This shirt was supposed to be done before my birthday so that my husband could wear it to my birthday party. But, disaster struck at the next to last step.
The problem: a poorly cut buttonhole. The almost-never-used buttonhole just above the button placket on the collar stand. The one that no one would have even noticed had I not snipped it open in the first place. That’ll teach me not to cut open a buttonhole willy nilly.
The save: a new collar stand. Thankfully, collar stands use very little fabric.
Everything else about the making of this shirt went smoothly. I’d previously made the pattern, vintage Butterick 4712, during the MBP Men’s Shirt Sew-Along, so no fitting was necessary this time around. The blue plaid cotton flannel from Mood (hooray for my MSN allowance!) marked well with tailor’s chalk and then cut like a dream. It was so nice to cut something with a bit of weight after quite a few delicate silks.
I cut the main body of the shirt on the cross grain since my husband preferred the bold stripes to go vertically.
The pockets were cut on the bias to shake things up a bit.
The yoke was cut on grain since I thought it would be fun for the bold stripe to go horizontal across the back shoulders.
The buttons were also bought with my MSN allowance. When I was ordering them online, it was kind of fun to go through all of their many buttons and guess which ones would go best with the shirt. I showed my husband some outlandish ones, pretending they were the ones I was going to use for his shirt, but he knew better than to believe me.
I did make one change to the pattern this time around. The original collar on the pattern is awesomely 70s sized. I’d left it as is for my first make since I thought it would help show off the silk accent that I’d added to the underside of the collar. This time around I wanted to make sure the flannel shirt felt modern, so I trimmed off roughly a quarter of an inch across the width on both the collar and the collar stand.
Happily, my husband is very pleased with the shirt. Blue is by far his favorite color, so this “marine/sky/dirty beige check” is a perfect flannel for him. Even though the arrival of the gift is months late, I’m considering this shirt his second anniversary present. It is cotton after all – the traditional gift in the U.S. and U.K. Thankfully, he’s a very patient man.
Happy belated anniversary, darling!
