Hello all!

Way back in April I found out that I was going on tour for 6 weeks. I had to fit everything into a carry on case so the most capsule of capsule wardrobes had to be worked out. As a dresser on a show the dress code is all black. Long sleeves, full length trousers, as little skin as possible. Space was at a premium which meant that it wasn't worth bringing many clothes that weren't black. I ended up packing 3 pairs of black bottoms (jeans, dungarees and trousers) and I only ended up wearing the first 2. The trousers just weren't comfortable enough to be worth wearing for the long days that I was working. In terms of tops I brought 4 or 5 black tops, 2 coloured t shirts and a patterned shirt (that I am incidentally wearing in the pictures for this blog post). I brought my polar bear pjs but ended up not wearing them because sleeping on the tour bus was too hot, so I ended up grabbing some sleep shorts while I was on tour. It worked swimmingly as a capsule wardrobe because black on black automatically goes together but was extremely boring and I missed having fun with my outfit choices. Anyway, I'm finally getting round to blogging the dungarees I made for tour. 

The fabric is a black bottom weight stretch cotton that the man at Leicester market found for me. I think I paid something like £8 for 2m. It's very pleasant to wear against the skin and the stretch content meant that I could be as flexible as I needed to be, especially when my work was so practically based. Cutting out was very straightforward and it sewed together beautifully.

Patternwise I nabbed the bib from Closet Case Patterns Jenny Overalls and plonked it onto my self drafted trousers which you can see other versions of here and here. I wish I'd taken out the front darts because they look a bit silly on dungarees, but I think the leg proportions are perfect. I love a good rolled up hem on a trouser at the moment!

Pocketswise I have the bib pocket and the front pockets which I made sure were deep enough for my phone. I ran out of time for back pockets, but I did cut them out so maybe one day. The bib pocket has stretched out a bit because I've shoved my phone in there so often so next time I'd stabilise that bit with some twill tape.

I didn't use dungaree buckles to attach the bibs and the straps because they wouldn't be appropriate to wear backstage so I sewed buttons to the bib and buttonholes to the straps and they fasten that way instead. 

They got washed a lot over the 6 weeks because they were pretty much 50% of what I was wearing and I love how the edges of the bib are ageing. It just gives the garment that little bit more depth. 

Overall they were a tremendous success and I feel very Mamma Mia in them (which is obviously only ever a good thing). If I can find the right fabric I'd love to make some more summery ones, or go full Mamma Mia and make some navy dungarees.   

Thanks very much for reading and to Ed for taking pictures in the beautiful San Fransisco botanical gardens!

Lauren xx