CT Naomi – Pattern Review

Dearest Sewers,

It’s Me Made May, and the sewing ton is buzzing with inspiration. My mind wants to join the soirée, but my body says no, no, No. My daily outfit currently consists of my huband’s white t-shirts anyway, and believe me when I say, there is nothing inspiring about that! So, instead of snapping selfies or sewing, I’m writing…

Gladwell says anybody can become an expert, if he/she devotes 10,000 hours (approximately 10 years) to studying and practicing a skill. Meh. I say to hell with Gladwell! I made 4 CT Naomi shirts last year, and in my mind that makes me a Naomi expert. hmmmph

I discovered the Naomi Shirt by Coffee and Thread Patterns at the beginning of 2021 and was super intrigued by the line drawings. The pattern retails for $12 bucks and comes in sizes 0-22. Naomi is drafted for a B/C cup and fits a bust of 30 inches up to 50.4 inches. The shirt has raglan sleeves which are incorporated into the yoke pieces, making for some pretty cool construction. At first, I was a little intimidated by the fact that the yoke/sleeve piece included a shoulder dart. Scrap that. I was A LOT intimidated. I almost always need to perform a forward and a sloping shoulder adjustment and I wasn’t exactly sure how to go about doing them on a raglan sleeve. Once my pieces had been assembled, I punked out, folded them up, and stashed them. *covers face

Coffee & Thread Patterns – Naomi Shirt line drawings

*Sometime later*

Though still absolutely clueless about the shoulder dart situation, but now determined to figure it out, I pulled my pattern pieces out, took a deep breath and put my brain to work. Once I was satisfied with the flat pattern adjustments, I sewed up a toile to: 1) see if I had nailed the adjustments, and 2) familiarize myself with the construction of this shirt – which is unlike any other shirt I’ve ever made! Pretty happy with the toile I got busy making Naomi number 1.

Naomi #1

Naomi number 1 is a shameless knock off of a version created by @made_by_e_. I used an Art Gallery floral print for the yoke/sleeve piece and a pink oxford shirting for the rest of the shirt – both from Style Maker Fabrics. In efforts to rock a monochromatic look, I paired this Naomi with hot pink trousers, #S9114 (which I wrote about here), popped on my faux glasses, and became a whole ‘nother person. lol.

Naomi #2

Fast forward a couple months, and again I found myself reaching for this pattern. I had watched my namesake, Kristen (of the Dahlia Sewciety on youtube) talking about the #sewshirty21 challenge. It’s no secret that I love shirt making so I couldn’t let this challenge miss me! I had just enough fabric scraps leftover from a recently completed Minerva project to cut out the sleeve/yoke piece and the outer collar. I shopped my stash and pulled out a teal cotton shirting I had bought with different intentions in mind, and used that for the remainder of the shirt. After an insta vote, I hand sewed some textured gold shank buttons onto my Naomi and fell in love with the pattern all over again!

Naomi #3

Within days of finishing number 2, I cut out a third Naomi!!! Aight, aight, so maybe I have just a weeee bit of a problem. Hear me out. I was laying in bed one night, way past midnight and Just. Couldn’t. Sleep. In between counting sheep, an idea popped into my mind – make a black ‘n’ white button-down shirt. Needless to say, morning couldn’t come fast enough for me.

I pulled a piece of black viscose and a white cotton (I think) from my stash. I loved the feel of the viscose, but was far less impressed by the white cotton. I can’t even remember when or where I bought it, or why I even bought it AT ALL. It has a funny texture that held on to wrinkles for dear life, but, I needed to get this make outta my head and into my closet, so cut, sew and wear is exactly that I did!

Since I opted for two solid colours this time I wanted to add just a lil bit more jazz to this make. I rounded out the ends of my collar, hacked the sleeve cuffs (into a fold over cuff) and put my piping skills to the test.

To execute my vision, I rounded out one side of the cuff piece and then cut four cuff pieces from fabric (instead of the two directed by the pattern). Once attached to the sleeve, I added a single buttonhole and button within the first half of the cuff, and rolled it back along the fold line. This Naomi took a bit longer than the others, given the piping detail, but the end product is quite striking IMO. I do wish I had used a nicer white fabric though!

Naomi #4

Naomi number 4 quickly followed number 3. *sigh* Mehhhnnn I was on a roll and just couldn’t help myself. This time I used two viscose fabrics and made the short sleeved version. The patterned viscose was the leftings from my Courtney Top, and the black viscose was left over from Naomi number 3! Again I added leftover white piping between the yoke pieces and the main bodice… just because i could! This Naomi is definitely my stash-busting version.

You’ll be happy to hear that with 4 under my belt, I retired my CT Naomi pattern to my archives. I’m sure I’ll draw for it some other time in the future, but for now, four will do!

If you’ve not come across this pattern before, go check it out; if you have it in your stash, but are just a little bit intimidated by it, DON’T BE! It’s a fun and interesting make, that’s for sure! Plus, it’s the perfect pattern for fabric scraps!