Cargo Shorts

car·go noun \ˈkär-(ˌ)gō\
Definition: the goods or merchandise conveyed in a ship, airplane, or vehicle : freight
Origin: Spanish, load, charge, from cargar to load, from Late Latin carricare
First Known Use: 1657
Synonyms: burden, load, draft, freight, haul, lading, loading, payload, weight

My heavy-duty, garden-worthy, cargo shorts are finished.

I probably won’t be hauling freight in them, but they should be able to take a beating in the garden. The fabric is a piece of olive stretch twill I picked up somewhere. It has fade marks along the folds and a few flaws, but for this project, looks definitely don’t matter.

On the other hand, durability is important, so the seams are flat-felled, the pockets are topstitched and edge-stitched, and I used heavy-duty snaps instead of buttons.

I cut the shorts length as in View A but added the side leg pockets and omitted the cuff. I also left off the belt loops. The back is plain with no pockets as in View C above, although you could easily put a patch pocket or another cargo pocket there.

The fabric was kind of a pain because it was so spongy and thick. I had to use binder clips to squash the mitered pocket corners flat. Eventually they got flat but not very square. 

I decided that two layers of twill would make the flaps and facings too thick, so I used some cotton scraps for facings.

I tried three different-sized hole punches and an awl to create a hole for the snaps before I remembered I had the Crop-A-Dile. It punched the perfect hole through all the layers so I could slip the snap in and hammer it together.

Lots of tools required (My tools. That hammer is not allowed to leave my room.)

I’m pleased with the shorts but don’t plan to make another pair in the foreseeable future. Not sure whether it was the amount of time spent staring at olive drab or the tiresome fiddling with layers of stubborn fabric, but I’ve lost my interest in utility clothing for a while!

Time to venture outside and see if any of the plants are still alive.

Katrina