Spring is here at last!
 We are all eager to
see the end of winter in the northern climes and put aside those
heavy winter sweaters and coats. The Spring 2010 collection gets
you ready for warm sunny days, fresh flowers and a fresh
wardrobe.
This collection
includes 24 patterns that will create a plethora of different
looks in a flash. We kept in mind the economy as well - most
items will take less than 2 yards of fabric so they are not only
easy to make and wear but easy on the budget as well.
We know you do not have enough time to design complicated
spring/summer garments so this collection features easy wearing,
easy to make yet versatile garments. Vary the fabric selections
and have fun creating a mix ‘n match wardrobe that will carry
you through to fall. Let your creative side out to play.
We focused on a new
neckline called the pleated neck and applied it to a pull over,
stretch fit, easy-wear blouse, and dress. They can be
fashionable and casual, yet ideal for a job interview or an
afternoon at the park, then can dress up for an evening out.
We applied the new
pleated front neck to 3 new swimsuits for comfort and fun at the
beach or pool as well.
Casual elegance features a neckline ruffle on a simple tank or
jersey knit dress. Or, try my personal favorite - a silky empire
slip dress that dresses up or down for evening or day wear and
can be covered with a versatile quick jersey knit jacket that
adds the panache of just the right finishing touch.
You can also add a
novel spring cover-up or soft knit cardigan that’s
chameleon-like, depending on your choice of fabric from a
splashy jersey print to a stretch lace or solid interlock. Ideal
for spring mornings or even hot days and air conditioned
buildings. Finish the outfits with our easy going pants or twill
pants for a cool and comfortable look that’s got a balanced
straight leg but not too wide a look.
Do you have a special event looming? Check out the elegant suit
with a waterfall flounce around the neck of this fitted princess
jacket and matching straight skirt that features a comfort fit
tapered waistband that will wear to a family wedding or
anniversary party. Make it up using a dupioni for after 6 or a
linen blend for day time.
The fashionistas will want the yoked jacket and everyone will
need a cool and breezy cotton or silky yoked robe.
Oh, I almost forgot - we added more “ How to” sewing
instructions for you as well.
Have fun - we sure did testing these garments.
Kaaren
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The Spring 2010 Collection requires MPD version 2.5 or later. If
you have not upgraded, now is your chance! The MPD 2.5 upgrade
retails for $69. Spring 2010 Collection retails for $59.
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Q & A
 Q:
Will it be possible (now or later) to buy one particular pattern
with pleated neck, with pattern credits for example?
A: The short answer is “not now, but possibly later”. We
won't know for some months, though. The full answer is the story
of how a new feature gets added to the program.
Adding any new
feature (neckline, sleeve, style line, closure, or whatever) is
often a many step process. The idea often starts when we begin
work on a seasonal pattern collection. Those, by their nature,
are trendy - we look at what is popular that season and
choose some to include in a new pattern collection. When we
started work on the Spring 2010 Collection, we found that a
popular feature this season was a pleated neckline in a close
fitted blouse.
 This pleated neckline is a good example of how complicated that
process can sometimes become. We had expected this particular
feature to be pretty easy to replicate as it seemed to be
similar to existing features that MPD already supported. We
thought the new pleated neckline could just be a variation of
one of those existing features. It did not quite work out that
way.
We first tried the peasant neckline. It has a gathered neck.
Width is added to the pattern at center front to accommodate the
neckline gathers. We could substitute pleats in place of the
gathers and get a pleated neckline easily. Unfortunately, the
peasant neck widens the entire pattern and pleats are sewn
together for 3” to 4” at most. The rest of the blouse becomes
very blousy, too loose fitting to be considered a close fitting
blouse.
Our second attempt was using the shoulder pleat feature that
pleated blouses use. If we extend the shoulder and side seam
using that feature, but place the pleats in the neckline instead
of the shoulder line, that might work. Again, though, the added
width was the entire height of the blouse. We could get pleats
up top and a big bag below. Not what we are looking for.
So, we had to widen the pattern at the top, but not lower down.
Our next attempt used a combination of widening the neckline
plus extending the shoulder. MPD has settings for both of those
options and perhaps we could combine them to get added width at
the top without widening the pattern below. That did, in fact
work that way. It looked promising until we noticed the sleeves.
The sleeve caps were totally trashed. This turned out to be
caused by a squashing of the armhole. The top of the armhole got
widened, but the bottom did not. The result was a flattened and
shortened armhole. We could not get this to fit properly with
any chart we tried.
What we really needed was to retain the armhole curve shape
while rotating the entire pattern outwards at the top, but not
below the bust. The princess line patterns do that. Maybe we
could use that, doing the shoulder and armscye rotation, but not
actually cutting the pattern with the princess lines. We tried
that. Somewhat promising, but the rotation was placed wrong. The
pattern shoulder rotated around the bust point and the pleats
were more at the center of the chest. The pattern shaping from
rotating the shoulder was in the wrong place to be corrected by
sewing the pleats. Both pleats and bust fit were all wrong.
Finally, we realized that none of the current methods for
widening the top of a pattern could work for this type of pleat.
So, we wrote two totally new methods for widening patterns for
neck pleats. One involved a slanted center closure that was
wider at top and narrow at the bottom - promising, but still a
bit loose below the bust. It would work better with longer
vertical pleats, which was not what we were going for with the
initial patterns. |
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Our second new approach was to widen the pattern at neckline and
shoulder by the pleat width, widen the pattern slightly less at
the center of the armhole, and even less at the bottom of the
armhole. Then, correct the fit problems created using strategic
ease amounts, mostly negative bust ease proportional both to
bust measurement and also to the pleat width. Getting the number
of pleats, pleat spacing, pleat width, pleat height, and
negative bust ease to all work together took dozens of attempts.
Up until this point, Kaaren had been the only one reviewing the
patterns. We had done more than 20 trial program builds and she
had sewn up a dozen or more samples. When she finally got one
that was acceptable, we sent that build to the test team to try
it with other charts. That was a disaster. It just did not work
with about half the tester charts and we were back to the
drawing board.
During the next few weeks, we tried another dozen variations of
pleat and ease amounts. We varied the drafting logic many times,
tried vertical pleats and radial pleats, stretch and woven
fabrics. At the end of that, we had come up with a mix of
settings that worked for all the testers, worked in both wovens
and knits, and worked in a blouse pattern, a dress pattern and 3
swimsuit patterns. We were still not satisfied with any of the
vertical pleat tests, the trials involving square necklines, nor
tests with nightgowns or unfitted patterns. So, those were all
placed on the back burner for later work.
The Spring 2010 Collection eventually released with 5 pleated
neckline patterns. We expect that feature to eventually work for
most MPD patterns and necklines, but it is going to take months
more work to get all the variations working properly. If and
when that happens, the pleated neckline will eventually be
released as a new MPD neckline and there will be a tool to
manipulate and control it. That effort, though, will only be
made if the example patterns included in this initial collection
prove popular. Popular features get extended. Less popular ones
get side lined as our development efforts move in other
directions.
When and if it is released for the entire MPD catalog, we will
then try to retrofit the new neck into the older library of
custom Dress Shop patterns. Many of those patterns use
one-of-a-kind bits of code that each must accommodate the new
neck type. That takes longer and not all features can make that
transition.
But, first things first - the future of the pleated neckline
depends on how well those first patterns are received. So, do
let us know. We are listening.
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