Bobbi squared

I'm heading off for a two week holiday in a couple of days, so of course I had some last-minute sewing projects. (You do this too, right?)

I'll be in a place that's somewhat warmer than here, but not hot. So I was thinking layering. Knit tops are always great in that situation, and I had the Bobbi pattern from Jalie and some fabric in stash. Ready, set, GO! In what seemed like a few minutes I had a top. And then the next day I had another one. And they are both already layered!

Bobbi #1

Bobbi #2

I started with this crazy poly print. It is very soft and would probably be too hot in real heat, but in this mid-season I think it will be just the thing.

And then I threw caution to the winds and my second Bobbi is made from a somewhat less stretchy knit that has these little plastic ... blobs ... uh I mean dots all over it.

I wasn't sure how my serger and sewing machine needles would like these but they chunked through them. On the other hand it was really hard to sew over them in an actual straight line. A moderate amount of re-sewing occurred.

So this top is extremely simple. There are 4 pieces, two inner and two outer. The inner is an ingenious "facing" that is really more like a cropped snugger fitting top that connects to the drapey outer top at the neckline.

The inner top does two critical jobs. First, it prevents the loose top from gapping away from the body at the neck. There will be no unintentional cleavage displays while wearing Bobbi, even when bowing very low!

Demo at right.

The second job is similar but operates differently. With a more conventional armscye, the inner facing covers the bra and stuff so there will be no unintentional side-flashes while wearing Bobbi either.

Demo at left.

So for a simple little top, this pattern is unusually sophisticated.

Inside-out Bobbi

I made this up pretty much as instructed except for one thing. I did not turn the armscye of the under-layer under and topstitch, I used fold-over elastic instead.

For my crazy print top, I had some standard white FOE.  On the dotty top I used some strange stretchy woven tape from Mokuba. It is only 9mm wide and it took some effort to keep it folded nicely around the curves of the arm opening.

Maybe I'll get to visit Mokuba's head office - we are headed to Japan!