Papercut Nagoya Pants

This time last year I don’t think I would even have considered wide-leg trousers, but as usual, my insta-sewing feed fills up with a style and suddenly it doesn’t seem so crazy any more. I purchased the pattern for Papercut‘s Nagoya Pants just before Christmas, and in the lazy week between Christmas and New Year I managed to find a little sewing time while the kids were distracted by gifts and festive films.

When I first considered sewing this style, the patterns which were on my radar were the Nagoya Pants (below left) and the Lander Pants (right) by True Bias. I wanted something comfortable and the Lander Pants look super stylish, but more fitted through the hips and thigh. The slightly more relaxed fit of the Nagoya won me over.

One of the most valuable things about Instagram, for me, is being able to search a hashtag for a pattern you’re planning to sew. Unfortunately there isn’t a huge amount in the Nagoya ‘pool’ at the moment, whereas the Lander is over-flowing! I’m not totally sold on the Nagoya, and perhaps I’m not alone.

 

My measurements put me bang onto the medium size, which is where I always am with Papercut patterns. As usual, I also took my own measurements of the paper pattern to check this. I knew there would be fitting adjustments because the fabric I chose is a cotton velour with quite a large amount of stretch.

Regardless of this however, I think the sizing on this pattern is pretty large. It wasn’t difficult to take in the seams at the sides, and I also took in the darts to get the waist to fit. The thing to note about this pattern is that the legs are really, really wide, and not just at the bottom but through the entire leg. My fabric is fairly heavy so this didn’t provide a very flattering look! I took in each leg at the thigh area by a good few centimetres.

The other ‘issue’ I found was that the crotch was too high, resulting in an uncomfortable fit. The problem I encountered here, is that the construction of the legs is what I think of as the ‘up and over’ – i.e. from ankle to ankle, rather than sewing the legs individually before joining at the crotch. So in order to remedy this issue I had to unpick the ‘cross-section’, overlocking and all! I was then able to re-attach things using the crotch seam method, but lowering the seam a centimetre or so further down the leg. Here’s a picture of the mess before the fix, which also shows where I took in the inner leg seams.

Once the fitting issues were addressed, I then had the hemming dilemma! I had been thinking of these as just above ankle length trousers, as the pattern photos show them this way. There is also a proper cropped version, but I sewed the full length view. I had to step away from these trousers for a few days as I wasn’t actually sure if I liked them. Truthfully, I’m still not sure! But I decided to go full length as the fabric is a warm, winter season weight.

So, hey ho, jury’s still out and I’m not sure if I like the style enough on me to go through the fitting challenges again. I chose not to alter my pattern for future use because the stretch in this version influenced some of the alterations I made. I do quite fancy a cropped denim pair for the Spring though.

Without further ado, here are a couple of photos. This style definitely needs to be paired with a more fitted top. This one is a freshly sewn Seamwork Astoria (lengthened) in a glorious soft cotton loopback jersey from Guthrie Ghani. The light grey velour/moleskin I used for the trousers is from Croft Mill. If you’re interested, it’s the same fabric (different colour) that I used recently for my Cleo dress.