Pine Crest Fabrics: Floral Workout Gear!

Happy Friday! Long time, no blog, I know! It's been crazy the past few weeks - so much sewing but not a lot of sharing! I had a craft show a few weeks ago that had me in a sewing frenzy! To top that off, two of my machines were down and I had to get them serviced. But lucky for me, the sewing repair store had my dream machine on sale and I got my first "industrial" machine! It is the Janome 1600P, Janome's version of an industrial machine, and I LOVE it. I was sewing on it 9 hours straight for three days and it was pure bliss. Eventually I'll get around to writing a full review, because it's a sewing machine not a lot of people know about!

I got my machines back last week (Janome HD3000 and Janome Serger) and I was able to work on this new active wear project I'm super excited to share! A few weeks ago, Pine Crest Fabrics reached out to me about trying some of their fabrics, and of course, I was intrigued. I wasn't familiar with Pine Crest but now I'm so happy I know about them!

Pine Crest is a wholesale fabric company specializing in active wear fabrics! They offer many different types of fabrics including performance, costume, gymnastics, dance, and even medical fabric! They offer features like compression fabrics, mesh and moisture wicking - so they are pretty well rounded in the athletic fabric department. Their biggest seller, Olympus (75% Poly and 25% Spandex) was the fabric I was asked to test.

Pine Crest told me to pick a print out of their digital print library, which currently houses 7,720 different prints, and I was basically a kid in a candy store! I looked at every single print because I wanted to choose the right one. I had a list of about 10 and eventually narrowed it down to the most amazing floral print. (Yes, I skipped over the cacti prints because I really need to limit the cacti in my wardrobe) Pine Crest graciously sent me a few yards of the floral and a few yards of their solid Olympus in matching copper.

First things first, this fabric is stunning. The dark floral has a white backing so I was a little nervous about stretching and revealing the white underneath, but the fabric is such a wonderful weight that I had no problems! One of my biggest concerns about activewear fabric is that many tend to be too thin, and when shopping online, that's a huge issue you can face, especially when you are sewing bottoms. Thankfully, I now know the brand to look for because this fabric is going to be my go-to legging fabric.

I can always use another pair of leggings, and there was a new sports bra on the market I wanted to try out. So for this set, I turned to Simplicity 8632. (May also appear as D0949) I love high waisted leggings, and I really liked the idea of a longer-line sports bra. With high waisted leggings, I don't feel super exposed, and I feel like I can really bend and stretch without the fear of the back creeping down.

This fabric is a dream to sew with. I've done a fair amount of active wear sewing, and while I'm not an expert, I immediately know when a fabric will work for me - and this fabric WORKED. It feels substantial without being too thick, and sewed beautifully. There was a section on the sports bra I had to unpick, and I was nervous with what that might do to the material but no problems here! And the print is stunning. I definitely made the right choice! While some printed fabrics can get blurry if done improperly, this print shows all the details including the lines on the flowers and leaves. And on a quick note- Pine Crest's site shows you how the print will look on garments so if you are concerned with the size of the repeat, just click a few photos and see how it'll look on a dress or bathing suit. Test it out here!

Now for the pattern details:

Sports Bra: I made a size small, and could have sized down to an XS. (I had to take the sides in a little). This is a low impact sports bra. It does not come with instructions on adding cups, but I'm sure it's possible. This bra would be great for yoga, cycling, core workouts, but anything where you are jumping or running is probably better suited with more support. Even though the back has a really cute design, it's better left at home on a long run. Another alteration I made was omitting the bra back closure and I just sewed the ends together. I would definitely make this bra again!

Leggings: Again, I made a size Small, and while I thought they fit well, after walking around a bit, I noticed something interesting...they had a lot of extra material in the knee area. Now, I do like my leggings tight, and prefer unsaggy back knees (is there an actual term for this part of the body?), so I had to go in and pin the knees in tighter. It was a simple alteration, but a strange one I've never encountered. I'm not sure if it was due to being petite, but you can actually see the back leg sagging on the pattern envelope so perhaps this was how they were drafted. Another note, I took about 1" off the waistband because with my shorter torso, they were a little too high. If I make them again, I'll probably take it off the top of the legs instead of the waistband. I also shortened these roughly 8" to capri length because I have about 4 pairs of full length leggings and need capri length in my wardrobe! I could have sized down on these as well, but I'm a crazy person and like things suuuuper tight- they are perfectly fine the way they are!

Now onto my top. While the envelope made it look super cute, I was not a happy camper while making this. I know that is not what you want to hear when talking about pretty fabrics and new patterns but I need to share my honest opinion. Simplicity 8704 was not my friend. I received a few yards of the solid Olympus fabric in Copper - and it is a lighter weight than the printed material. I actually really like the contrast because you can do a lot with both and I wanted to test this fabric on a top. This fabric is a great weight for a long sleeve top or base layer because it will keep you just warm enough while you are working up a sweat.

I decided to make View C because it was simple, and I really didn't want a cell phone pocket. This top started out normal, and having just made a simplicity pattern in the bra and leggings, I thought I knew what to expect. I have never worked with a pattern that made me feel so stupid. I'm a pretty confident seamstress, and have made a lot of patterns over the 12 years I've been sewing. The directions and photos were awful. The front pocket was a mess and I had to re-do it about 4 times. To be honest, if I didn't already cut my gorgeous fabric, I would have thrown this project in the trash. I suffered through and got the pocket straightened out and thought I was home free. Next headache was the zipper and after needing to re-do that 3 times, I was just about done altogether.

Laying flat on my sewing table, the top was cute and looked wearable, but physically wearing it, the zipper looked all sorts of messed up, I was cringing. Being given this fabric, I wanted to make something spectacular! Especially since the fabric is so beautiful, I wanted to do it justice. But this top crushed my poor little sewing soul. I was left with two options - try to salvage it and turn it into something wearable or cut out the crop top from Simplicity D0949 and start all over.

So my refashioning brain got to work and I cut out a new front to salvage the top. I completely omitted the pocket and zipper and just made a turtleneck pullover top (the key to making this work with the neck was to use a serger so the seams can stretch!)

So the top is technically saved. And it's ok, and I will totally wear it because the fabric is beautiful and having another top is great - but I will never make this pattern again. As a seamstress you never want to produce anything bad. It's in our blood to make pretty, wearable garments where people can't tell you made it. But more than that, when you work on a project for another company, you want everything to come out picture perfect. But if I lied and said this was the way I wanted the top to be, then I wouldn't feel happy with myself, and I wouldn't be able to tell you about the really great thing to come out of this.

For as many seams as I ripped out and re-sewed with this fabric, it looked as if I never sewed a stitch in the first place. And I ripped out a lot of seams. This fabric held up so well, I'm shocked. Sometimes with knits you can get a few holes or the fabric gets snagged when you fight your machine but I had no problems with the material. That's the sign of a good fabric.

Now I know you are probably reading this and asking yourself, why is this girl telling me about wholesale fabrics? Because that was one of the first concerns I had about Pine Crest - where am I supposed to buy it if I fall in love?! Well, well, well - you can buy it at fabric.com - this exact print! Fabric.com does not have the solid copper, but they do offer many other color options!

Shop this floral print here:

Shop all of Pine Crest on fabric.com here:

Now, for all my sustainable lovers out there - which come on, should be EVERYONE - I was doing a little digging and came across Pine Crest's commitment to the environment. While they do a lot of recycling within their own offices (and you can read all about their personal practices here) they also stock Repreve which is fabric made from recycled water bottles!  In their own words, "Repreve® is one of the most certified, earth-friendly fibers available in the world. High-quality, recycled Polyester yarns are made from 100% recycled materials, including post-consumer plastic bottles, pre-consumer industrial waste or a hybrid blend of both."

Now I wasn't able to find an online retailer selling Repreve by the yard (although this etsy shop has fabric made from water bottles), but my contact at Pine Crest let me know that they are working with fabric.com to get recycled fabrics at the retail level! How cool is that?! No word on timeline but we are becoming a little closer to getting more sustainable fabrics! If you have a local business who you think should check out Repreve - direct them here!

Thanks so much for reading! If you try either of the patterns mentioned above, let me know! And if you make something with Pine Crest, I would love to see!

{Please note: this post may contain affiliate links. While I was given fabric to review by Pine Crest Fabrics, all opinions are my own.}