A Long Overdue Dress

I have a long overdue project to share with you today.  This is a dress I made with fabrics provided by White Tree Fabrics, for their blog team.  I actually made it about 2 months ago, but for some reason never got round to blogging about it.



I think the reason why I haven't blogged about it is that although I love the fabrics White Tree kindly provided and in theory I like the pattern, I just don't like the finished dress on me.  This is also why you're now seeing it modelled by headless Rosie, rather than me.  It looks so much better on Rosie.

The pattern I used is the Zsalya dress by Kate & Rose Patterns. It's the kind of dress I used to love for Autumn/Winter with thick tights and boots and a cardi when it's really cold.  But I think my style has changed somewhat and it's not really "me" now.  It is a lovely pattern though, and well written.  It gives 2 options for finishing the yoke - a "thorough" finish that leaves you with no raw edges and a quick finish that does leave exposed edges.  True to form, I didn't use either, as I made my yoke from a single layer of fabric, rather than self line it as the pattern instructs.  I did this because I wanted to use the remains of the embroidered lawn I used for my Victoria blazer back in the summer.  To finish the neck edge I took a leaf out of Carolyn's book and used a bias cut strip of fabric.  This highlights the crossover really nicely.





The main body of the dress is made from this ditsy print chiffon.   It's really unusual fabric.  The base is a crinkle chiffon, which has strips of lace applied across it, then the ditsy print has been added on top.   It's available in several colours, and I had a hard time choosing the one I wanted.   The pink and the green would both be lovely for Spring, if your thoughts are turning in that direction.





The photo above shows the lace overlay on the fabric pretty well. 

In all honesty I'm not sure how much I'll wear this dress.  I do have some of the chiffon left over, so I'm thinking I might use the leftovers and recut the dress into something I am more likely to wear, as I love the fabric. 

Thanks must therefore go to White Tree Fabrics for providing me with the materials for this dress.  Care must be taken by myself to ensure I'm making something I really want to wear when provided with such lovely fabric. 

7 comments

  1. Well it looks lovely. I looked at that fabric: was it hard to sew?

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    1. Thanks Manju. No the fabric wasn't too hard to sew. The lace overlay seems to give it a bit more stability than plain chiffon would have.

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  2. Rosie looks lovely in the dress. Such a pretty dress and fabric.. but sometimes...what works for Rosie doesnt work for us.. sorry..

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    1. I like the dress on Rosie, just not on me! The fabric is very pretty.

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  3. These are lovely fabrics. I can see why you chose the fabric and pattern. Sorry:(

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    1. Thanks Maria. I guess they can't all be winners can they!

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  4. Sorry it didn't work out! It's a lovely dress, but not every pretty dress looks good on everyone. It's always a bit disappointing when you spend time on something that doesn't quite work out, but I find it's those projects that we usually learn the most from.

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