Hello! Happy 2017, I know we're are nearly at the end of January, but I'm still in week one somewhere - where has time gone? Anyway, I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, and you had a fun NYE enjoying ALL the cuddles at midnight. I'm here to report on my latest make, and I am VERY excited about it!
A couple of weeks ago the lovely Lucy at Sew Essential contacted me to ask if I would like to sew up one of their patterns with a fabric of my choice. Was there ever a more redundant question?! I merrily headed straight over to their lovely collection of dressmaking fabrics and patterns. Choosing the pairing took some time! I decided to let the fabric drive the pattern choice - I normally operate in this order. I was tempted by a couple of the beautiful woven fabrics, but I decided I wanted to try something a bit different. Then I stumbled across this...
A scuba jersey with this beautiful paint stroke design. I wanted it: an interesting fabric and ALL the colour. SOLD (or not as the case may be!). I've worked with scuba once before for a wedding guest dress for a lovely friend, and I was thrilled with the result.
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| By Hand London Anna Dress with a dipped hem half circle skirt in a reversible scuba from Fabric Godmother |
It has beautiful body, and I love the look of the raw cut hem. Here it is on said lovely friend (beautiful body and all)...
Decision two: the pattern. This was mainly driven by the dress above. The dipped half circle skirt worked so beautifully with a scuba, but I'd been there done that. So this is where the peplum obsession began. I wanted a new dress for work, so a wiggle dress was a strong contender and perfect for a peplum. Several patterns fitted the bill on the Sew Essential website. I wanted a simple darted bodice with sleeves and a straight skirt. I thought if I couldn't find the perfect pattern with a peplum I could draft one just as you would a circle skirt. However, I was in luck I stumbled across Butterick B6087 - it even had a dip shaped peplum!
The last scuba I worked with had a relatively small amount of stretch but a good weight. As I hadn't handled this fabric, I was a little apprehensive to dive straight in. Lucy offered to send me a sample, but I was too impatient to wait, and I threw caution to the wind!
It arrived very quickly, and I was over the moon. It was beautiful! Lovely and soft against the skin with good structure for that peplum. However, it did have more stretch than I had imagined. This wasn't a particular problem for the dress itself, but it made working out what size to sew a little more difficult. I was planning to cut a pattern size smaller to compensate for the stretch, but I needed confirmation. Why worry when you have such wonderful women at you fingertips for advice? I turned to Instagram.
I measured the pattern pieces to get an idea of the built in ease and settled on a size 8. I should have been patient and waited for Sew.Very.Bridget's advice as the dress ended up being enormous! She suggested wrapping the fabric around my bust considering the stretch and fit I desired then comparing that to the pattern pieces. Perfect advice that I will follow from now on when sewing up a stretch fabric with a woven pattern -Thank you, Bridget!
The pattern suggests a lining for the bodice. As I was working with scuba, I decided to draft a facing to reduce bulk in the bodice.
I sewed up the shoulder seams, the facing, and the side seams before pinning it along the back seam at S/A and squeezed it over my head. It was huge! I could pinch a good 1.5'' S/A either side at the back! I should have waited for Bridget and taken into account the amount of stretch in the fabric as well as the ease in the pattern before cutting. I unpicked the side seams and re-sewed them to redistribute the excess on either side and at the CB.
I figured I would have similar problems with the skirt, so I went straight in and matched the S/A to the bodice side seams. This worked perfectly.
Next for the sleeves. I measured the sleeve ease by walking it around the bodice armhole using a pin. I knew I wanted a sleeve that sat perfectly flush with my skin, so the ease had to go. Just as in the bodice and skirt, the built in ease for a woven pattern to allow movement just isn't required with a stretch fabric. I went ahead and removed that ease using the techniques I learnt at a pattern drafting class at Bath College last year. It has been so useful I thought I'd share a summary below. You can use either or both techniques depending on your requirements to add or remove ease in the sleeve head.
I then moved on to that dreamy shaped peplum. I cut it out very carefully as I knew I wanted to keep the raw edge un-hemmed. I increased the S/A as I had for the bodice and skirt. Other than that it came together quickly and it hung beautifully!
Instead of inserting a zip I sewed the dress together along the CB seam. The joy of stretch! I finished all the seams inside in yellow on my overlocker. I left the peplum and sleeve hems raw, and I hand stitched the CB hems of the peplum and the skirt hem. I would have left the skirt hem raw too, but I was typically indecisive about hem length. Un-hemmed, the skirt hit me around mid-calf. I loved this look but only with heels, and realistically this is not how I will wear this dress for the majority of the time! Boots or small heels will dominate, and when you are only 5ft, I had to hand stitch the hem in place so it hit just above the knee. I do like that I have the option to bring it down if I change my mind (or suddenly grow!).
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| I realised after I'd done it that I'd normally leave the facing free and stitch to the seam allowance from the inside by hand - don't do it the way I've done it in the photo! |
My confidence sewing with stretch fabric is growing. But those pesky machine hems still seem to cause me the most gyp... cue daydreaming about owning a Coverstitch machine! I stumbled across this beauty on the Sew Essential's website when I was browsing fabric. I can feel my other half rolling his eyes as I type this. One day... I'll have to find a bigger flat first!
Thank you again to the lovely Lucy at Sew Essential for the beautiful fabric and pattern - I love my new dress!
Lots of love to you all x
