Lace Angel-Sleeve Top

  Last year, I bought a few yards of a beautiful royal blue stretch lace from LA Finch Fabrics, thinking I'd sew myself something from it. Then, in March, my mother-in-law had a birthday! And of course, being in the habit of using my personal fabrics for gifts, I made her a shirt from said lovely lace.

  I used Jalie 2805, and starting with elbow-length sleeves, flared them to add some interest. I hemmed the lace on the sleeves using some tips from Sew Fearless, and they didn't turn out too badly! I used a single needle for this, as the sleeves have enough fullness that they don't need to stretch.

  I lined the whole shirt with plain white knit, and since I've never seen the recipient wear anything sleeveless, decided she might like the coverage of some cap sleeves under the lace sleeves. I wanted the lining separate from the lace at the underarm seam and side seams, so I sewed both sets of sleeves separately, then set them in the round once the body was sewn.

  I left off the neckband, but didn't raise the neckline to compensate. Since the neckline of this pattern starts out quite high and tight that didn't cause any issues, and I really think the slightly wider and lower neckline looks better with this fabric. A little top-stitching around it would have helped to keep things in place, but clearly I didn't do that!

  I hemmed the white layer just shorter than the lace with a twin needle, and used Wonder Tape and wash-away stabilizer to try to prevent the lace layer from tunneling when I twin-needled it. It worked until I soaked the stabilizer away, then tunneled, so next time I think I'll try to find some sort of sheer knit that I can leave in the seam to stabilize it. It looked a little worse in real life than in these photos, but it still looked better than a lettuce-edge or rolled hem would have.

  I did my best to line up the lace 'stripe' along the side seams.

  I have no idea if this one fit or not... I really hope it did! Isn't that lace pretty?

Thanks for stopping by,