A past project uncovered.

You know you've been sewing a looong time when rediscovering evidence of early projects feels a bit "archaeological".
On Saturday morning, I was going through the Menswear Pattern Library* shirt patterns to source enough shirt front and pocket patterns to teach pattern matching. This is in my Mad Skills class where we just blast through about ten techniques in samples. Much to my surprise and delight, I found this:

This is the very first men's shirt pattern I ever used, to make three shirts for my friend Ian at church. It was 1980 and I was 15. How I know it was this pattern is the tracings on the pocket piece. The fabric was a leopard print jersey with very little stretch (thank goodness). The other two were white and midnight blue satin.
Oh the folly of youth, to take on making shirts out of knits and satins!
Anyway, the tracing was my first attempt to match a pattern for a pocket, and it was quite apt, given I was about to teach the technique that evolved from this attempt. (It was successful, but these days we save the pocket piece from being scribbled on)
But wait, there's more. I sent the photo above to Ian and he told me he still had the shirt! His lovely wife Shirley unearthed it and sent me this photo:

Great pattern matching eh, not bad for 15.

Ian was, is, pretty zany and fun, and this shirt suited him, both in colouring and in personality. Of course it's quite tame compared to the shirts I make for MrC, but 35 years ago it was pretty different!

*My shop has a collection of menswear patterns, many of them vintage, that anyone can borrow for a gold coin donation ($1-$2) which we then spend on more patterns. We do this as there are much fewer options for menswear patterns even with Thread Theory's excellent work in that area. Plus, I love the cut of many of the 1960s-1970s patterns; they are cut for a slim fit and many of our customers and students prefer this shape.