McCall’s 8490

Today’s make is a sweet vintage blouse with raglan sleeves, buttoned neckline, bib with gathered ruffle and ruffle hem sleeves. I used a sweet floral Swiss dot fabric; woven with raised spots and printed with retro daisies in brown and white. And found vintage brown buttons in my stash that were a perfect match.

Technically I used M8490. This is a vintage McCall’s 1970’s pattern by Laura Ashley that includes tops, a petticoat and a skirt. Previously called McCall’s 5280, it has real prairie cottage-core vibes! But it’s only available in a pitiful sizes 8-16. A victim of it’s time where this would have been considered good value for money with several sizes in one envelope. Hoping it’s obvious to see… I made a lot of hacks to view A’s top.

I started by cutting a size 10 extending to size 16 at hip. Then I cut the sleeve at the lengthen/shorten line. I folded up a 4cm hem and added an elastic channel at the upper edge making a 3cm ruffle cuff. And I removed 6cm from the bodice length because I omitted the drawstring waist. The pattern calls for lace trim to be the ruffle on the bib yoke but I cut a 8cm strip of fabric 140cm wide, narrow hemmed the edge and gathered into a ruffle.

I also stupidly thought, let’s add a button front instead of the tie neckline, but it created so much more work. It was super hard to neatly finish on the inside because the bib is supposed to be faced in two parts and I had to meddle with the centre front lower edge of the facing; snipping and folding over awkwardly to make it look finished on the inside. Thankfully it’s neat, but I wouldn’t recommend it!

The pattern has you make a pair of bibs, sewn at the shoulder seams – one for the outer and one for the facing. The instructions say press up the lower edges, sew the two RST around the neckline edge before turning through and pressing. Then attach the frill to the outer by hand before mounting and topstitching through all layers onto the bodice.

My tip is: attach the frill first, then place the outer and facing RST and sew just around the LOWER edge with a basting stitch. Then snip the seam allowance (clip, DO NOT notch, about 4mm away from the basting line) turn out and press flat. Then unpick the basting to return to two pieces and then sew around the neckline as per the instructions. This helps you mount the bib on the bodice with a perfectly pressed curved edge rather than struggling to press up by hand. Though this new tool by my friend Jen might make easy work of that!

There was a moment when I considered adding ricrac to the edge of the bib but I’m pretty proud of the neat topstitching around the curve so left it untrimmed. The raglan sleeves are a great fit but I always forget to add a little bit more length across the bicep but it won’t stop me wearing it.