Zippers

Zippers give me heartburn, primarily because I can't seem to remember from one project to the next how they're supposed to go. I'd do anything to get around them, and I have a great sailor-inspired pants pattern (and now that I have a block to work from, I'll be able to turn great into fabulous) that has allowed me to avoid them (more to come on that later). But, one of my goals this summer was to make at least three pair of pants with a fly front zipper and get over this trepidation.

Luckily, there are lots of awesome resources out there to help with the dreaded flat fly front. My favorite video, from Trudy at Hot Patterns, goes a long way toward getting rid of the panic. Trudy, a YouTube thumbs up doesn't cut it; I love your video.

I love that her patterns have the pocket bag reach to the extension, don't you? This is one of my favorite features of some of my RTW pants because it seems to combat any weird pocket distortion from bending, leaning, or random dancing. (I forgot to redraw my pockets for the cherry capris before I cut them. Oops. This was one of many oopses with this project so far.) 

Here's the Sandra Betzina method that Trudy's method was derived from: Video: An Easy, Flat Fly-Front Zipper - Threads

An observation: Trudy's fabulous video results in a fly that opens to the opposite side to what I'm accustomed to, like for menswear. I'll try to remember that next time. This is another one of those things that escapes me, as I have at least one other pair of pants in my wardrobe that have the zipper opening to the left rather than the right.

Here are some stills from the cherry capri project, a visual reference for next time.

Zipper attached face up to zipper extension. I'll try to remember to mirror this for next time so that the zipper ends up opening to the customary side.

I opted to forgo the extra offset from Trudy's video. I think it's weirder to have the zipper so far off center than have it potentially show.

The bamboo turner is pointing to the line of stitching that attaches the zipper shield to just the extension, not to the front. In fact, all the stitching here is to the extensions, not the actual front piece. That's saved for the topstitching bit.

This isn't actually pinned in the right spot - just a reminder of what's next for next time.

Learning! Woot!