Up, up and away (with the birds)

I really didn't intend for there to be such a delay in posting about these dresses but unfortunately malfunctioning technology intervened!  Anyway... problem one resolved, problem two trundles on, but at least I can now download my photos.  Now, on with today's dresses.

I've seen a few made with this hot air balloons fabric popping up in the blogosphere, and this is the colourway I liked best, so when I saw it at Ally Pally last year I had to get some.  I was running out of cash by the time I spotted it, so bought 1.5 metres with the plan of pairing it up with some plain fabric.  I don't remember now whether I already had the yellow cotton in my stash or whether I bought it after the balloons fabric, it came from the Fancy Silk Store in Birmingham and I'm not entirely convinced that it is 100% cotton.  Doesn't matter though because I love the colour.  Since the balloon fabric has rather a large pattern repeat I decided to do a gathered skirt and not worry about pattern matching.  Same skirt as for my Dotty Anna actually, two widths (58") of fabric with one cut up the middle for the zip at the back.  Although I think this one is a little bit shorter.  Why I felt the need to make such a summery dress in December I don't know, I haven't actually worn it yet, but once the weather warms up a bit it's going to get quite a bit of wear I think.  The pattern is of course Elisalex.

Up, up and away Elisalex

Dress number two is another variation on Elisalex, made with some fabric I bought in Ikea a few years ago with no plan in mind, I just liked the look of it.  I probably thought I'd make a cushion cover because I only bought one metre.  Because of this I cut the skirt narrower, it goes from 14 at the waist, to 6 at the sides and back out to 14 at the base (pretty much in a straight line actually).  I worked out the cutting line with the highly technical method of putting on my Flamingolex dress, grabbing some pins, pinning the sides to take out some of the width and deciding 'yep, that'll work'.  I can't remember exactly what I did next because I made this a while ago and didn't take any notes, but I now have a paper skirt pattern in this new outline which I can use again.

Birdielex

This dress originally had short sleeves which I had to fiddle around with because by mistake I cut out two the same rather than a left and a right, but eventually I got a left sleeve and a right sleeve, attached them and tried the dress on.  Disaster.  Well that's an exaggeration really, but I can't think of a more appropriate word at the moment!  And it looks wrong whether I spell it with one 'g' or two.  The sleeves pulled the shoulders down and the armholes were a bit snug - it's furnishing fabric so that may have something to do with it, but I was so disappointed after all the time it had taken me to cut the sleeves and put them in.  So I unpicked the sleeve seam, took them out and oversewed the bodice and lining together at the armhole and it's now a sleeveless dress.  The black bodice fabric is a plain cotton from Fabricland.

Birdielex

Dotty Anna & Lily Anna

Here are two more Anna dresses from By Hand London – this is such a pretty and versatile pattern that I will be making more of them this year.  I made both of these in December but haven’t had time to blog about them until now because, well, life.

The first one is made from some polka dot fabric which I bought at the Knitting & Stitching Show at Ally Pally in October.  I like polka dots, in the same way that I like gingham, and bird prints, and I like this particular one very much because (a) it’s cotton not polycotton and (b) it’s white dots on a colour rather than the other way round.  I decided to make this with a gathered skirt, which is just two widths of the fabric (58” wide) with one cut in half to accommodate the back seam, so I got the whole dress out of 2m of fabric.

As with my first Anna I cut a size 12 and took the back neckline in by ⅝” and tapered it out.  I also did size 14 bust pleats because the pleats on my Anthro Anna come up a little high.  With a machined hem this dress came together very quickly.

Dotty Anna

This next one is a v-necked maxi version made with stretch cotton which I bought in Fabricland recently.  As soon as I saw it on the roll I knew I wanted to make an Anna maxi from it (and that doesn’t happen often – it’s more usual that I buy fabric without a particular pattern in mind).  I bought 3.5m and as it’s 56” wide and I cut the skirt pieces 6” shorter this was enough fabric, even though it has a one-way print.

This too I made with size 14 bust pleats, however I didn’t think to cut a size 14 skirt front, so there is a bit of mismatch going on at the waist.  I don’t think it’s that noticeable though and it’s not something I’m going to fret about.  Next time though, if I am using the skirt pattern pieces, I will either cut a 14 skirt front, or use the size 12 bust pleats and make them shorter so that things match up.  With a gathered skirt of course this doesn’t matter!  I also tapered all the skirt seams from ⅝” out to ½” to give a little more room around the waist and this has worked well.

As I was sewing the skirt pieces together I noticed one of them had a mark on it – not sure what from, but having seen it I decided to cut out a replacement piece which fortunately I had enough fabric left to do.  If there hadn’t have been enough I’d have left it and tried to ignore it, it wasn’t that noticeable really and I’m not sure that anyone else would have seen it, but once I knew it was there…  However, I didn’t have quite enough fabric and so the replacement piece was a bit shorter than the rest.  This meant I ended up cutting 1½” off the length, and with a machined hem of ⅝” + ⅞” it is now an ideal length for wearing with flip flops rather than killer heels.  Which is just fine actually as I tend to live in Birkenstocks in the summer.  The only thing I haven’t done, and probably will, is to top stitch the neckline to keep the facing from riding up at the front.



Lily Anna maxi

I’m really pleased with both these dresses and I’m sure other versions will be appearing in the next few months.  At least one more maxi (this is the only maxi dress pattern I have), and maybe a mash-up with the Elisalex skirt, possibly one with the Cambie A-line skirt if I can make the darts line up (or use a fabric where it won’t show if not), and, well, we’ll just have to see where the fancy takes me for further outings of this pattern.

2013 - Round up of my knitting and sewing year

Ideally I suppose I would have written this before the end of the year, but I was busy doing stuff, so it appears now.

2013 started with me deciding not to buy any more yarn since my stash reached SABLE[1] proportions some time ago.  Deciding and doing are not the same thing though and there were a few purchases between January and May (who am I kidding, there were quite a lot of purchases actually) – the result of going to Unravel (link is to this year’s event) a few destash purchases and special offers.  However, from June until mid-December I cold-sheeped successfully (this is probably entirely due to my return to sewing and buying fabric instead of yarn…).

I also decided that I would concentrate on knitting cardigans for me and managed to knit four before the knitting took a back seat to the sewing – two Emelies, one Honeybee and one which I designed myself because I couldn’t find a pattern which matched the idea in my head.  I also knitted a shawl and some fingerless mitts/armwarmers for me and a hat and cowl for my man.  So not much at all really and that is because in July I Was Bitten By The Sewing Bug.

So, since July I have made 18 dresses.  Three of these are test versions, two intentionally so (the two purple gingham ones which I’ve blogged about) but the third one didn’t start out that way.  I bought some blue stretchy cotton from Fabricland and used Butterick 5813 to make a Joan Holloway inspired dress (pretty much like the picture of the model on the pattern website actually, although I bought this pattern in a shop and the photo doesn’t appear on the pattern envelope, so I thought my idea was brilliantly original).  Unfortunately though, as I started sewing the pieces together, I noticed a few slightly greeny-looking patches on the fabric.  I can only think this happened when I pre-washed it – I think the colour must have run from one of the other fabrics I put in the machine to pre-wash at the same time.  It is also a bit too tight – the only time I cut a size 12 dress that would have been better cut as a 14.  So… I have bought some more of this fabric (2.5m for £10, so I didn’t feel bad about having a fail with this version) and will make a better fitting version later on this year.

Of the 15 dresses I’ve finished I realise I have yet to blog about five of them, so will aim to do that by the end of January.  I also have one more which just needs a zip inserted, the bodice lining sewing into place and a hem.  And two more which are cut out ready to sew.

I’ve really enjoyed making them all, and the fact that it is substantially cheaper to make a cotton dress than to buy one (at least the ones I seem to like) is a very welcome bonus.  Knitting with wool on the other hand has become increasingly expensive over the past five years…

I’ve loved discovering other people’s sewing blogs (really must get a list up on here) and being inspired by both patterns and fabrics that I’ve come across while noodling around.  I’ve also found it really helpful to see dresses modelled on real people rather than stick thin willowy models.  Maybe in 2014 there just might be some pictures of me in my dresses appearing here.  I have a real mental block about this for two reasons – one, I am the most unphotogenic person I know, so to get one decent photo will probably take at least 50 attempts and life is just too short, and two, I have this silly feeling that it’s self-indulgent to put pictures of me up on the interwebz – in a ‘look at meeee’ kind of way.  Silly really, because I don’t feel that way about other people doing just that – as I said, I’ve found it really helpful.  Hmm… a dilemma.

If I had to pick a favourite dress of the year it would be Flamingolex – it’s a great fit, was an easy make (apart from the princess seams being a bit of a faff, but not enough to stop me from making more of them) and it makes me smile every time I look at it – which at the moment is every time I open the airing cupboard.  It doesn’t get wardrobe space at this time of the year and I can’t bring myself to shut it in a suitcase and put it in the loft out of sight for months.

Now I’m off to consider my sewing and knitting plans for 2014, write lists, consider pattern and fabric or yarn options, and finish my latest Elisalex. 

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[1] Stash Acquired Beyond Life Expectancy

Measuring up

Well, having blogged last month that I would probably make up this pattern in this fabric, I decided not to wait for spring and cut it out earlier this month. It’s a very quick make and I can see me getting a lot of wear out of this when the weather warms up. I love this fabric, which I bought on the Goldhawk Road back in the summer, it makes me smile whenever I look at it and I have some more in one of the other colourways – I haven’t decided what to use that for yet though.

I cut this as a straight size 12 and followed the pattern exactly except, as before, I just cut two widths of fabric for the skirt. Even with this narrower width fabric (45”) it’s plenty full enough and I got the whole thing from less than 2.5 metres which is a lot less than the envelope suggests is needed. I added fusible interfacing to the fold-back facings because I thought that the print might show through, which would bug me, it’s done the trick!

Looking at the photo of this I think I should probably adjust Myrtle (my dressform) in some way, because although she has the same vital stats as me she definitely looks thinner!

Pink tape measures

Now I have an Anna maxi dress to hem.  Toodle pip.

Check these out

Well, so much for getting a couple more posts in before Christmas.  Time just ran away from me but there is now a lull in the festivities between now and New Year, so time to catch up with the blogging.

I really like gingham but the fabric that I have sewn with so far hasn’t been great, so I’ve realised that actually I really like cotton gingham, and there doesn’t seem to be nearly as much of that around as the polyester & cotton gingham that the next three dresses are made from.

The first one is Vogue 8727 made with ⅛” gingham from Fabricland.  I bought this pattern mainly because I thought it would be a good starting point for recreating the shape of the Limb teadress which I blogged about last month.  I think with the NL6824 narrow skirt option and some self-drafted (should that be self-draughted? Hmm… not sure) cap sleeves it’ll work rather nicely.  This is a pattern which would have completely passed me by if I’d only considered the initial photograph, however, the line drawings showed that it had potential and so I bought it.  For its first outing I cut it according to the pattern and did view D in a size 14.  Which as I now know, turned out to be too big and so I had to do some fiddling around with the side seams to get it to fit.  Next time I’ll cut a size 12.



Vogue 8727



I love the shape of this dress and it can be dressed up (with a smart plain navy jacket) or down (on its own with some wacky jewellery) but is now put away for the winter since I don’t have enough wardrobe space to not have to pack away summer clothes in the winter and winter clothes in the summer.  As an aside, there was a thread on Ravelry which I came across whilst noodling about, asking how many dresses ravellers had.  So I did a quick count this evening – there are currently 26 rtw and 4 handmade dresses hanging in my wardrobe, so I reckon the total count (including summer dresses) is probably quite a bit higher.  I do love me a dress.  In fact I really like the one I’m wearing right now which I got in H&M a couple of weeks ago.  Let me see if I can get a link to it.  No, sorry, not on their website.  It’s black, sleeveless, just above the knee (probably half way up the thighs of a 5’ 10” model), fitted through the waist and bodice and with a flared skirt.  I may take a photo of it at some point, it’s a perfect go-anywhere LBD – I wore it out for lunch today and could just as easily wear it to work or for an evening out.

On to dresses two and three, both made in purple gingham fabric which I bought because 1. gingham and 2. purple.  However, these fabrics are truly unpleasant imo, they’re shiny, full of static and fray like be-atches.  So they have both become trial versions of patterns which I will be making up in better fabric later.  The 1” gingham is Simplicity 2444 (and yes, there is a seam down the bodice front, don’t ask me why I cut down the fold because I truly have no idea), and the ¼” is New Look 6567.


Simplicity 2444

New Look 6567

For both these dresses the sleeves feel a bit skimpily cut, so I might try them with the sleeves from Butterick 5813  which fit fine.  I don’t think I have weightlifters’ arms by any means, but they’re not stick thin either.  I’ll see how I get on, if it’s too much hassle I’ll probably stick to making sleeveless dresses, but as it’s winter I wanted some sleeves.  Or it could just be that the fabric has no give in it at all and cotton, with a bit of widthways stretch, will be fine.  The New Look dress is also surprisingly short.  So far, I’ve either hemmed dresses per the pattern instructions or chopped off between 5” and 7” of the length, but this pattern could do with being a bit longer – not much – just enough for the finished length to be at the cutting line, but it was a bit of a surprise when I tried it on.  It sewed up very quickly but once I put the sleeves in I found that they pulled the shoulders down, so when I make this up with ‘proper’ fabric I’ll probably cut either the square or the sweetheart neckline, because they have more fabric at the shoulders, and I might cut the back neckline a bit higher.

I have another gingham dress cut out waiting for me to sew it up which will also be a test version because it has several small flaws in it.  Not sure that anyone else would notice them, but I know they are there so it is a trial run for Simplicity 3673.  I’ve got some 1” gingham for the final version – I thought this pattern would be good for a version of the Peggy Olson check dress which has popped up on various blogs as part of Julia Bobbin’s Mad Men challenge – but that won’t get made up until next year.

Well that’s all for now, I hope to be back tomorrow.

Everything's coming up roses

Or more accurately roses, pansies and a mixed bouquet (aka I'm not sure what they are, other than flowers).

So, three floral dresses in today’s post.  The first one is Butterick 5748, a vintage reprint from c1960.  I really like the cut of this dress and will definitely be making more.  I started out cutting a size 14, but once I’d sewed it up, attached the skirt and put the zip in I tried it on and it was too big, so I unpicked it all and recut the bodice to a size 12.  I sewed the side seams up at ½” rather than ⅝” and took in more fabric on the waist darts.  I think I might have also taken the shoulder seams up as well.  I bought the fabric from A One on Goldhawk Road and could have just got this dress out of 3 metres except for the fact that I was picky about the pattern placement on the front bodice – but for a plain fabric, or one with a small all-over pattern 3m would be enough.



B5748 red roses

Dress number two is a New Look pattern 6723.  Again I cut a size 14 and had to cut it down to a 12.  I’ve done this a few times now, Partly because I’d rather cut too big and then take in, than cut too small and end up with a dress that I can’t wear.  Also, I think I had in my mind that because the Elisalex in size 14 was such a good fit, that is the size I should cut for everything.  But now that I’ve made a few dresses I feel more confident that, as long as there is enough wearing ease, a 12 will be fine, at least with the patterns from the big pattern companies.  The small independents don’t seem to follow the same sizing schemes so I’ll cut whichever size I think will be the best fit for those patterns.

Pink pansies

I didn’t bother to interface the neckline on this dress and I also fully lined it and made the sleeves a bit longer.  The fabric was a 3 metre coupon (not sure what the English word for this is – a 3m cut length) from Classic Textiles on Goldhawk Road.

Dress number three is another vintage reprint pattern, this time from 1946 – Vogue 8728.  And made with another 3m coupon from Classic Textiles.  I made the skirt 5” shorter than the pattern and actually cut this as a size 12.  It’s a reasonably good fit although the neckline is quite wide, so I need to either wear a bandeau bra under it, or go out and buy one that has transparent shoulder straps.  I’ll probably make this again because I like the design, but I might try it with a size 8 neckband next time to avoid the bra strap issue.  I also might line the midriff section another time.

V 8728 yellow floral

Hello again dear blog

Well, I don’t know where this month has gone so far, but I would like to get all the dresses I’ve made this year blogged about before 2014 so I guess I need to get a wiggle on and post more frequently  :-).  I’ll start with Elisalex from By Hand London.

I made two of these one after the other back in August.  I love this pattern, it is such a flattering style.  I’ve since made another one and got the fabric ready to cut out for a fourth but they will be for another blogpost.

Both are a straight size 14 and fit really rather nicely thank you.  Sewing the princess seams was a bit of a faff if I’m honest, but once they’re done it’s downhill all the way with the rest of the sewing.  I also cut them 7” shorter than the pattern which meant that I needed less than 2 metres of fabric.

The first one is made from fabric which I bought in Fabricland.  Their website is really not a joy to behold, but they do have a good selection, it’s reasonably priced and the shops are well worth a visit if you happen to be in the vicinity.

Alohalex

The fabric for the second one I spotted in Fabricland months ago, before I had started sewing again.  I’d gone into the shop to get some buttons, or something, and it was on a stand at the front of the shop and caught my eye.  I did fleetingly think, hmm, I could make a skirt out of that, but having had to wean myself from buying yarn because it’s just. so. lovely. and then once I’ve got it home and stopped petting it wondering what I’d actually make with it, I didn’t want to fall into the same trap with fabric, so it stayed on the roll.  Of course, once I’d made my first Elisalex, and also by this time seen a dress made up in this fabric in Brighton for over a £100, I decided I should really go and buy a couple of metres.  Well obviously because I hadn’t bought it when I first saw it, when I went back to buy some they had sold out so that was the end of that idea.  Until… I spotted the end of a roll in Toni’s on the Goldhawk Road in London.  More expensive (actually it would be fairer to say less cheap) than Fabricland, but still nowhere near £100 for a dress, and in fact enough for two dresses.  Cue big smile and a purchase.  So, here is Elisalex number two.  I haven't decided what to make with the remaining fabric yet though, but that's a lack of decision that I can live with.

Flamingolex

That’s it for this evening folks - if there are any folks reading this of course ;-).  Will aim to back again tomorrow.