For my first attempt at making pants for myself, I decided to go with the Colette Clover pattern. I started on this project before I made the Jutland shorts, so I wanted to avoid a zipper fly for my first try. I was also drawn in by Colette’s fitting guide for these pants, and knew some hand holding was available if I needed help.

The fabric I used is a stretch twill from fabric.com. When I bought it, I imagined the pattern being more of a cute polkadot rather than being covered in large splotches. There are reasons I don’t order fabric online too often. (Usually, I just don’t want to pay for shipping, but, you know…)

The pants came together pretty easily, but I took a lot of breaks from them to work on other projects. I just looked it up, and I actually bought this pattern way back in May. Once one leg was put together I tried it on, and it was obvious that I would need to take out some of the curve in the hip region. Based on the amount from this leg, I adjusted the other leg before inserting the zipper, but didn’t adjust the waistband at all. At this point, the pants sat on the floor half-finished for months. It was summer, and I didn’t think I would be wearing pants anytime soon.

Finally, after months of sitting, I inserted the zipper, and the rest of the pants came together really quickly. I just needed to sew on the waistband facing and hem the pants.  I’m not sure why I waited so long to finish them.

I serged all of my seams, but was impatient about it. The serger wasn’t properly threaded at the time, so a lot of the seam allowances are wavy. Technically, I think the serging will still do its job, but the insides are not super pretty.

After being lured in by the fitting guide, I didn’t end up using it at all. I made the pattern as-is, and figured I would deal with the fit issues later on a future version. There are definitely some issues, but I am happy with them as my first ever pants. For the next go-round, I will work on the wrinkles around the crotch and knees. The question for now is, what goes with splotchy grey pants??

Abstract