Not a lot of sewing has been going on around these parts. I stupidly entered a Tough Mudder and didn’t start training until about a month ago so most of my spare time has been spent running and weight training, desperately trying to get fit enough to not die half way round the course. So with that, enjoying the sunshine and househunting I haven’t had very much spare time to sew. I did manage to finish this baby though.
After the success of my Anna maxi dress – which I have worn the hell out of – I knew I wanted to make another maxi dress as they are easily my favourite thing to wear. So I prowled Minerva looking at pretty much every maxi dress pattern they stock. I was torn between New Look 6096 and 6774 but chose 6096 in the end because of the lack of zip. I hate zips.
The fabric is some viscose I got on eBay, pretty cheaply. I bought 5 metres and plan to make some Tania culottes with what I have left. It was my first time working with viscose and I wouldn’t say I did a great job. Some of my cutting out was pretty shoddy and I sincerely doubt that very much of the dress is on grain. I really struggled with that part as the selvage wasn’t very straight and the slight stretch to the fabric kept throwing me.
I used French seams pretty much throughout but I messed up the one joining the bodice to the skirt. I sewed it the wrong way first and ended up with the seam on the inside. I thought about trimming it really close to the stitching line and sewing at 1/4 inch again and then finishing off as normal, doing a sort of double (triple?) French seam but was a bit worried about making the bodice too small. That turned out to be a needless worry as next time I’d probably take some length out of the bodice anyway.
I cut a size 10 and it fits okay apart from there being a bit too much floof in the bodice (technical term). I don’t think I’d go down to an 8 as the arms fit just right on the 10. So I think I’d possibly just see what taking some length out does and if that doesn’t work then either fiddle with the pattern to take some fullness out or cut an 8 but use the same length arm elastic as for a 10 and see how that works out.
I wasn’t too keen on the dress when I tried it on before I hemmed it. It felt a bit too much like I was trying to hide a baby bump. But somehow it doesn’t feel as huge now and I really like it. The viscose feels lovely to wear too. It has actually inspired another dress I’m working on at the moment that I’m going to laughably call self drafted.
Cost:
Fabric – 3 metres @ £3 /metre = £9
Elastic – not sure how much I used. I’ll say 2m as I bought 5m and have loads left @ 30p / metre = 60p
Thread – free
Total = £9.60 Bargain
And I’ll leave with some outtakes of my stupid faces – no photobombing Max this time, he was too sleepy.
