Super soft winter trousers

Since term started I have been living in my new wool trousers. I was waiting for the chance to get a good picture of them but the winter weather hasn’t been helping, so I hope you can bear the camera-phone shots after a day of wearing.

I used the same trouser pattern I have used before, but added a few special features…

2″ deep turn-ups and wide bands around the pockets.

I really like these extra details – who would know they are the same pattern as my black trousers? I’m sure you are thinking that design features like this must take hours of designing and drafting, but can I tell you a secret? Promise you won’t tell anyone?

Well, I was half-way through cutting up my lovely soft wool fabric when I realised I didn’t have enough fabric! Normally I over buy, but apparently not this once. And I had cut the back legs out so I couldn’t use it for a skirt. Uh oh! After a LOT of arranging my pattern pieces I decided I could just squeeze the front legs on to make cropped trousers. But would I want cropped trousers in a snuggly fabric? Nope, so I decided on adding scraps to get the length and covering the join with some deep turn-ups. Problem sorted! Errr, not quite. One leg fitted perfectly but, when I placed the pattern piece for the last leg, there was a chunk missing! Hmm.. what to do? Cover up the missing whole with an applique/outer-facing, of course! I deliberately wanted to play with the direction of the herringbone stripes here, and the decision was nothing to do with squeezing pieces on the ever-shrinking left-over fabric I had.I lined the pockets and waistband with the fantastic hot pink lining from my Minoru. I found a trouser hook and bar in my sewing box (from my first ever sewing attempt as a teenager – a long corduroy skirt) and hand-sewed them on pretty carefully – so much easier than sewing tiny hooks.

The wool fabric was so so soft I didn’t line the trousers, but I did try my best to finish the seams. The 10p bias binding I got in the holidays was a great colour match and there was just enough to finish the seams of the pockets and fly plackets.

I’m definitely changing my sewing plans from quirky to classic – the amount of time spent making these doesn’t compare to the amount of time I have worn them so far. Definitely a productive use of my time! (Although there is still room for some quirkiness; I wore my bird skirt today and got compliments on it, and it is so fun to say it is from Ikea!)