I made trousers – and they fit! Sort of.

This is their best angle

They look great from up here!

This is my second toile (muslin) for the Sewaholic Thurlow trousers pattern, following on from the shorts I made a month or two back. For this version, I added 1.5″ to the crotch depth, meaning that the waistband now lies higher up and there’s less pulling in the front crotch area. So far, so good.

Given the difficulty I have finding RTW trousers that look vaguely passable, I wasn’t expecting this to be a one-step process. Sure enough, a new problem has now emerged.

I’ve now got diagonal wrinkles going upwards from the back crotch to the hip area. And according to my copy of Fitting & Pattern Alteration, this is a sure sign that the back crotch length needs increasing. I’m going to try doing this using the instructions Sunni has posted from Pants for Real People which should add a little extra width at the thigh as well.

On the whole, I think these are a wearable toile – they definitely fit better than some of the RTW trousers I’ve worn in the past. The front view is good, and I’m pleased with some of the details. OK, the back welts aren’t immaculate…

I chose the outer fabric at Birmingham Rag Market. It was sold as cotton drill at £4/m but it’s definitely polyester! So it doesn’t press very well making it tricky to get the welts tidy and the side seams flat. On the upside it’ll wash well and won’t fade, I guess, but I wouldn’t use it again. Somehow it manages to drape both too much and not enough at the same time.

For version three, I’ve got some charcoal grey wool mix suiting from The Fancy Silk Store (also in Birmingham) so that should be a bit better behaved and nicer to wear, too.

Overall, I really like this pattern but there’s one point that’s bothering me. I can’t get the left waistband piece to line up with the fly extension piece when I put waistband on – it’s been 1-2 inches short both times. A browse around the blogosphere shows I’m not the only one with this issue. So I might contact Sewaholic and see if Tasia and friends can work out whether we’re all making the same mistake or if there’s a flaw in the pattern pieces.*

*Update: I worked this out on version three. I’d been taking too small a seam allowance on both sides of the fly extension piece. On version three, I made sure I took the full 5/8″ when I finished the seam allowance and it fits much better. Although I’m still not totally convinced all the notches line up..!