Burdastyle 078-2010-104 Zipper trousers

[motorharp]

Burda 07/2010 #104  (link to the German site, the American one still seems to be having issues after the change in ... management?) is a pattern from over a decade ago.

I made this pattern before and it was... not great. The fabric was way too stretchy and weirdly polyesterish.

This time, I used my jamie jeans as a fitting template. This fabric has about 20% stretch. Jamie requires at least 30%. The pattern pieces are so different, but it looked like this pattern was about 10% bigger through the hip. So I just cut on the original lines. And that size was either a size 38 or 40.

I took in an inch width of the center back seam at the waist, and subsequently had to add 1 1/4" in height, which gave a deeper yoke.

These jeans would be slightly more comfortable with 4.5 gauge zippers. Apparently, the color I wanted is not sold anywhere in continuous yardage. All I could find was 5-gauge and they are a little too beefy.

Making the zippers was a bit of a learning curve. I ended up mangling a couple of the tapes trying to remove the teeth before I figured out how to cut them off without getting the tape caught in the jaws of the wire cutters. It looked like I had discovered gold - flakes were flying everywhere.

I bought 2.5 yards and had about 10" extra, and that was a good thing. I lengthened the pants 1" longer than the pattern, and I definitely don't have longer legs. The zippers do NOT open all the way up, there is a backing strip that ends just below the knees.

Also, I didn't realize the zipper pulls weren't the dangly kind, ie, with rounded corners.

They fit and are very comfortable. They do, however, tend to stretch out and not quite recover. I'm guessing that's a function of the twill weave, not the stretch part.

This was another project I immediately wanted another pair of. What is happening.

Without zips, though.

Fabric: Cotton stretch twill 60"wide 1 3/4 yds
Cost: $26.23 fabric, 3.10 thread, 14.27 zippers
Time: 1/30 fabric purchased, 2/9 zippers purchased, laid out pattern 2/14, sewed 2/15-16, finished 2/16