
So for a further sassy look on my face, here's a white jacket (with my doggie stuff all over it). And again, the pants are remarkably fashionable, flattering and unbeknownst to the rest of the world comfy!
I love this white pant and there's nothing that makes me feel dressy and summery than this white pant.
Something else to notice here. There is no lining. That's right ponte doesn't need any lining. Another plus to this fabric and this look.
Here's the straight on view, and again you can see the break in the pant crease in the front. This is typical of what a "break" should look like. The pant should hang nice and straight with the crease in front, while the style and shape look fabulous. It's flattering, well-fitted and comfy so it meets all my points.
These pants are some white linen (woven) pants and see how much larger they look. If you check out this black linen jacket to the one above, you'll notice the one on the left hangs on me (yes I was about 10 lbs lighter then). But the pants make me look bigger.
This is for 2 reasons. The legs aren't shaped correctly (see below), and the pants must have ease in them to hang right and so I can sit down and not squeal or break a seam.
The difference here is dramatic. This is what the ponte pant can do.
 Finally this is a more formal look for my white pants. All these photos are the same white ponte pants.
This is a little different take. I took my core pattern here, and made it double breasted. I simply traced off where my bust was, and put that button right between my bustline and waistline and drew the line from my upper collar at the neck to just under my bust, then had it drop straight down. I traced the other side so it was the same. then I cut a long piece of tissue with a curve at the end, and placed in on the line from the button to the neck at the
shoulder seam, and curved it around to stand up just like a wanted it, and traced that off and that was my collar. Basically this is my core pattern, double-breasted.
This is a sheer fabric, so I wear a simple cami under it and if I really want to be risqué, I will wear a skin-toned cami. It's long sleeved, but I always wear rubber bands to keep it pushed up with some of the gathers of the sleeve over the rubber bands. I've worn this to summer weddings, musical openings in NYC, and any evening dressy event in the summer.
A cute story about this outfit. When my cousin the Hollywood designer, came to a family wedding, she was a bit on the run from one movie to another so was a little off guard about what to wear. This was in the country in Oklahoma and I promised her she would see everything from a dark more formal suit, to hard pressed, jeans with a dark jacket, starched white shirt and bolo tie, so anything would be great. She asked me what I was wearing and I told her my knit pants and a
sheer top. She said, "Oh no, Claire, not knit pants." Well, when she saw me before the wedding she said, "Those aren't knit pants," I had her feel them, and I could see her eyes get all glowy and "I want something like that!"
OK so you can see that the jacket hem placement line is key in all these outfits which is important in making this as attractive as possible.
The Casual Jacket
One note about the two jackets - the black one and the dog one - the body is from my core pattern. This was a dare on a Burda Pattern post a long time ago. The pattern had a lot going for it, but the body was all messed up. As a matter of fact the photo of the pattern was very misleading, it's only when I saw the tech drawing that I begin to see all the problems with it. If you were reed
thin, it was fine, but the photo was so misleading that it didn't give you the right shape of the jacket.
This is the photo of the original pattern:
This looks great but the problem is that you can't see the waist and how it lays, and that's where the problem of this whole jacket it. Now I love the mix of prints here - jacket is lite ground print, tops is same colors in another print and the skirt is the dark ground print.
Here's the technical sketch and you can clearly see it has no shape.
 Not only is there no waist, that pleat at the neck makes it straight and full all the way in the back. But the collar had a lot to it, and the comfy, casual sleeve head placement had a lot to it.
 Now, when I placed the body of this on my core pattern, I was able to take those seams and add a little shape to them. In back I took out the pleat and moved those two back seams to where the pleat was and made a nice nip at the waist as well. Seeing the difference between the two technical sketches
makes it clear what we're going to do.
Both the black linen and the doggie print jackets were done with this pattern. After I worked this around from my core pattern, it's become a favorite jacket pattern. It's casual and not meant for more formal events, but the black linen jacket and the white pants are pretty darn cool!
The Leg Profile
All pants now have this "yoga" or "boot cut" shape. And without fail, if you do this cut on your pants (even an older pair of pants), it will make them modern and make you look sharp and with it in a flash.
This is kinda a raw photo - but it makes my point. On the left are pants that are straight down - from the top of the inseam to the hem on the inside of the leg, and from the hip to the hem on the outside of the seam. They look old and like "granny pants". They also make me look fat, which I don't need anything more to add to my fatness thankyouverymuch!!!!!!
But the pair on the right has been trimmed, but it's been done in a very specific way. What you do is you trim from just above the knee - about 2" above the knee. Sometimes this is 2" out, sometimes it's more. The think you need to check is you need to check when you sit down that when the pants ride up (and they should always ride up) that it's not too tight around the thighs to be uncomfortable. For my taste that's really a tightness that
shouldn't be more than 1" stretch there. IOW, if your circumference of your thigh is 13" and the pant is 12", that's about as tight as I want it. It should really be at 13" so that you have some ease of movement.
OK now that you have that circumference set, you should draw a line from that place above the knee, about 2" above the knee, and to the hem and it should be parallel to the straight of the grain of the garment. This should be done on the outside seam and the inside seam. IOW split the difference between these two seams so that you are taking the equal amount out of the inseam and the outseam.
One last thing - I love the Ponte that VogueFabricsStore.com has a fabulous fabric and the description is a little deceptive. I get their semi-monthly samples (and if you don't, you should - for the price it's a bargain and you can put your hand on the fabric and know instantly what it's going to be). But this 231-41 has an excellent hand with Bamboo, Rayon and Cotton (all of these wick beautifully) but it's listed as a jersey which is usually a higher percentage stretch than the ponte. I've felt the fabric and it's a GREAT STABLE knit perfect for the ponte pant. It's got some great body to it and I'm seriously thinking about a white jacket cause it would tailor like a dream. This is a winter white, which means it's
a warm white. However for all you cool-sided-color-wheel folks, remember this winter white will be away from your face, so a navy, black, grey, wine, forest green, blue and cherry red would be excellent with this white pair of pants.
That's it. You will be shocked at how cool your pants will look after this. But most of all I want you to consider white ponte pants. You can do this and it will be a wonderful new look for summer. With a fabulous bright color solid, or a fresh new floral top, it will be a very positive happy look!
Enjoy!
A little quick bookkeeping here. I go through my list and pull out those who haven't opened their email in a while (usually 90 days), and unsubscribe them. I figure you don't need another email in your inbox that you're not reading. I'm getting ready to do that. So if you don't get an email from me on March 31, pull up one of my old emails and email that you want to be back on. It's not that I don't trust the mechanics of the email
service I use, it's that I don't trust the mechanics of the email service I use.
If you get emails on the 31st, you're fine. Most everyone is fine. This applies to about 10 email addresses out of about 1,000, so this is a very small number.
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