Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Jalie Jeans or McCalls?


The new Jalie Stretch jeans pattern just came out and I've been wanting to sew a new pair of jeans. I had started tracing the McCalls pattern a few weeks ago, but decided to wait on cutting them out when I heard about the new Jalie pattern.

Here's a look at the front and back pieces of both patterns. If you click on the picture, you'll have a better view of the differences between the two patterns. The McCalls patterns have 1" seam allowances, but even after tracing those in, you can see a significant difference in size. This is before any alterations were done. I went with the size charts and tried to trace the one that matched my measurements closest. Jalie pattern size T matched waist and hip measurements perfectly, while McCalls size 14 pattern was within 1/2" of my waist and hip. However, after tracing the two patterns and laying the Jalie pattern on top the McCalls one, you can see there's a significant difference not only in style, but in sizing! And yes, both require STRETCH DENIM. For a minute, I thought the McCalls pattern was for non-stretch denim... but nope, it lists both regular denim and Stretch denim, and there is a stretch meter on the side of the package. Hmmm...

In comparison, the Jalie pattern is much more fitted from waist to knee. The rise is a bit lower in front, and the center front slants at a slightly greater angle. It is also much closer in angle to my favorite pair of jeans.
The CB seams on both appear to have a bigger wedge cut out than my favorite pair of jeans, though both angles are very close.

Okay. So then I compared the measurements from both patterns to my favorite pair of jeans, and because the McCalls pattern seemed way too big, I included size 10 and 12 as well... here's how they fared (Favorite jeans, area measured, Jalie, McCalls 10, McCalls 12, McCalls 14):

7 3/4" (Front crotch:) 6 3/4" , 7 3/4", 8 1/8", 8 1/4"
12 3/4" (Back crotch:) 12 3/4", 10 1/4", 10 1/2", 11 1/8"
37 3/4" ( Hip:) 37", 37", 38 1/2", 40"
23 1/4" (Thigh around crotch line:) 23 1/4", 23 1/2", 24", 25 3/4"
22 1/4" (2" below crotch line - around the saddlebag): 21 1/2", 22 1/2", 23 3/8, 24 1/2"
15" (knee): 15 1/4", 19", almost the same as size 10
17" (leg opening): 20 1/4", 19 -20" for McCalls sizes

I did NOT take into consideration basic length measurements as those can easily be adjusted. So far, Jalie seems to be closer to what I'd want to wear.

Next post: Alterations

1 comment:

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