Women’s Knit Top, Shorts, and Pants Sewing Pattern
Sewing patterns that offer more than one garment with optional details are great additions to your pattern stash. McCall’s 8456 has lots of outfit options offering a variety of pull on pant lenghts and top choices. It is easy to sew and offers details that add interest to the garment. Let’s take a look at my McCalls 8456 Pattern review.
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The Pattern
McCall’s 8456 offers sewists a variety of garment sewing projects, incuding a women’s knit top with two sleeve options, knit shorts, cropped, and long pants. My favorite part of this pattern is the top stitching detail on the pants. They look super high end ready to wear and stylish.
Size Options
The pattern is available in a wide variety of sizes include 10-18, 20W-28W, and 30W-38W.
Fabric Options
Cotton knit, French terry, and sweatshirt fleece are recommended fabrics for this pattern selected by McCalls. I used a cotton knit for the short set and a ponte roma for the long pants — both fabrics worked extremely well.
The Sew Along
I take you step by step through the sewing process. In this sew along we make the banded sleeveles top and shorts. All the pants options are constructed in the same manner.
The Knit Top
The easy to sew knit top has a long sleeve version and a banded sleeveless option. The fold over turtleneck adds an interesting designer touch to the pattern.
The long sleeve knit top has wrist cuffs giving it a cozy, sweatshirt feel.
The sleeveless version has banded armholes which are a nice way to finish the arm opening. I did find that the armholes were too big. Since I discovered it was too big after it was completed, I ended up making the armholes smaller by stitching up the side seam and across the banding. I prefer to sew sleeveless tops more close fitting. I also think the banding could be half as wide, that would elminate the exagerated, boxy shoulder look.
For the matching shorts set, I used a Minerva knit that is out of stock. However, they had tons of cute cotton knits — you will have a difficult time choosing. You can see all your cotton knit shopping options here.
The Pants And Shorts
These pants are gorgeous! I love the seaming detail and top stitching. For the long pants I used a contrasting metalic thread to elevate the stitching on the fabric. Even though the pants have a lot of seaming detail — three panels for the front and back — they sew up quickly. I am a fan of the wide waistband. I did add 2″ elastic instead of the 3/4″ elastic recommended in the pattern notions. The pants also have optional front patch pockets, which I left off. I would consider adding side pockets to the pants and capture the top of the pocket into the wide waistband.
The shorts have a banded hem adding more interesting details to these cute and comfy shorts.
For the long pants, I used a medium weight Ponte Roma from Mood. You can go online shopping at Mood to explore their wonderful Ponte Rome fabric collection. Click here to explore their online store.
The Sweatshirt Hoodie
The sweatshirt in the photo is Simplicity 3012. You can view my sew along below.
Difficulty
The pattern goes together easily and the instructions are very good. The pattern is rated as easy, and I think that is a fair rating. The banding technique on the pull on knit shorts and top is a good technique to learn and a clean method to finish the edges. Also, the optional front patch pockets add interesting pattern detail within an easy sewing skill set.
A beginner sewer could easily complete these projects — expecially if you follow my sew along above.
Conclusion
I enjoyed sewing the pants and shorts from this pattern. The pattern offers interesting details on the pants and shorts — aren’t we always looking for something a little different. You can never have too many pairs of pants in your closet!
I hope you found my McCalls 8456 pattern review helpful. I strongly recommend working out a pair of these pants to add to your wardrobe. If you are considering adding some fall patterns to your sewing plans, check out my Vogue Pattern Review and Simplicity Pattern Review. I go over the patterns details and what you might create with each pattern.
Happy Sewing,
Sandi
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