Today I’ve got my review of the Fibre Mood Bernie Trousers to share with you. Or is it pants? My unscientific method is that if they are fancy-looking I’ll call them trousers – anything else are pants!

So these would definitely come under the “trousers” nomenclature.

OK, so the short version of this blog post goes something like this: Bernie, where have been all my life?

Now, I am the first to admit that sewing a pair of tailored trousers always makes me feel like sewing is a super power.

In fact, I still very distinctly remember the abject disaster which was my first ever attempt to sew fitted tailored trousers (this was back in the day before the plethora of lovely pants-fitting guides created by indie sewing companies). And now, 10 years or so later, I still feel a sense of sewing awe that I can sew up a pair of trousers with relative ease.

But, notwithstanding that in-built magic of pants sewing, the pleat fronted goodness of the Fibre Mood Bernie trousers feel like they are basically my perfect pants!

Sewing the Fibre Mood Bernie Trousers

The Fibre Mood Bernie is a cuffed, fly-front, pleated front pant with interesting welt pocket details on the front. Although it is a wide and roomy leg, it does taper at the ankle, creating a shape which is more interesting than your average wide-legged trouser.

My Fibre Mood Bernie is a size 18/46 – it still confuses me how Fibre Mood magazine list European sizes in their measurement chart, but then the pattern sheets switch to American sizing. I’m forever counting up from the smallest size to make sure I’m tracing in the correct place!

My Fibre Mood Bernie trousers are sewn in a mid to heavy weight linen that I purchased as a coupon from from Zyga Paris.

I also added two inches length to these Fibre Mood Bernie trousers as the pattern, as designed, is very cropped.

Am I the only one who firmly believes that ankle-length trousers look cute-as-hell when standing up but immediately look clunky and ridiculous when seated? At least on me!

I would note that the Fibre Mood Bernie trousers have no ease built in at the waist. The body measurements for my size was an 88cm waist and the finished garment measurement was 88cm at the waist. If, your waist is likely to fluctuate throughout the day and NO WAIST EASE sounds like a utopian fantasy to you, you may want to look at the finished garment sizes carefully and take this into account when choosing your sizes.

I don’t know if it is just due to inaccurate sewing (or inaccurate tracing), but my waistband piece actually ended up being significantly too short for my finished pants. I had to cut out a new one – four centimetres longer.

So if your waist needs ease, you need to make sure to add it to the pattern!

My other little note is that I did find this pattern difficult to trace off the pattern sheet. There were A LOT of lines.

The markings for the pleats are really important but there were just so many of them that I just wasn’t sure I was marking the right ones. Frankly I’m still not sure I got it right! I also messed up tracing the fly front and, due to the plethora of closely placed lines, I accidentally only drew up to one line, when there was actually a second line I needed to continue to. This resulted in me having to add a piece of fabric to reconstruct my fly front on one side.

So my recommendation would be that if at all possible, this is a pattern to just buy as a PDF, rather than try to trace from the magazine pattern sheets.

And if that’s not possible. Well good luck!

Welt pocket adventures

So, sewing confession time, these Fibre Mood Bernie trousers only have one functional pocket.

Welcome to my world of sewing misadventure.

You see, I’d never sewn a welt pocket quite like this one before. And I wasn’t feeling confident.

So I decided to make the smart sewing choice.

I decided I would construct the pockets one-at-a-time, rather than doing each step on both pockets simultaneously. That way, if I made a mistake, I would have one pocket to fix, which is 100% better than having two pockets to fix!

Sounds sensible, right?

Now, by following the instructions, I was able to correctly sew my first welt pocket.

Yeah! Cue: photos of my cute pocket for insta, together with a victory dance and a celebratory cup of tea.

But, then I got too confident.

I thought, yep, I know how that worked and then I proceeded to repeat the steps for the second pocket. Except I did it just based on memory and without looking at the instructions. Not even once.

And, for the second pocket, made purely on the power of my own memory, I ended up with a pocket which cannot open. And, what’s more, I didn’t really have a clue how to undo it.

So, rest assured that if you follow the instructions, the gorgeous welt pocket is absolutely achievable.

And in the meantime, I’m just consoling myself that I only have one telephone so only really need one functional pocket! Plus the sealed closed pocket still looks really cute!

Apart from these entirely self-created problems of not being able to trace properly and not following the instructions, I otherwise found the Fibre Mood Bernie a satisfying sew.

Sewing stories

In fact, I actually owe a debt of gratitude to these Fibre Mood Bernie trousers.

They feel a bit like they are more than just a garment for me.

In reality, I’ve been struggling with my sewing practice for the last 3-4 months. Real life has not been particularly kind in the last half year or so: death and health scares in the family, issues with our house, general over-work.

And it’s had a real impact on my sewing motivation.

Now I know that it is totally normal to experience periods of low sewjo, but, for me, well, it just isn’t that normal. Since I discovered sewing 10 years ago, I haven’t really had any moments of low sew jo. Sure, I’ve had moments were I haven’t had time to sew, but I’ve never had a lack of motivation or desire.

Sewing has kind of been a welcome comforting constant in my life – whatever is going on around me.

But for the past few months, truth is I had had very little motivation or enthusiasm for sewing. Getting to my machine has been a struggle.

And even when I do manage to sew, it hasn’t been feeling right.

It turns out that when I’m not in the right frame of mind to sew, it doesn’t work out well. I make mistakes. I feel underwhelmed by the results.

When all of this is also combined with the fact that I’m currently struggling to fit into a lot of my wardrobe at the moment and that we’re coming to the end of months of sun deprivation in the northern hemisphere, the truth is that I’m just struggling a bit lately and, in that context, sewing has definitely lost some of its lustre.

And when I can’t feel motivated to sew, I just don’t feel balanced. I don’t feel like myself when I don’t have my favourite creative outlet and self-soothing mechanism performing its necessary role.

So I have been in a bit of a sewing slump lately.

And then these Fibre Mood Bernie trousers came along.

And it’s the first sewing project in months that made me excited. That made me smile. That made me feel like myself. That made me want to finish in a “I can’t wait to see how this works out” way rather than a “let’s just get this shit finished” kind of way.

So, I love, love, love, these Fibre Mood Bernie trousers.

The Fibre Mood Bernie trousers are a great pair of trousers in their own right.

But it’s more than that.

I feel as though they have reignited a spark. The motivation feels like it’s back – and together with some traces of sunlight and the hope that maybe I will again be able to wear linen outdoors, it feels for the first time in months and months like maybe I’m about to turn a corner.

And for now all I’m thinking about is, what fabric should I use for my next pair of Fibre Mood Bernie trousers?