Laura has been doing a spot of emergency holiday sewing at the weekend for her trip to Morocco next week! Find out how she sews the most perfect summer trousers:
“Hello again! Long time no see! It certainly feels like I haven’t sewn anything in a hot minute, but a deadline will certainly help to motivate. It occurs to me that going to hot Morocco in a weeks time probably calls for more than a single pair of loose, cool, blessedly comfy trousers I don’t hate to wear. What are these magical trousers I hear you ask? Why the Liberty Tana Lawn® ones of course! They are SO GOOD. Like PJs but acceptably not PJs, silky smooth and light. Trouser bliss.”
“I’ll admit, I did think about getting away with just the one pair. It’s not like I can’t also take a couple of long-skirted dresses and alternate wearing them. But what if every day’s activities call for trouser-wearing and I won’t know until I get there, what then? Maybe washing them as soon as I get back to the accommodation, hanging them out to dry in the warm evening air, they’d probably be ok to put back on in the morning… But let’s be realistic Laura, are you really going to have the energy to wash your trousers in the sink after you’ve eaten your weight in couscous? No. You’ll do it once, get lazy, smell increasingly of sweaty camel and the other tour-goers will glare daggers at your back for stinking out the bus. It’ll be a disaster and an insult to Liberty Fabric. No, I’ll need to make at least one other pair to save myself from myself. Cue the emergency sewing sesh!”
“The Liberty Fabric I chose is Spring Blooms A from Liberty’s capsule 2023 Floralove collection. This collection features floral designs produced by different artists in Liberty’s studio. This print in particular celebrates the arrival of spring and was made using watercolour paints and pencils. The realistically rendered blooms are so lovely. Tulips, poppies and lilies can be spied dancing across the fabric. The C colourway has a soft pink ground but I felt this A colourway was perfect for trousers with its darker navy background.”
“I used just the trouser section of this amazing Cloe jumpsuit pattern from Fabrics-store.com. Having made this pattern before, I know it works so I’d much rather modify it than start again with a completely new trouser pattern. The original trousers are more tapered at the cuffs but I cut mine a bit wider to make a looser style. At the waist, I simply ignored the darts and cut the waist 1” higher than the pattern indicated to allow for turning down the seam and encasing the elastic. The overall effect is a loose, gathered waist and comfy, swishy legs. This style, combined with Liberty Tana Lawn® fabric is absolute heaven for the trouser-adverse individual (read: me) because it hardly feels like you are wearing trousers at all. Bliss.”
“So there we have it, a grand total of TWO pairs of trousers that are fit for travel! They don’t take too long to whip up either, I think I finished this pair in about 2 hours all in all. Definitely worth the minimal up-front sewing effort now for a guaranteed 10 days of not being the most smelly/hated member of the tour group. Phew! Though now that I’m typing this it doesn’t seem quite enough yet. Maybe I’ll need to whip up a third pair, just in case…”
Liberty’s Floralove Collection:
