In the recent hot weather I’ve found the outfits I feel most comfortable in are my long cotton dresses, especially the teal one I made in February for our holiday and a Liberty one I made last year, both just simple sleeveless dresses. I decided I needed another one…
A couple of years ago on a trip to Goldhawk Road in London I bought 3m of a beautiful blue Liberty tana lawn. Tana lawn is so soft and smooth it almost feels like wearing silk, it’s lovely to wear, perfect for a summer dress. This one is a gorgeous shade of blue (cobalt??) with a very delicate design on it, I love it!
I looked through my dress patterns, that’s when I realised how many of them take nearer 4m! Eventually I found Simplicity 2917 which reckoned with 60″ wide fabric you only need 2.70m. It’s a princess line dress with a full-ish skirt, a nice shaped neck-line and a sleeveless option. Bingo, I thought! Only tana lawn is only 54″ wide and sometimes 6″ makes all the difference!I wasn’t anywhere near being able to get it out of 3m.
Then I had a brainwave! I cut the side back and the side front pattern pieces along the ‘cut here for the top’ line, I left the front and back full length, reasoning that I’m sure I’ve got patterns with such a design feature! Without the full length of the two side pieces there was now plenty of fabric, in fact I even cut the skirt an extra 4″ long as I do like my skirts pretty long! I even remembered to add extra seam allowances (most of the time!)
The first thing I did was to stitch the side front and backs to their respective skirts and then just made the dress up as usual. As it’s such a busy print the seams don’t show anyway, but even if they did it I think would look fine.
I also removed the centre front seam from the pattern, cutting it on the fold instead. The neckline and arms have facings on the pattern, I stitched a neckline facing as per pattern, but I didn’t fancy an armhole one, so I bound it like a quilt instead with a strip of bias-cut lawn. The zipper was hand-stitched in as I find that easier and neater than fiddling round with the machine and the hem was stitched on the machine with the blind hemming stitch. The only thing I would add with hind-sight, is pockets.
I wore my dress to work today, it was cool and comfortable and I think it looks really pretty. I love the way it twirls!
thecraftycreek 
Definitely twirl worthy!
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Thank you, I like a twirly dress 🙂
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I loved your teal dress and this one is gorgeous too. Lovely twirl!
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Thanks Jane, my teal one was worn to death on holiday 🙂
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You’re inspiring me to get my sewing machine out again, it’s been gathering dust for a while now. However, I’m envious of and full of admiration for your skill and confidence in adapting a pattern. The result looks really lovely.
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Thank you, it’s definitely time you got your sewing machine out 🙂
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The dress is lovely – perfect for a hot summer’s day. I neeeed to sort out my fabric and make dresses …. you are an inspiration!
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Thank you, I love wearing summer dresses 🙂
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Beautiful! Great use of fabric. What do you do with your leftovers?
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Thank you, my leftovers go in my scrap box 🙂
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I love that pattern on you and think I’d love it on me too! Tana lawn sounds like a dream fabric, this is a wonderful combination and suits you perfectly, Margaret. 😍
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Thanks Kathy, it’s so lovely to wear 🙂
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That looks great on you. If you wore it here in Woodstock NY, everyone would ask where you got it and want to buy one!
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Thanks Donna, I wore my red summer dress to work the other day, a new girl saw it hanging in the changing room and admired it, someone else looked at it and said ‘there’s no label in it, it’ll be Margaret’s!’
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Another beautiful dress! The colour is lovely, 8m glad you made it work with the fabric available!
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Thanks Catherine, I was amazed the difference it made when I cut the two pieces!
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It’s so Pretty! And it looks great on you! I love dresses in the summer, they are so cool and comfortable on hot days.
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Another lovely and cool summer dress – such a gorgeous colour for you, too! Envy England’s quantity & quality of cotton lawn fabrics. Sigh . . .
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Thanks Del, the cotton lawns are beautiful but they do come at a price, Liberty ones are usually £24/m, I usually try and pick them up in sales!
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Well, you can imagine their prices over here – $40 is far from unusual, but that is not a sale. I do not even recall seeing anything similar to lawn, Liberty or no, until about 4 or 5 years ago. Now I’ve managed to “collect” 3 pieces, only one of which I’ve made up. But am seeing the category “lawn” a bit more now, so am just waiting to match the right pattern with fabric… and keeping eyes open for more!
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oh this is lovely! so well fitted around the bust, and the neckline has a lovely shape to it.
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Oh whoop for making the patten fit the fabric, your very clever – it’s a beaut!
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Very casual and comfortable dress. Your background matched well.
Welcome to
https://styleofbonnie.com/
Bonnie
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