Once again I've made a very poor imitation of a designer garment.
(I don't think I need to point out what one is the original and what one is the copycat)
Let's start from the start shall we?
I found this really nice tunic on
net-a-porter from Alberta Ferretti. It was a tunic in plum wool crepe with bias stitching on top. The design seemed quite simple, so I thought it wouldn't be too hard
I think this copycat failed as soon as I bought the fabric. The closest I could get to wool crepe was that jersey in purple (which is not very close at all!!!). Because jersey is a lot lighter than wool crepe, my copycat tunic hangs loose, and it doesn't have that nice stiffness that the original does. I think it looks more like an old jumper :(
If I had actually been able to find wool crepe (not even wool crepe, just ANYTHING thicker than jersey), seriously, this tunic would have been so much more successful. It was just down hill right from the start.
I spent a while experimenting with top stitching, trying top replicate the original
At first I tried hand-sewing the topstitches, which just looked terrible. I couldn't sew a zig zag stitch and get it to all line up neatly. Then I tried zigzag stitching by machine, but I couldn't get the stitches close enough together, like they are in the original. So in the end I actually cut the fabric where the stitches were, overlocked all of the edges and then stitched the pieces back together
So it's obvious what I was trying to do, but clearly, I didn't do it very well. Mine just looks messy (and let's be honest, a bit sad).
The original tunic costs NZ$1,247 (from net-a-porter). I spent $30.90 on this tunic and all up it took me 17 hours and 50 minutes to make
 |
| Alberta Ferretti by Copycat. (and the messy inside of the tunic) |
