It’s time to chat about the other half of my first activewear outfit – the Tie Back Tank from Greenstyle Creations. Did you catch my review of the Avery Leggings yesterday? If not, go quick and read that – then come back!
The Pattern
The Tie Back Tank from Greenstyle Creations is a fun workout top that comes with a variety of different options. It includes a high and low neck, a racerback or full neck and a banded neck and arm holes or bound neck and arm holes. It also has three “hem” options – to leave it open, to tie it in the back or sew it up so that it’s “no fuss!” That was what immediately drew me to the pattern – if it worked, it would be a workout wardrobe staple to me.
The instructions were really easy to follow and the tank came together really quickly. Even though it looks “complicated” it was easy and didn’t have a lot of steps. The “hardest” part was the neck band – I think I could have lengthened the pattern piece provided for the neckband to make it a little bit easier to attach. Maybe my fabric had a little less stretch than it should have?
The Tank
While I really love the look of this tank on all the photos I’ve seen, I think it’s not for me. I had some weird fitting issues. It’s pulling in the back and in the front it’s not really “low” even though I did the low neckline. It’s really roomy in the hips, bodice and bust so I thought I picked the right size but maybe I needed to size up. If I sized up, I would be concerned it would be too tent like – sigh, I just think it doesn’t fit me very well. I made a size small, which is perfectly in line with my measurements.
I usually don’t have a ton of fitting adjustments that need to be made on patterns which has made me into a little bit of a #lazysewist. I am not usually the one to try to make tons of adjustments – if the pattern doesn’t work, I usually just try a different one. That makes me a total #lazysewist but it is what it is. That all being said, I’m not particularly motivated to try to make adjustments on this pattern because it’s such a simple pattern!
I do really like the “tie back” slash open back feature. I wear this same style of sports bra to workout every day so it nicely shows the strapiness of the bra.
I am going to use this moment to RAVE about the Thermoweb hem tape (again) – it has CHANGED my opinion on hemming knits. Why did I not discover this stuff earlier?
The Fabric
I ordered some athletic wear fabric as “prep” for this series from Peak Fabrics in Alberta, Canada. They carry some awesome designer overruns – and they even carry Lululemon so I couldn’t pass them up. I used their Bamboo Poly Lycra knit fabric for this tank and it was perfect. I wore it to Pure Barre too – so it’s workout approved!
I also got lots of questions about my fabric for my leggings from yesterday. Here’s a link to the fabric on Fabric.com that’s identical to what I used for my Avery Leggings. The Fabric.com site says it only has 25% stretch but it has more like 70-80% stretch.
I think some of the hardest part of sewing activewear is the fabric. I hope to have a whole post dedicated to fabric choices for activewear over the course of this series – so stay tuned!
This is the third post in my series on sewing activewear. For the intro post click here and for the review of my Avery Leggings click here.
Note: This post contains affiliate links which means that if you purchase from one of my links I may get a small commission. Thanks for supporting my blog! See here for more details on affiliate links.
Leave a Reply