wearable muslins

Wearable muslin is a sewing term. A muslin is a sort of "test garment" - one made quite roughly to check fit and suitability of a pattern before using the more expensive fabric. A "wearable" muslin is one from a fabric that, while not necessarily cheap, is one that can be tossed if the pattern doesn't work out.
Now, I've been after some t-shirts for a bit, a t-shirt, but more than just a t-shirt, if you know what I mean. Something for the cottage, but with a little more style than a basic crew neck t-shirt, which by the way, does nothing to make me look good...
I saw this pattern (McCalls 6241) and thought I'd give it a try. It was still pretty basic, but had enough interest to take it beyond a simple tee.
Now, I had some white fabric I wanted to use - plain white, but a cotton/lycra blend with moisture wicking properties. I bought it for the weight - it had a lovely hand and enough weight to know it would hold up. But at $19.00/metre, I wanted to test the pattern first. Hence the wearable muslins. the first one was a serious fabric departure for me. Totally fake fibres, and glitter? Me? But yes, with the Christmas season approaching I needed something with some shine.

Surprisingly, this worked out well. Far better than I ever would have expected. (And since the fabric was only $7.00/metre, if it didn't, no big loss.
But I also wanted to try it in a more natural fabric (you know me and the fake stuff...) so I found this cotton blend knit in my stash and decided to try the longer sleeve version.

Again - nice enough to wear. Some things I noticed - I'm okay with the shoulder pleats, but don't necessarily need them all the time. I love the front neckline drape. The bottom could use a little more width - my tummy doesn't need to be hugged so much with a lighter weight fabric! So I've redrafted it a bit, and will go after the more spendy fabric soon.

Wearable muslins are good.