I started this dress in September and two months later here it is, all finished!
This was my project for my weekly sewing class, my first Burda project and first time with jersey.
Jersey was a big challenge. Encouraging words from classmates and bloggers got me through... "jersey is great to sew with"... "jersey doesn't fray"... "jersey is forgiving" ...
And you are all right, it definitely is forgiving, and doesn't fray and is great to sew with once you get used to it. I forgot to stretch the fabric a few times, whoops.
The hardest part was tracing the Burda 7254 pattern on to "paper". I never cut into the original pattern, always trace it on to sew-on interfacing and use that as a pattern piece. The Burda pattern confuses me, the "lines" for each size are busy looking, not like BM&V.
Marking the hundreds of pleats on the bodice was tedious but I made it through, pleated the side bodice pieces and sewed it to the interfaced centre piece, then the fun began ;)
The rest of the dress was easy peazie. Four darts on the back, some pleats on the sleeves, facings.
This dress is not lined, instead it has facings which are stabilized using McCall's textureweft (iron on) and raw edges serged. The centre piece and centre back is interfaced.
The dress is closed with a 22" black invisible zipper.
I hemmed the dress by hand, using a 'flat catch stitch' - I think that's what the stitch is called, my tutor showed me this new stitch and I missed the name of it so I Googled and found this handy document on hand sewing. Have a look at my pic below and let me know if I'm right.
I was suppose to finish the sleeve by hand as well, but I got lazy, went and bought myself a twin stretch needle and finished it by machine. I think the sewing-gods were watching and decided to punish me for being lazy, cos I stuffed up one sleeve and spent a good half hour unpicking, grr, hence the title of this post.
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TOP: Inside view of bodice & facings
MIDDLE: Zipper & darts, Outside bodice
BOTTOM: Pleats, 'Flat catch stitch' on hem
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Pattern Review: Burda 7254
Size: Size 10
Fabric: 1.75m jersey from Rathdowne Fabrics
Notions: Invisible zipper 22" (black), Gutermann thread (000), Textureweft interfacing,
Time: 2 months worth of sewing class aka 16 hours
Cost: Fabric $30; Zipper $5; Textureweft $10, Pattern $10,
Cost: Fabric $30; Zipper $5; Textureweft $10, Pattern $10,
Techniques used:
- Flat catch stitch
- Darts
- Pleats
- Sewing with stretch fabric
Pattern Modification/Adjustments:
No modifications or adjustments! Fits perfect everywhere.
I am extremely pleased because I don't have those terrible drag lines in my butt area that I usually get with a fitted skirt (handmade and RTW). I'm putting this down to either me being a 10 in the butt and should start cutting a size 10 or it's the jersey's beautiful drape, bless you jersey.
If I make this again, I'd like to make a small adjustment to the back, gapes just a tiny bit near the top of zipper.
Not a very photo heavy post, but you can see that this dress is awesome! I feel like such a lady in this dress. I don't own any dresses that are below the knee.
Hello skirt vent!
Another reason why I'm watching my photo upload on Blogger is because I found out the other week that Blogger has an upload limit and once you reach that limit you won't be able to upload more. Wah. Check out Miss Directions post for tips on uploading pics on to Blogger (here).
So now I make sure that I don't upload duplicates and resize my images using Pic Monkey so I don't exceed my storage limit.
My next project at class with be Burda pants. I can't wait. I'm also working on a dress for my work Xmas party (30th Nov) which I am on track to finish. Have already finished the bodice, took only a few hours. If you follow my Instagram (Neeno_24), you can see some progress pics :)
