I Could Starve Myself for 1000 years....

... or make myself a version that fits!!!

Have you ever come across something that you prayed would fit you, and it doesn't?

That's how I felt when I saw this dress on Etsy.  If you're interested you can see the listing here.  Even though it didn't (and would never) fit me, I kept it in my favourites, knowing that at some point I'd want to remake it.

Well, that time is now.  I thought it would be a wonderful hurrah to summer dresses before I start making suits.

Here are the fabrics I chose:

I just love the intensity of these colours together!

As for the pattern, I'm using a whole bunch of self-drafted bits that I used for other things.  The bodice is from this dress, the skirt is just a circle skirt with some modifications, and the bolero is from this outfit. 

I started cutting out and before I knew it I had this pile:

It was pretty straight forward, with only the skirt pieces requiring extra brain power.  I used the same skirt pieces I always use, but just cut them down in size.  The inner skirt (the blue one) has the pleated frill so it got cut to half the length that it would normally be.  The frill, when attached, will make up the rest of the length.  The fashion fabric skirt (the pink one) was cut 6 inches longer than the blue fabric skirt.

 The point of the scissors is approximately where the frill will end on the underskirt.

But then the fun bit - the creating!

First I sewed up both bodices, the pink one for the outside and the blue one for the lining.  To the blue one I sewed in some boning casings along the seam lines:

On the pink one, I added blue bias trim along the top edge:

I just love the way the blue looks against the pink.  And yes I know I should have hand sewed it on... and I would do that if it was for someone else... but its just for me... and who would actually look at it this closely???

Then I hemmed the pink fabric skirt (ugh! hemming circle skirts is an awful job!) and pinned on more bias trim for good measure:

But that is as far as I got before I got called away, sadly.

I'm really looking forward to getting back into this project!  But I'm not looking forward to 1" pleating nine metres of fabric for the ruffle on the underskirt...

Beccie
xxx