Style Arc Elle Pants

After a long absence from blogging...three whole months, I am finally back. Life has really been busy lately. My two youngest children have moved out...my daughter finding herself a new job and moving to Canberra and my son was accepted into Sydney University and has moved to Sydney. I am now officially an empty nester. So proud of all my children and their achievements. My darling partner surprised me with a marriage proposal and a gorgeous engagement ring and we have been on holiday to Tasmania where we spent 6 days in the wilderness walking The Overland Track. Despite all these goings on, I have been sewing but no time for blogging so I have some catching up to do.

Style Arc have a growing reputation for their great pants patterns. I have really been wanting to learn how to make great fitting pants so I have bought a variety of Style Arc pants patterns to try, including the Elle Pants.

Elle Pants

Very tight Elle Pants

I chose a size 12 and used some stripy bengaline purchased online from The Remnant Warehouse. Boy did these turn out tight. I could barely pull them up over my hips and they are skin tight.

Front view showing way too much.

I certainly won't be wearing these in public. I was really surprised that they were so tight so I did some internet research. Lots of other sewing bloggers have commented on varying results, blaming the amount of stretch in the fabric used. 

Even though these are tight there is not too much wrinkling.

I compared my stripy bengaline with some black bengaline purchased at the same time from The Remnant Warehouse, and it didn't have nearly as much stretch as the black. I had assumed that all bengaline was the same, but apparently it is not.

Pleased with my stripe matching, shame they are too tight.

The waistline hit me at a very unflattering place, causing a huge bulge over the top. Despite this disaster, I did like the general shape of these pants and I was determined to make them work. So I made a second pair straight away using the black bengaline with more stretch.

These are definitely a more relaxed fit.

Not happy with all the wrinkles.

What is causing all those wrinkles.

The only changes I made to the pattern was to add 5cm to the top of the pants to raise the waistline so that it didn't cut my spare tyre in half. This has resulted in a much smoother fit around the waist.

Raised waist by 5cm

Woops...forgot to suck tummy in.

I would never wear these pants without a long top.

I have been wearing these pants all day and they are so comfortable. The skinny leg is a new thing for me...I usually wear a bootcut style in pants. I would appreciate any ideas for how to reduce the wrinkling in the legs. Now off to order some more "stretchy" bengaline.

Happy sewing.