Herringbone Flannel Archer

I made a flannel shirt. Yep, flannel.

Yep, me. The woman who complains about Bangkok's stifling heat on a regular basis, made a long-sleeved flannel shirt.

Did I make this shirt specifically to wear during a one-week trip to the Northeast U.S. in mid-November? What?! No. Noooooo... that would be crazy, right?! 

Ok, fine, yes. Yes, I did. Shhhh. It's an Archer and it's flannel and it's fluffy and it's warm and I don't care. I wanted something new and fun and warm to wear for the trip since all of my winter clothes are, at a minimum, five years old (purchased before moving abroad to Southeast Asia).

The fun thing is, I snuck in some blog photos while on the trip... the autumn leaves were lovely in Boston's Public Gardens, so I forced my mom to take my photo (thanks, Martha!).

The fabric is Kaufman Shetland flannel in Ocean, a pretty turquoise and black herringbone, that I bought from the Imagine Gnats shop (affiliate link). This stuff is insanely soft!

I cut the button band, pockets and yoke on the cross grain to shake things up a bit, although you can barely tell because the whole thing reads like a solid until you're up close.

Speaking of up close, don't look too closely at my collar stand, as it's a bit of a nightmare. The fabric is quite thick, so anytime there were multiple layers, I struggled a bit.... The patch pockets on the front also turned out 3-dimensional because of the thick fabric. I was worried it would look weird, but I kinda like it.

I skipped the top two buttonholes because my machine didn't want to deal with the layers. I never button them anyway, so no biggie. And I finished the hem with a bias tape facing because I knew that double-turning that thick fabric on the curved hem would be impossible and bulky. The bias tape worked out beautifully!

I had to lengthen my stitch a bunch for the topstitching; my machine wouldn't have it otherwise. But I recently learned how to use my edgestitching/stitch in the ditch foot, which helped keep things straight.

I made two silly mistakes, neither of which really matters to me as far as wearability goes: I made the back pleat inside out and I accidentally put the button band on the wrong side of the front bodice. Oops!

Size-wise, I decided to cut the same size as my last Archer, but graded up a size at the hips since I find my first one to be a bit snug in that area. I dealt with my crazy-long and crazy-wide sleeve issues by shortening them by 3 inches and grading down two sizes at the lower arm and cuff. I'm really happy with the fit! Having slimmer, shorter sleeves makes the whole shirt look much sleeker and less slouchy.

Overall, I'm loving this Archer! It's like a wearable blanket. In the words of that kid from Despicable Me, one my nieces' favorite movies, "It's so fluffy, I'm gonna die!!"