Seeing double

After reading Melissa’s post on sewing magazines, I remembered having drooled over this skirt out of Knipmode. So I promptly did a search on eBay and a week or so later I had the March 2008 issue of Knipmode in my mailbox. Believe it or not, I have a pattern library in my head so when I see a pattern I’ve taken notice of in the past, I can usually find the original source quite fast. So when I experienced some déjà-vu when looking through the magazine, it didn’t take me too long to find out why (point to the picture to see the source, click to enlarge):

The patterns are similar but not identical. You can see that Burda’s has a seam under the bust and Knipmode’s doesn’t. I think the collar and the link between the breasts look better on Burda’s version, but all the reviews I’ve read about the Knipmode’s were raving so I might be wrong.

Edit from May 13: Melissa just pointed out that Butterick just released a very similar pattern too…

According to Patrones, the original blouse is from Adolfo Dominguez. The collar of Patrones is a single band with two tunnels, whereas Knipmode’s collar appear to be two one-tunnel bands sewn on top of each other, which give it some oomph. The sleeve cuffs are also different. I don’t know which is closer to the original garment but I like Knipmode’s better, even though Sigrid’s based on Patrones looks really good. Patrones’ is in plus sizes and Knipmode’s in regular ones.

Isn’t it interesting? Like I’ve noticed before, it’s not about who has the most original pattern features, it’s about whose pattern was drafted better. It makes me wish I had time to learn pattern drafting…