Valentino RTW Knock-Off: McCall’s 4922 March 17, 2007

I have to give Diva Els a giant hug because I misplaced my photo of the original RTW Valentino shirt.  She located it on her hard drive and emailed it back to me.  Els has an astounding ability to locate things on the internet and in her PC files, and I think this research skill must serve her well in her professional couture career.

The photo above is from September ‘06 Vogue, and I fell in love with this shirt right away.  The combination of the sporty style and sweet heirloom embellishment is sexy yet demure, and it just screamed “knock me off” when I first saw it.  If you can believe it, this shirt was about $400 when it was in the on-line Neiman Marcus catalog.

The pattern is McCall’s 4922, a good basic princess seamed women’s shirt with a few sleeve variations.  I made the French cuff version.

The drafting on this pattern is excellent - every piece fit together beautifully.  If you’re looking for a basic women’s shirt that will be current for several years this is a good choice.  I also recommend it if you’re ready to tackle your first stand collar because the directions are clear and accurate.  I actually had to use them for once because it has been a while since I made collar stand, and I needed to refresh my memory.

If you’d like this to really resemble the original, the separate placket would need to be incorporated into the center front as a facing, and you’d need to get a fell  seam foot.  These are fake fell seams, I sewed them on a regular machine, finished them on the serger, and then topstitched them from the front with white machine embroidery thread.  The buttons holes were also stitched with white machine embroidery thread.  The center front panels were cut out single layer so they could be mirror imaged across the front.  More pattern details are on Pattern Review.

The two fabrics are a wavy cotton eyelet and a soft cotton twill.  The twill was a gift from Diva Mary Beth and I *think* the eyelet might still be available, so if you like it just leave a comment.  I’ll find out and edit this post.

The front placket was cut back ¼ inch so that the outside edge of the entredeux would align with the  edge of the placket underneath.  I made the high-dome pearl cufflinks from the same buttons as the shirt.  The bottom two placket buttons are regular shirt buttons to keep a smooth line under pants and skirts.

Right now there’s about 8 inches of snow on the ground, but it’s melting fast and Spring is on the way so hopefully I’ll be able to wear this very soon!