You were all very nice to not mention it, but I look like a sack of potatoes in that purple dress. And while I do have a few pounds to lose, I am not totally shapeless.
A second try at this dress was warranted.
The Fabric: To counter the Talbots feel, I chose a bright fire-engine red fabric - bought at Goodwill for $1? $2? Not more than two bucks. My lining was a remnant bought at Bouclair for $1.
Pattern alterations: A ton of them. First, I took two inches off the front piece and the back top piece. I essentially drew two parallel lines on the pattern, parallel to the bottom line, the first one just below the dart point and the second, two inches down. I cut the two lines out, and attached the pattern back together. Easy-peasy.
I have no idea if this is the proper way to do this, but I dislike reading instructions, and prefer to learn by doing and failing.
Also, I deepened both the front and back darts - the front by a quarter of an inch in each dart (taking an inch off overall) and the back by a tiny bit - maybe 1/8 of an inch?
Finally, I took off another quarter inch on each seam in the side, from under the armpit down to two inches below the waist.
This pretty much removed all excess fabric on the dress, leading to...
The dress: Ta-dah. Ignore my closed eyes in the picture. Also, the dress needs to be washed and ironed. It fits well, any wrinkles in the picture are wrinkles, not puckers.
Up next: I'm so torn - there's a million things I want to make. I made a muslin of the October 2007 BWOF, style 115. See Christina's version here.
My version was a bit of a disaster - for a few reasons.
1. The neckline is really, really low! I like my cleavage and all that, but this was a bit much. (Think, below the bra center.) A pattern alteration to raise it has been made.
2. I used a very heavy jersey? knit? for the fabric. Which means the gathers gape open big time. I think a lighter fabric will prevent this.
I'll take a picture of the disaster version - but up next will be this t-shirt, in my actual fabric, a black jersey knit.
3 comments:
Love it!!!! Nothing wrong with Ann Taylor or Talbot's, that's classic you'll wear forever. :)
Ok. I really like this in the red. Way to alter!
Hey! Pretty dress. The red really compliments your skin tone. I didn't now how else to contact ya but I still have that simplicity pattern. shoot me an email so we can discuss.
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