Fun with a collar frill

My phone has decided to be uncooperative with photos, but let's try this anyway.

Another stash fabric goes under the rotary cutter -- this one a lightweight seersucker. It was originally white with a brown stripe. After a dip in the dyepot (Rit indigo) it is now a color much more flattering to my silver grey locks.

I used my shoulder princess seam shirt block and decided to give it a little lift with a ruffle on the collar stand. I wanted to try something a tiny bit different though, and have the center back of the ruffle be higher than the front edges. Sort of a 'popped' collar look? 

So, I took a collar ruffle from a pattern I had and redrafted it to be 1 inch higher at the back, which I thought would be a small, but noticeable, change.

I thought the seersucker was light enough to allow me to have a doubled ruffle (i.e. no hemmed edges showing) but that may have been a slight miscalculation. Although the fabric itself is light, the texture of the weave gives it more bulk, so a single layer might have been a better choice. Live and learn.

More learning -- the pattern I borrowed the ruffle from had the ruffle continue around the curved edge of the collar stand. I found that a bit tricky to neatly distribute the gathers around the edge, and even after redoing it's not my best work. It's a cotton, everyday shirt though so I'll live with it. (shrug) When I do this again though I will either square off the top edge of the collar stand, or see how it looks with the ruffle started after the curve.

And yet more learning -- the higher the back is made the more it will tend to droop without reinforcement. This is one case when a stiffer fabric is needed. I'm fine with it, but I do wonder how interfacing it might have helped.

The sleeves were hemmed at 3/4 length, which is my preferred summer length. I didn't like the width of the lower edge though --I should have tapered them in a bit. Well, might as well try an after-the-fact taper, so I made four small darts around the sleeve opening. If I had made them a bit larger I think I would have gotten a nice lantern effect, but I was worried about making the opening too small, so...

All in all, it worked out to be a wearable everyday shirt. I learned a few things, and I got another small fabric cut out of the stash and into my closet. I'm calling it a win.