Simplicity 8620 blouse in viscose sateen

Aug 30

Aug 30 Simplicity 8620 blouse in viscose sateen

Big-collared blouses seem to be everywhere right now, so naturally, I decided I needed to make my own version. I was originally inspired by the Rixo Misha blouse (unfortunately no longer available), but after finishing this blouse, I realised that Kitri's Laura Green Floral Frill Top is incredibly similar to the blouse I have made. I searched high and low on Instagram to find the right pattern and eventually found Natalie Ebaugh had made a gorgeous blouse using the vintage Simplicity 8620 pattern. After some Googling and an initial bidding fail, I purchased mine on ebay.

I had already purchased this beautiful green Fabric Godmother Cloud Flower Viscose Sateen a few weeks earlier. I usually try to avoid buying fabric before I have a pattern but as soon as I saw this emerald viscose sateen, I knew I had to have it! It’s not a particularly easy fabric to cut out and whenever I sew with slippery fabrics, I often wish I had a rotary cutter and mat. I did some stitch testing but despite my tests, the first seam I sewed did pull the fabric slightly, creating snag lines. Thankfully, this was on one of the shoulder seams, which is covered by the collar. I soon discovered that I just needed to loosen the tension further and didn’t have any more issues.

I started working on this blouse just as everything was opening up in the UK so it took me quite a long time to finish between all the holidays and catch ups with friends. I purchased the fabric in April, the pattern in early May I started sewing in early June, so it’s taken me 2.5 months to complete the blouse (although I did make a pair of pyjamas in this time). It was certainly made at a much slower pace than my lockdown creations.

The pattern was easy to follow and I didn’t come across any real issues that required adjustments. It’s quite a loose-fitting blouse and I think I could have gone a size smaller. My measurements were between sizes 12-14 so I made a 14, but this wasn’t really necessary. One funny mistake was buying the pattern in the wrong set of sizes - I accidentally bought it in the larger set of sizes (18-22) and then had to trace it down a few sizes. It didn’t seem to cause any issues, but I wouldn’t be surprised if some features didn’t come out quite the same as the actual size on the correct pattern piece.

I didn’t want to use lace on the collar, so I created a ruffled and sewed this into the collar edge. I found the Tilly and the Buttons Oversized Detachable Collar tutorial helpful to decide how long and wide the strips of fabric for the ruffle needed to be. The collar wasn’t technically too complicated, but the ruffle was a bit fiddly so I spent an afternoon just on the collar alone. The pattern suggests using an iron-on interfacing for the collar but despite using a relatively light-weight interfacing, I think my collar is slightly too stiff compared to the floaty drape on the rest of the blouse.

Aside from the ruffle on the collar, the only other change I made was to shorten the blouse by about 10 centimetres before hemming. Since I’m planning to wear mine tucked into high waisted jeans and skirts, I didn’t see any need for it to be so long. Being a vintage early 1990s pattern, the blouse does have quite dropped shoulders and a loose fit, but could be adjusted to have a more structured fit.

I love the result and found the pattern easy to follow and without complications.