This past week was a wild ride. Other than our regular monthly show, Holodeck Follies, on Wednesday, we also performed at FanExpo on Thursday night, the opening night of the convention.
My husband wrote a wonderful entry that recaps the whole affair. So this entry is about sewing, since that is the theme of my blog.
I sewed up four uniform shirts in four days using the Tahoe Tee pattern from Peekaboo.
Because of the time constraints, I didn’t have time to take detail shots. I have quite a few other shirts to make for the rest of the crew. I pushed through to get the shirts done for our FanExpo performers.
Dale and I already had uniforms. Although, I will also be making new ones for us to match the rest of the crew. I have about 7 more shirts to make before the October 7th show! I will be so tired of making Star Trek tops by then.
With some cast members, I was able to take measurements in person. With a couple, I was only able to go by their shirt size or get measurements from their wife. It turned out pretty well, though. The fit is reasonable on all the shirts. They are meant to be a looser fit than the original uniforms to give the cast some breathing room for human pyramids.
Each t-shirt got individual treatment. I traced out every size. I hate tracing patterns. This was seriously a labour of love. Some of the cast members are the same size so I will be able to re-use those patterns.
For Tracy, our blue shirted Bajoran lady on the left of the photo below, I did a small FBA to allow for a bit more room in the bust without making the shoulders ridiculous. I will have to shorten her sleeves before the next show, but overall the length and fit work for her. Tracy was fine with me using a men’s shirt pattern.
The fit was less complicated for the guys. For all shirts, except Chris’s, who is behind me in the below photo, I simply slashed the pattern to get the colourblocking and added in seam allowances in various areas. I sewed them all on my serger, except for the hems and sewing the topstitching on the neckband, and did a simple neckband in black. On Dale’s uniform and my dress, I did a Mandarin collar, but found that process to be difficult with a knit fabric. Because our show is a parody, it’s doesn’t require 100% accuracy. Leaving off that infernal collar saved my sanity…what’s left of my sanity.
Photo credit for group shot: Quentin Twaites
Chris (pictured above with my ire directed toward him) plays Weasley Pincher, our resident Wesley Crusher parody. I got to say, “Shut up, Weasley!” at one point during the show! I’ve been waiting for that opportunity for a while.
I made a basic grey t and added in the stripes in the three colours just below the armscye. Just don’t look closely at the stripe matching. It was the last one I made and I was exhausted. Bloody exhausted. Stripe matching that basically blew my mind. I couldn’t even…
The Tahoe Tee is a pdf pattern and goes together really well. It even conserves paper by having smaller pattern pieces on a corner of the other pattern pieces. I liked that part. The only issue I have with the pattern is that there is a cutting guide rather than a pattern piece for the neckbands. I totally get this is personal preference, but I really hate cutting a square of fabric. I’d much rather use a pattern piece. I’m a princess. What can I say?
There are fit issues here and there. Without getting a ton of time to test the garments out or get accurate measurements for each cast member, I think they turned out really well!
Nothing else to say about the pattern. It’s a great base for a Star Trek uniform shirt!
Here are some choice actions shots. All taken by AltoVenue, like the picture above.
TL:DR Review
- Pattern: Tahoe Tee
- Pros: Super fast, basic t-shirt for men.
- Cons: Runs large. Check the pattern pieces for finished measurements. I found they were off from what was printed.
- Make again?: I HAVE TO! Lol. But honestly, if Dale wants a t-shirt, I’d make him one using this pattern in a heartbeat. It’s a nice basic t and comes with long, short, and no sleeves! Totally worth the 9 bucks.
- Rating:
5/5 stars
Andie Wells Studio 
Excellent use of Star Trek gifs! It looks like it was a fun event and your costumes all look great. 🙂
Thanks, Anna! 🙂 It was so much fun!
Oh MAN! They look fantastic. I’m a TOS girl myself, but the TOS uniforms leave a lot to be desired…
Thanks so much! 🙂 Yeah, the TOS uniforms aren’t that nice… I did see tons of people in them at FanExpo, though. 🙂
Actually I really like the medical uniforms – I like Bones’ saddle shoulder and Nurse Chapel’s interesting neckline is clearly the best thing to happen in the show. I wish you could still buy the pattern for it. And they get better fabrics, too. Bones’ looks like SILK! Or maybe taffeta. Something shiny, anyway.
Some of the alien costumes are great, at least. Favourites so far are the female Klingon commander and the cat-lady-alien who wore a skintight catsuit under a see-through kaftan. Style. Goals. Plus, you can play ‘what costumes are they re-using’ (current fave was when they used the space-dog costume as some weird arm warmer the next ep) as well as ‘what ordinary object is that prop’ and ‘what other tv show filmed a western/war move/medieval thing and they reused the set’.
But NOTHING would get me into either those mini dresses or those dumb DUMB short pants!
Yes, I hate the mini dresses and short pants.
The alien costumes tend to have a lot more variety and interest even in the later series. They get to really play with different looks. Must have been a blast to be a costume designer on those shows and movies. 🙂
Those look like so much fun! (The wearing, not the making.)
The wearing was definitely fun! 🙂
Oh, bringing back some memories! I am a total Star Trek nerd (much to my kid’s amazement) but also way way way back I sewed up some Star Trek uniform tops for a few people at a convention. I was quite new to sewing (brave or stupid I was to agree to this job) but they ended up looking pretty good between lots of work and luck.
Yeay, Star Trek nerd! 🙂 Nice job on the uniforms. I bet they looked amazing. 🙂
I saw one of the original costumes at Chicago’s Museum of Sci and Industry a couple of summers ago and I was struck with how much skill was built into such a simple design. Star Trek wins hands down for minimalist yet sleek and stylish uniforms! Nice work on a boat load of sewing! What kind of fabric did you use? The Picard gif made my day too!
Nice. I can only imagine what they look like up close. I read over some design elements once and was surprised it is more than a basic shirt. There’s a lot of little details you never really see on the show.
I can’t believe I forgot to include the fabric. It’s a polyester ponte. The only thing in my area that had the right colours.