And accidentally matched the late summer flowers in the Adelaide botanic gardens that I photographed the other day on my lunchtime walk.
I’m not mad at all about that! Such gorgeous colours.
It’s still sunny and warm in Adelaide rather than being rainy autumn weather. So I’ve even already worn the dress!
The fabric is a polyester crepe from seamstress fabrics, an Australian online sewing shop. I’ve not purchased from them previously but they had a sale on something, probably pins or needles, so I bought fabric as well. Like you do.
I really like the colours, the print and the texture of the fabric.
This is Vogue 9237
Many of the reviews noted that the sleeves were tight so I did a large bicep adjustment and added 3.5 cm.
I made a size XL and added about 5 cm to the finished length. It’s a touch too big (that could be the mechanical stretch of the crepe) and possibly a bit too long too.
It looked better without sleeves, but I needed to see if my large bicep adjustment worked, so it has sleeves!
And now I’ve seen the photos I see that the hem is a bit uneven too. Perfectly imperfect.
The back ruffle is a cute touch. And if you want to see it in a twirl from a 50 plus woman, you are in luck!
And, what’s more, this dress has pockets!
I’m marking this one up as a success. Very easy to sew too.
Perfect a long sleeve version could work for actual autumn and winter?
As soon as I said I almost always start with fabric rather than a pattern, I remembered all the times this isn’t true. Like the second dress in my last blog post.
And this dress.
Felicity saw McCalls 8252 sewn up and on display at my local Spotlight. And said how good it would look in the blush pink gingham linen I had in the stash. Matching patterns to fabric like a pro. Of course I bought the pattern for her!
I made View C, initially, although we both thought we’d end up with View A’s skirt length. And we did!
It actually looked great in this length on Felicity too. But the shorter skirt was definitely more fun. So out came the dressmaking scissors and off went the length.
The other change I made was to add 2 cm to the base of the bodice from the side seams back to zero about three quarters the way from the side seam to where the bodice was gathered onto the ring at the front and to all of the bottom of the bodice back.
This is because I made a toile in calico of the straight size 16, and as I suspected, because I usually do an FBA for Felicity, the top was a little short and showed a bit of the bottom of her bra.
The shoulder fit seemed okay. The back was a bit too wide and blousy so I removed about 2 cm from the center back at the base angling back to zero at the slit.
I started with a size 16, because that was the smallest size in my local store and I thought I could make it work. Given the shoulder fit, looks like it did! Looking at where the skirt is sitting, perhaps not – the pattern pieces could have been narrowed here because it is sitting a bit low. But Felicity was happy with the toile, so I left it as it was.
I reinforced the top of the skirt with iron-on interfacing strips before binding with premade bias binding. Quite a bit of the skirt ‘waist’ is on the bias, and there’s only one bit attaching it to the top. It seemed like a bit more structure might be useful!
You can also see some basting on the right in the image above. This was a guide for the part that was gathered onto the ring.
The ring feature is fun. I was super surprised that the pattern does not refer to the diameter of the ring anywhere or at least I could not find any reference. And diameter is sort of important!
Luckily I am not the first person to make this dress – Erica Bunker says in her review of this pattern that she used a 3 inch ring. I had one almost that size in the stash. For what reason or where it was from I have no idea, but I do love it when my stash comes good like that!
Construction was a bit clunky for this bit – I folded the fabric over the ring, aligning the basting line with the inner side of the ring, pinned and then stitched close to the other edge of the ring. Mostly but not completely without puckering – there’s a lot of fabric gathered into a small awkward space.
And here she is, taking that dress out on for an evening of late summer fun!
I’ll leave you with my sewing room floor at the cutting out stage – love that I was wearing my yellow bold gingham linen dress whilst cutting out the corresponding blush pink bold gingham linen fabric! Both lovely linens from The Fabric Store
The Sewing Revival’s Fernbird Dress might be my favourite pattern this summer.
My first version had all the fun of mixing two patterned fabrics.
These two viscoses just wanted to be together. They are both from my local bricks and mortar fabric store, Spotlight.
I bought three metres of each fabric. Because I wasn’t sure what they’d end up as. Eye-roll required. As it turns out, most of the red and almost all of the other fabric have now been sewn into three garments.
The Fernbird dress flanked by Newlook 6471 and In The Fold ruffle sleeve top
Totally love how this turned out. Get so many compliments every time I wear it. And I feel great in it every time I wear it.
So of course I made another Fernbird. Also using Spotlight viscose.
The back story to this one is that I specifically had this pattern in mind when I bought two fabrics to make it up in (not like my last post!) Two fabrics.. Because. Worked so well last time.
Yep. Totally good idea. But, see the dress?
The second fabric never made it.
And I’m not mad about it.
This is a fabulous dress pattern. 10 out of 10 would recommend!
Mashing up patterns? What could possibly go wrong?
Luckily for me, this turned out much better than expected!
The patterns:
Burdastyle 05/2004 #129 (below left) and 07/2004 #135 (below right). The links go to and the images are reproduced from the Russian Burdastyle site because they’re from so long ago that’s the only one that still lists them
I’ve always liked #129, the green one, but never got around to sewing it. Until now. Nineteen years later.
I’m not in this size range anymore. But that didn’t stop me. I’ve already made #135, the red one, in my size (46 bust 48 hips) so I mashed them up.
My starting pattern had a bust dart so I rotated that to the yoke seam and then converted it into gathering. That was the easy it of the mash up!
I marked up the panels on my front dress pattern piece and then drafted new pieces with extra width at the top for the gathering, using the 05/2004 #129 pieces as a guide.
You can see from the pattern pieces that the gathering isn’t additive – the top of the piece is gathered in but the bottom of the piece is back to what would be the regular width of the base pattern. I replicated this on my pattern pieces. The gathering is modest – about 1.2 times the width of the straight piece it’s sewn onto.
I lined the yoke with white batiste. When my fabric is doubled up, the black shows through the other colours a bit and dulls them down. The white makes them pop.
The gathered and then restrained-back-in panels give the dress a cocoon shape feel – which is a silhouette I love.
Grey hair don’t care
I added pockets – because pockets are always a good idea – and used white batiste for the pocket pieces facing the outer fabric. For the same reason.
Smug sewist because she added pockets
I used the pockets drafted for the Cloud dress. They’re fabulously large.
The lovely fabric I used is a Japanese woven cotton from The Fabric Store. Wonderful to sew and gorgeous to wear.
I didn’t intend to make another party dress but a bit more free time than I was expecting on the weekend prior to a gala dinner in November, some old Burda magazine pattern perusing (I was looking for a blazer pattern for sensible sewing. Yes really!) and delightful fabric in my stash made me do it.
Look at this image. What more could you want? A party dress with great sleeves, a sparkler, multiple necklaces, a slouchy knitted hat and a man how clearly adores you! With glasses! What’s not to love?
Finishing the hem at midnight on the day before the event – which was, of course, in the middle of the working week because it was a corporate event – did make me question my judgement.
I didn’t add the contrast hem band. Very happy with how it turned out though.
The fabric is a wool and metallic boucle that came from @pinpoint_textiles through the Adelaide sewists fabric swap this year. Thanks Belinda. Its beautiful!
I underlined it with green bemsilk rayon lining from Spotlight. Green because I liked how it looked with the silver and underlining because its boucle and I was worried about it not holding up to stress.
You can see in the image below how I also stitched the underlining to the boucle through all the tuck and pleat markings in the sleeves. I did the same for the darts. Hopefully reducing any possibility of fraying and pulling apart at the seams to zero!
The sleeves are supposed to be gathered slightly onto a self fabric band that is turned to the inside and lightly elasticized. Using boucle for this sounded like a nightmare, so I used a premade satin bias strip from the stash instead.
I sewed it onto the sleeve before I sewed the sleeve seam, leaving a small section unfinished, sewed the sleeve seam, inserted the elastic and then finished the opening by hand.
I faced the neck with an interfaced black poly cotton remnant. Sometimes I remember to sew the interfacing on first and then turn it over and fuse it. I did this time. It makes such a neat finish that I wonder why I don’t always do this?
The neck trim is a strip of black powermesh from EOS stitched into the neck facing seam and then slip stitched down onto the dress once the facing was turned in. The pattern calls for piping, but I didn’t have any in the stash or inclination to make some.
I like the trim a lot more than I thought I would. Particularly happy with how it echos the shadow created by the vertical pleat in the sleeves.
I made this up as a size 48 bust, 50 hips, back to 48 at the hem. This is a size larger than I have been making recently, but its an older Burda pattern that seems to be drafted a bit smaller than the more recent ones, its delicate fabric and I wanted it to hold up to the strain at the side seams when seated.
I felt great wearing it on the night. And I have my very own adoring man with glasses.
We were under yellow lights – my hair does not look this colour, anymore
And, this story gets even better.
Within about 2 weeks of the gala event, my office had its end of year breakup party. It was a coolish day. Could I wear the dress again? The dress code was not silver dress, but.. I feel like I glammed it down enough with sneakers…
This gorgeous linen from The Fabric Store was a delight to sew, even all that gathering went well (apart from the bit where I sewed one of the layers to the bodice wrong side to right side. Duh)
I paid a lot of attention cutting out to getting the squares lined up and even – a double layer of yellow at the bodice/tier one seam and a smooth transition at the next tier down, plus matching across the vertical seams. It was worth the effort. Uneven seams on gingham irritate me. And there’s been a lot of gathered gingham dresses for sale to be irritated by!
All this pattern matching meant that my fabric length was not quite enough for a full length second tier. Not by much though – 8 cm – and the length looks fine on. Perhaps a longer first tier and shorter second tier would’ve been more aesthetically pleasing for uneven length tiers but that’s being very critical!
You’ll notice that the hem dips up at the front – because the bodice does too. It’s not because my hands are in the pockets!
I’m not convinced the hem should dip up – none of the modelled versions do this. It might be because I sewed a size down from the one that my measurements suggested and that resulted in my bust hoicking it up? I chose this size (4) because the finished garment measurements gave me 5 cm of ease though the bust, which was just at the limit of the ease suggested, and my actual size (5) gave me twice as much as the maximum ease recommended. I like the closer fit through the bodice so I’ll add more length to the centre front on the next version.
The back bodice is buttoned. Which is very cute.
I used vintage mustard buttons from the stash They are larger than recommended so I used 5 buttons rather than 6. I didn’t adjust the facing width to work for my larger buttonholes. Which was a mistake. Macgyvered with iron-on interfacing.
I repurposed a damaged linen pillowcase for the facings. Because it meant that I didn’t have to think about more pattern matching than I needed too.. I know. It’s cream and the gingham is white and yellow. But it works. I didn’t swap my overlocker thread from cream to white either. Slapdash seamstress.
My tip for gathering? Mark the centre front and backs and half way between centres and sides of the non gathered piece with a fabric marker. Do the same on the gathered pics but add safety pins to the markings. Because your marking may disappear when you gather all that fabric up.
I couldn’t resist adding a label to the outside. I had a teeny tiny handmade tag from KATM in mustard. It’s on the lower tier skirt side seam. And probably only I will ever notice it. But. So cute!
I love this dress. Can you tell?
I wore it yesterday on a family trip to the zoo and it was perfect. Swishy. Cool. And SunSmart – crew neck and almost elbow length sleeves.
Why the zoo? Nostalgia. The kids and I used to always go in the holidays when they were younger. Seems like they still enjoy it as adults!
And how could you not when you get to see meerkats after a big night out?
This one was sewn in a delightful rayon nylon blend from The Fabric Store. This is what The Fabric Store say about it (and it still seems to be available – this is not a sponsored post – I just love the fabric!)
A deadstock rayon blend in a lemon yellow horizontal stripe. This lightweight fabric has been woven with a clear nylon warp and a striped weft in varying stripes made up of lemon yellow, candy pink, fine black and white. This unique structure creates a subtly textured fabric with great bounce. A semi-sheer fabric with a subtle sheen and no stretch.
I cut out a straight size 40 but with the main skirt piece (its a rectangle) cut the full width of the fabric (150 cm) rather than as drafted (126 cm). I lined the dress with cotton batiste. I didn’t line the sleeves.
I cut the rectangle bit of the skirt lining the width of the batiste (about 130 cm) and then had the annoying task of having to gather the outer fabric onto the lining and then gather both of them to fit onto the bodice. Oh well, the bit of extra fullness in the skirt was probably worth it!
I lined to the edge of the neckline and slit and then treated the lining as an underlining for the rest of the seams – I sewed the front and back bodices together at the shoulders for each of the lining and the outer fabrics and then, with right sides facing, stitched the lining and outer fabric bodices together at the neck and slit before clipping, turning and under stitching. No interfacing – the other fabric is light but tightly woven and hasn’t stretched out or distorted. Yet!
The neck is a bit tight and high. I’m glad I left the slit open rather than adding a button – that button would never have been used! The bust darts are a bit too high too.
Melissa for Fehr Trade posted about this dress recently and also found the bust darts and the neck too high. So I’m calling out the drafting as being a bit off.
The fit is loose, as you’d expect from the line drawing. So I added thin ties, attached where the side seams of the bodice meet the skirt, to create a little more shaping at the waist
The sleeve ‘cuffs’ are cute
I’m very happy with my unintended but quite excellent strip matching across the bodice to the sleeves!
And its a thumbs up from Felicity!
And this is the dress that was worn on the day!
Here she is on her way to the ceremony. With bare legs and the most delightful pale pink shoes that coordinated so well with the dress… and if you are a shoe lover – you’ll want to take a closer look at these. Fortunately they’re featured in another wedding post
I’m so pleased the weather cooperated and she wore this dress to the wedding. It was my favourite out of the two.
After shopping the stash, no appropriate fabrics were found. I know. Amazing…
Off we went to The Fabric Store, and found many lovely fabrics. And came home with one that would work with 07/2021 #119, the white dress on the left, and another that would be fine for 11/2021 #116, the mint knit dress on the right. And some other fabrics for other projects which I might get to in the next ten years. Fabric shopping is dangerous!
The plan was to make both dresses and then pick which to wear on the day depending on the weather…
The end of April is usually cool and can be rainy in Adelaide. So I hedged my bets and made the long-sleeved knit one first.
This is Burda Style 11/2021 #116 in one of The Fabric Store’s many lovely 100% merino knits.
It’s a size 40 with a 1 cm dartless FBA – made using the pivot and slide method. Lots of great resources online on how to do this- I used this one on oliver+s’ blog. I also made the sleeves full length.
I like the simple neckline on this style
I used a light weight fusible knit interfacing to give a touch more stability to the collar. First time I’ve interfaced a knit. Always something new to learn!
I also added strips of interfacing to the shoulder seams and to the insert square bit that you can’t see where the collar joins the bodice.
I’m pleased with how it turned out. Let me show you a closer view. Two reasons – the awesome label from Kylie and the Machine and my lining.
Yes I lined this dress with power mesh! I only had this off white colour – a darker colour would’ve been better because there is some shadowing of the knit facing and seam allowances. But this is much less obvious IRL, and in the photo taken below on a different day
Using power mesh was another first. I immediately purchased more (from emmaonesock – 80% nylon and 20% spandex- much superior quality to what I can purchase locally, and less expensive, even with exchange rates and shipping to Australia). Fabulous stuff! Gonna line all my knit dresses with it now!
Here’s a back view. This also shows that the skirt lining is shorter by 6 cm and all the hems are done with a double needle
Felicity says the knit lining feels gorgeous – secret pajamas if she ditches the belt..
And the other dress? Yep, made that too. And another blog post is coming soon about its story
Well, I had intended to add olive cuffs to my last red Bella dress but the fit issues dampened my enthusiasm.
But you know how it is – I still had the olive fabric out and there was a sizeable remnant of the red fabric left. Plus a new to me pattern to try: Style Arc’s Mila dress, which seemed perfectly suited to colour blocking.
Why not give it a try?
This is a size 16 and I like the way it fits
That V shaped bit in the centre was less tricky to do than it looks
My two fabrics were both from the stash. I’ve told you about the red before – it is a woven rayon from a local designer roll end sale in 2014. Almost vintage! It has more structure than a rayon normally has, a dry hand, and no stretch.
The olive is a polyester hi-tech microfibre from emmaonesock with great texture, drape and mechanical stretch. It was bought with a garment for Felicity in mind back in 2019 but she was less than happy with its colour so it’s languished in the stash. Despite it’s loveliness.
The Mila dress is an interesting design. The skirt has no side seams and curves from that V just under the bust to well below the waist at the back
I really like it. What I now need to do is work out how to add long sleeves to it so I can make a winter version.
Tessuti’s Bella dress pattern is an old favourite. Search through my blog – you’ll see I’ve made several Bella’s for myself and Felicity.
But I am no longer the same size thanks to having so many birthdays that I’ve hit menopause. So it was time to test another size.
Version one was in a red rayon fabric from my stash but originally from a designer fabric sale. It’s an odd fabric. Gorgeous colour but has a very dry hand and is prone to creasing.
I traced off and made a size 16 with shortened sleeves.
It was too big through the shoulders – the only bit that really needs to fit.
So I added a 1.5 cm tuck to the centre front,going down 15 cm, to remove 3 cm of the excess fabric through neck through the bust.
This sort off worked.
Although the armscyes are too low – I really should not be able to lift up the hem this much when I raise my arm! Another pointer to the size being wrong
Whatever. I have a dress I can wear. And the colour is still gorgeous despite the fit!
So for my next version I went down a size to size 14.
This one is made in an embroidered wool blend purchased on holiday in Leicester.
Souvenir fabric!
I didn’t have a lot of fabric but was pleased that I had enough to be able to line up the embroidered motifs reasonably well.
It’s lined with a polyester galaxy print which I bought as a roll end several years ago for a fabulous price because it was so last years.
Now so dated after sitting in my stash that’s it’s best used as a lining.
The facing is a grey linen. Because I thought the wool might be itchy. But it was a bit of an afterthought once I realised that lining right to the edge with the galaxy print might not be such a great idea. So I overlocked and stitched it on a top of the lining rather then doing things properly with a seam.
I used a wool 4 cm strip for the pocket openings for the same reason. And also just stitch an overlocked strip on top of the lining. What can I say? Consistently slapdash!
I used a wide stain bias from the stash for the hems -and the stitching just disappeared into the wool.
Love it when that happens
So. What do I think about the sizing? This is probably the right size. But the fit is not great. The shoulders are good but it’s a bit tight through the bust whilst being looser through the back.
And of course everywhere else is fine because the style is loose everywhere else
Bottom line -I like the dress. I’m not convinced Tessuti’s block works for me. It did work when I was a smaller size. Now, perhaps not so much.
So what other trapeze style dress pattern are out there that I should try? All suggestions most welcome 🙂
I’ve had this small floral woven cotton in my stash for a while. It’s always been earmarked for a shirt. Shirting weight, small floral. Makes sense doesn’t it? Light grey and white. Perfect as corporate wear.
But I had an idea in my head that I wanted to use the Closet Core Cielo dress pattern for. And I needed a wearable toile because the hips are a bit tight on the last Cielo dress I made.
Yes I used the shirt fabric. And played around with a coordinating fabric on the back yokes and as a sort of flat piping on the sleeve cuffs.
I have successfully tested the sizing (too big – took in the side seams).
But I haven’t made the best use of this fabric – too light both in weight and in colour.
It’s a fail.
So some further experimentation couldn’t really make it much worse (spoiler alert – it did).
I asked myself: Could Cielo be used as a very casual interpretation of a Chanel jacket inspired dress? Likes these from the Chanel Spring 2022 RTW collection?
Chanel Spring 2022 RTW image source: Vogue.com
The answer is maybe but probably not. The loose fit makes it a very loose interpretation of Chanel gloriousness. It might be more successful in a more appropriative fabric.
What did I do? I added a strip of contrast fabric at centre front-the length was determined by the amount of remnant I had . I topstitched it in place. I then added two bands to the top of the pockets. The topstitching of these was tricky to do with machine sewing but looks ok if you’re not close. I didn’t have enough for a neck band.
I wore this dress on very hot days only. When I’m not likely to be seen in public….
I should’ve made a shirt. But it was fun whilst it lasted.
Style Arc’s Hope Woven Dress pattern is hugely popular. Several Instagram sewists (I’m looking at you @rou2an1_made and @johassler) have made more than 10 versions. Yes. More than 10! There’s even a hashtag for multiple sewing of this pattern: #hopedressspringseternal.
And it is deservedly popular. This style seems to look great on everyone, every body shape and every age. Why has it taken me so long?
My first version was in a chambray with an embroidered border. So I cut the skirt and all the other pieces out with the grainline running selvedge to selvedge rather than parallel to the selvedges. Seemed to work just fine.
It has pockets!
My fabric is soft and I only have fairly robust interfacing in my stash so rather than interface the neck facing pieces, I used vilene bias tape on the neck edge instead.
I cut the tape using the pattern pieces as my guide, pinned the tape at the centre front and seams, eased the neck edge to the tape with more pins and then pressed The neck edge has slightly stretched out but this process brought it back in. Luckily! I followed up the ironed on securing with machine basting. And then faced as per normal.
I love vilene bias tape.
The sleeves are described as 7/8th length, but either I have the sizing wrong (this is a size 16) or longer than normal arms – they are more 3/4 length on me. I like them pushed up a bit closer to my elbow joint to give a bit of puffiness
Waist? What waist? Why are you looking for one? Don’t think I can find mine.
This is a really comfortable dress to wear, but if you’re looking for a waist enhancing dress this is not the style for you. But oh so comfortable to wear! Did I say that already?
Version 2
Of course there is a version 2. This is also midi length.
I can’t get my hands out of the excellent pockets in this design
Style Arc says there is a knee length version too, and shows one in the line drawing but doesn’t include a pattern piece or cutting line on the skirt pieces for it. So I just cut out another midi length.
I thought a lot about how to fit this all on my not quite long enough piece of fabric and still place the ‘stripes’ were i wanted them. This meant the skirt was 4 cm shorter than drafted, but not the 20 cm or so it would have been if I was actually thinking about it being knee length. And a shorter skirt would hve made the pattern tetris a lot simpler!
So, just a little bit more thinking before cutting would have been good! Then I could also have lined up the sleeves better too- it’s almost but not quite pattern matched. how does this even happen?!
I didn’t even think there was any chance of pattern matching. My focus was on getting a bit more length onto the sleeves (I managed to get 5 cm more). Not that you can see the extra length in any of the photos- in all of them the sleeves are pushed up and sitting in my elbow joint – because I love the puffiness!
This fabric is a gem from my stash. It’s a rayon viscose blend double weave. A bit like double gauze and with lovely body and a slight shimmer.
I used a gathering tip from @kaleidoscopekatie_ : overlap the gathering stitching. This stops the gap that’s not gathered where you start and stop your gathering stitching in the same line and close to each other.
safety pin at centre front and bright red and pink thread for gathering
Look! no gap!
Thanks for the tip Katie!
Do you think I stopped at two Hope dresses? Well… I couldn’t… I had to make a knee length version. I might also be trying to join the #hopedressspringseternal club.
So, another Hope blog post is coming soon … just as soon as I can get photos!
Have you made a Hope dress? Could you stop at two?
Why was fabric purchased as a souvenir? Is that really a question for a sewist? I’ll answer it anyway. It wasn’t because it was Scottish in style, fabrication or colours – the only thing Scottish about it was that it availabe in a fabric store in Scotland. It was for the normal reasons I buy fabric – I liked it.
And then it sat in my stash for a long time – because I had to find the right pattern for this lovely fabric…
..and that turned out to be Cris Wood Sews Envelope Dress.
I didn’t intend to make a kaftan. I was planning more of a knee length Envelope dress.
The way the Envelope Dress is cut out means that the length of the dress is the width of the fabric. My fabric was 140 cm wide. I know that a knee-length dress is not 140 cm from shoulder to hem but I still wanted to cut it out this way, even with the likely need to trim it to knee length. Why? Because putting the ‘stripes’/’panels’ running vertically could be more interesting that having them horizontal.
Well, that was right – I like how they look in the vertical orientation.
It was also very clear as soon as I tried it on that it needed to stay this length and be a kaftan, not a knee length dress. So I added side slits rather than hemming it shorter.
Occupational hazard of posing with a fancy drink for blog photos
The Envelope Dress is a very easy ‘pattern’ to construct and the instructions are great.
If you haven’t made one yet, I highly recommend it – it’s a unique and fun way of constructing a garment.
Using Jocelyn Proust Christmas themed Australian animal prints to make Christmas dresses has become a tradition.
This year, wombats and waratahs became a Sew Different Tulip dress for me.
The whole menagerie of Australian animals was made into another version of B6677 for Felicity.
Yes of course there was a matching mask!
If you follow me on Insta you know my dress was not as successful as Felicity’s
It seems perfectly drafted to emphasise full tummies
Sewing details
Felicity’s dress was made the same as previously except only the bodice was lined and this is style A of B6677 without the flouces. I followed The Insouciant Stitcher’s tip and used an IKEA Nattjasmin cotton/lyocell bed sheet for garment construction. Excellent lining material for quilting weight cottons!
Three dresses in and I’ve only just worked out that Felicity can pull this on without unbuttoning. Next time I’ll omit the back neck slit and button! The shiny red button above the smiley wombat does makes me smile though.
I like the smiley wombats on my dress too. Even though they are more hairy.
Mine was a size 18 which I then added a bit of extra width to after construction by taking the side seams out about 5 mm above and below the pockets (because the pockets were already sewn in). I probably could have just expanded through the waist above the pockets.
I used an olive suiting weight linen from Spotlight for the bottom band of my dress because it was in my stash, the colours worked and I didn’t have enough of my wombat fabric.
And the bias for the hem – same reasons
The ‘you can’t buy this’ tag turned out funnier than I expected – you can’t buy this and you probably don’t want to!
If there is a next time I will sew a larger size from the bust down, petite the bodice by removing 2 cm above the bust and round out the shoulder to sleeve transition.
Despite my lack of love for this dress I did end up wearing it for Christmas – for the meal prep part of the day. Then changed into the other “unsuccessful” dress for Christmas dinner. No longer unsuccessful because I saved that one from refashioning or donation with a tablecloth weight!
This fabric was a souvenir from Barcelona. I fell in love with the colours and I love border prints. As a bonus it’s an overprinted jacquard. Almost certainly made from synthetic fibres but interesting and unusual.
Hand sewing on the front verandah
The base is white (as you can see above) and the looseness of the jacquard means that there are a few spots where this shows. Like below. The jacquard weave also made it very prone to fray. The overlocker was essential!
Separating red threads in the middle of the leaf showing the white base layer
Style Arc’s Adeline was just the simple dress pattern I needed to showcase the fabric. I made a size 16 (printed at 98% by mistake).
My souvenir fabric was a precut of 1.5 m. At least it was 150 cm wide and with a border printed on both selvedges! But there was no way I was going to be able to cut out this pattern as drafted with the longer turned up sleeves.
No centre back seam either
After some pattern and fabric Tetris and accepting that cuffed sleeves and pockets were not part of my vision for this fabric, I successfully placed the pattern pieces on with the border at the hems and just a teensy bit on the shoulder.
There were enough scraps left for the hem and neck facings, and some self drafted sleeve hem facings.
I placed the border so that the maximum width of the border was on the front. This meant that the last few cms of plain red under the border shows on the lower back hem. Perhaps I could have placed it differently? Or straightened out the hem? Would that have been better? I’ll never know!
Such a comfortable dress to wear.
On it’s first “outing” I wore it to a day event with bare legs and blue sandals and then changed to black tights and heels for an evening event.
He who Cooks thought the opaque tights were a bit heavy and needed balancing out with a chunky black necklace. He was right!
I love this pattern so much that I immediately made another one. This time with the cuffs and pockets in a turquoise silk nylon blend that’s been a long time stash dweller. The last time I sewed with this fabric was March 2011!!
It looks much less like scrubs in real life…. although these photos are starting to make me doubt…
I don’t think I’ve finished with this pattern yet.
He Cooks... She Sews! 