So I took delivery of a lovely bundle of goodies from Minerva Crafts a few weeks ago after deciding I wanted to make my Christmas Day outfit this year. I'd bought the November issue of SEW magazine a few days earlier and it had a free New Look K6411 pattern that I knew was just the dress I'd been looking for.
I measured myself up (taking into consideration the amount of 'merry making' that was going to happen between starting the sewing project and actually wearing the finished article on Christmas Day!) and plumped for the size 16. I was probably nudging an 18 on the waist and hip, but only a 13 at the bust (almost a perfect pear!) but as the pattern gives some ease and considering there are no darts, so the least 'fitted' dress I've ever made, I thought a 16 the best bet.
I used approximately 2m of the beautiful beige/blue tartan with appliqued rose detailing and gave myself a headache worrying about 'pattern matching' .... which I should have realised far sooner wasn't going to be a problem at all, considering all the lovely vertical and horizontal straight lines given in a tartan pattern!!! - fool !!!!
I've never really given too much (any) consideration to pattern matching in the past, either because I've used plain fabric, or, such 'busy' material that pattern matching becomes obsolete! So I can't begin to explain how chuffed I am at the finished result of this dress. Other than a couple of tiny 'sewing' wobbles, the pattern matching on this dress is almost 100% bang on, even down the to the front and back seams of the raglan sleeve - who knew successful pattern matching could be so satisfying?!
I opted for a shorter sleeve and what a good decision that turned out to be, Christmas Day down here in Kent was unbelievably mild, not at all cold, I think I might have melted had I done longer sleeves.
This dress was a pure pleasure to sew, simple, quick and in my humble little opinion, looks pretty darn good!
look at that awesome back seam pattern-matching
comfiest dress with Christmas Day eating 'growing' room
with my handknitted Stylecraft Alpaca Tweed scarf - just in case the weather turned more festively chilly - it didn't!
In fact, I'm so happy with this dress that I'm going to make at least one or two more for work. I've got to work out in my head how to 'tweak' the pattern so it fits better across my back shoulder (I'm quite narrow...) or maybe I just need to 'tweak' my festive eating and drinking habits so I can grade the pattern down to the size 12 - 14 at the bust ?!?! In a fabric with a bit of stretch....just in case I relapse - it is my birthday in January after all.
No comments:
Post a Comment