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This Week's Topic:
What is your current sewing avoidance?

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My answer to this question has two parts. A general avoidance/fear, and a specific avoidance/fear.

My general avoidance/fear right now is a tailored oxford shirt. There are lots of things about this garment that make me nervous: altering a shoulder cap and armscye, fitting the waist without throwing off the grain (and, thus, the hang of the garment), making a collar that doesn't flip up on one side (another grain issue)...the list is long and intimidating. Like most articles of clothing that contain more than three separate pieces, a quality men's dress shirt walks a line between art and science. In the case of the tailored shirt, though, I think the weight leans a little more toward the science side. There's also the fact that I do not have anything that even remotely resembles a man's body, and so I'm unfamiliar with the ways an ill-fitting shirt might feel on a man's body. The problems I encounter with women's oxford shirts (buttons gaping over the breasts, cuffs too large around my wrists), aren't an issue with most men (at least not with those dressing as and identifying as men).

But there's also a specific aspect of the tailored shirt that worries me more than any of the others: The Front Placket. Anyone who sews clothing will tell you that sewing a straight seam is not an easy thing. Honestly, I am not very good at it. I'm not saying my seams are crooked, but they have the occasional crooked stitch in them. And a crooked sewing line is not an option on a front placket. All eyes are on that very visible stripe down the front of a shirt, and there's no room for even a hint of wobble. Talk about pressure.

It's interesting that this question came up so early in the game of

auroraceleste's Creative Chat series. Because

mckitterick asked for a tailored shirt for xmas. I bought David Page Coffin's shirtmaking book, but have only made time to skim through it. The whole idea is very intimidating to me.

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