Puffed Sleeve Sweater By BurdaStyle

 As I mentioned in last week’s blog post I’m really getting into the full swing of autumnal sewing. When the September issue of BurdaStyle arrived a week or so ago, this puffed sleeve sweater really caught my eye (actually, the whole issue has several fab designs…sew many ideas but sew little time). I absolutely adore the long cuffs and the big sleeves on the lovely slim body shape… perfect for tucking in and belting or just wearing out over some lovely wide-leg pants. I was totally in love with the design of the sleeves as they reminded me of some sweaters that my mum knitted on her knitting machine when I was about 17 and now that I’ve made this pattern up, oh how I love, love, love it!

 Anyway, before I dive into the pattern and making details, first let’s have a quick word about this fabric it’s a beautiful lightweight melange powdery duck egg blue colour in some kind of acrylic blend. The fabric was what you might call ‘dirt cheap’. It literally only cost me £2 for about 2m from Birmingham rag market. Now, I love a good quality fabric and I’m not one to by up any old rubbish, but this fabric has a superb handle and feels fab to wear. It may well have just been an end-of-run from a major store’s stock and so was being sold off at a bargain price. Either way, I love it and it’s turned out to be the perfect weight for this style of sweater.

Puffed Sleeve Sweater Construction And Fit Notes

So the pattern I’ve used is number 108 from the recent September BurdaStyle magazine and here’s the line drawing (next photo),. The grown on slight funnel neck is really nice as it’s warm but not stifling to wear like a higher roll neck would be. The neckline has a short concealed zip at the back to make it easy to get on and off and I would say that if it weren’t for the concealed zip it would be classed as an easy make so if you wanted an alternate fastening I bet some buttons and loops would be a lovely idea.

Size-wise I cut my sweater out on a 38 and this was pretty much spot on except for the fact that I had to shave a bit off down the sides below the bust, so I could have graded down there a little before cutting out. I also had to make the shoulders a little less sloped on the seam that runs along the shoulder down to the sleeve. The sleeves were a perfect length for me with enough room to ben my arm and not pull on the voluminous sleeve.

 I only needed to do a little bit of preparation before I started sewing and that involved ironing some very lightweight knit interfacing onto the neck facings, the seam allowances where the zip goes, and also into the corner sections on the armholes for reinforcement. On these corners, I also stay stitched and then clipped right up to the stay stitching pivot point. Right at the end of the cut, I dabbed a bit of Fray Check.

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*Note: the pattern does not suggest interfacing the neck facings but I chose to and my iron-on knit interfacing is featherweight (if you’re in the UK, I bought it from the shop section of Gill Arnold.co.uk)

So the construction of my sweater went off without any problems and my fabric was really nice to sew up (I love it when there’s no skipped stitching angst). I used my walking foot and a jersey needle size 80 on a narrow zig-zag setting. Then I overlocked all seams.

I did a fairly deep hem to prevent roll-up and finished it with two rows of stitching for a mock cover stitch effect. There’s no hemming on the luxuriously long cuffs because the fabric is double with the fold at the hem. See? It really is a straightforward make 🙂

I’m calling this make a total success. I absolutely adore it! (*fist pump*) I love how it looks with my wide-leg corduroy pants and feel 100% ‘me’ in this whole outfit. Great when that happens isn’t it? 

What have you made lately that you absolutely love to bits?  Please share with me in the comments, because you might inspire me. Meanwhile, I’m thinking of what other colours I’d love this top made up in 🙂

As always, thanks for checking in on my blog, I really appreciate it and I hope to catch you again next week.

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