I've made a summery little dress for myself.This is dress F from the Japanese pattern book Stylish Dress Book, by Yoshiko Tsukiori. I've made this pattern up once before here, and that polka dot dress is still in my wardrobe and remains one of my perennial favourites. I don't know if this new one is going to topple its big sister from my favourites list, but anyway, it'll still be a goodie and bound to get worn a lot in this long, loooong, very hot summer we're having!
I made a couple of teeny changes, adding inseam side pockets and also leaving off the sleeve ties. Instead the sleeve opening has a button sewn on to close. Still looks quite cute and meant I didn't have to try to sew and turn out those skinny-binny sleeve ties in this lovely but rather challenging fabric.
I know... it doesn't look particularly challenging in my pictures; it appears from a distance to be a quite ordinary duck-egg blue, handkerchief linen. Only closer inspection reveals random dots of what appears to be clear plastic, splattered all over it. This has the happy side effect that in the sunlight it appears to sparkle like diamonds, *squeals, oooh pretty!* and the less than happy side effect that it was quite difficult to actually sew the splatters and they don't fold well at all; also it, how shall I say this? presents an Ironing Challenge, to say the very least.
Happily, I think it did work out! :)
sleeves finished with buttons in lieu of the ties; and pockets
I finished the neckline with a bias-cut strip, but it was nearly impossible to attain neat looking top stitching over the splatters! so I ended up unpicking all attempts and just hand-stitched it down with invisible fell stitches along both fronts. I kept the double row of machine stitching on the back neckline, where it miraculously turned out kinda neat-looking.
Well I've washed and ironed it once now and fortunately I don't think the dots are going to be a problem. I ironed the dress inside out and even though it does stick together it's no biggie to just peel the layers apart while turning it right side out again. And the plastic does cool and dry hard again pretty quickly. Thank goodness.
Fortunately I had enough fabric to cut extra lengthening bits and sewed them on to the bottom, hiding the joining seam up inside this tuck. You can't see the join on the inside because I turned up the hem long enough to enclose everything. The hem is hand-stitched using invisible fell-stitching, and I caught the upper fold of the tuck in the same stitching to secure all the layers together.
Problem solved!
In fact, I have to say that this is a very simple dress which belies its unexpected difficulty-factors! but I am so pleased that it all came together quite happily and satisfactorily in the end. :)
Details:
Dress; dress F from the Stylish Dress book, by Yoshiko Tsukiori, plastic splattered linen
Hat; Vogue 8844, ivory corduroy, details and my review of this pattern here
