Prairie Style, 1978: Butterick 6038, McCall’s 5948, and dirndl skirt

Clearinghouse post on 1970′s prairie style:

The first bit is Butterick 6038 (1978 or 1979), a casual blouse with a split neck, gathered front, collar, and side ties at the waist. I wasn’t sure how I felt about this but I think it’s growing on me. I’m notoriously fussy about fit and I was sort of afraid this just said, “boxy!”, and possibly, “maternity!”, but I don’t really think now that it’s that bad (and I’m trying to become less picky about fit). If I make it again, I’ll trim down the tops of the sleeve caps, both to avoid having to gather them so much and to make the shoulder fit a little less awkward.

The fabric is Kona cotton in “Snow” which, ironically, is off-white. It’s about the color of unbleached muslin but without the natural brown flecks (I wanted to use muslin but couldn’t find any that was opaque enough to look decent). It’s kind of stiff but it did behave beautifully, without any stretching or distortion.

6038 also looks cute with jeans.

Here it is with an improvised dirndl skirt, which is not specifically retro but also not really not retro. This one was made of two yards of brown Indienne-style calico and uses this awesome half-elastic waistband tutorial.

I’m from Texas; I’m allowed to wear boots with everything. If it’s not already in our state Constitution, it should be.

Here’s 6038 again, but with McCall’s 5948 (1978), which is full-blown Seventies prairie chic and not ashamed to say so.

This pattern didn’t include pockets, and I am morally opposed to clothing that doesn’t have pockets, so I added some small patch pockets to the front, since the side inserts made side-seam pockets awkward.