blue sundress

I finished the blue sundress. I wasn’t sure about it, but I’ve been wearing it for about an hour now, and I’m feeling better and better about it. The cool things that I wanted to achieve are the diagonal seam that goes from back to front, with no side seam, and the lovely back neckline that goes into a high collar. I’ve managed them both. Here is the front and back. Notice the nice seam that comes to a V in the back. It actually took quite a bit of fabric sculpting to achieve that. Oh, and be aware that I had my dress form made many years ago, and I have actually lost weight since then. So the dress is not nearly as tight on me as it appears to be on the form.


Here’s a view of the side. There’s no side seam, which took a dart going from the hip and curving around to the bust.

I did some nice bobbinwork in purple on the collar. I like the way the collar turned out, but if I were to make this dress over again, I would cover a bit more of the upper side front (not sure if it would be called cleavage). The dress feels secure enough, but I wanted something that I could wear to the playground. Even I, who routinely flout playground sartorial conventions, would not wear this dress to go down the slide with my kids.
The secret weapon in this dress is the support attached to the inside. I thought about buying bra cups to attach to the lining, but then I realized that I have lots of bras that are good enough, but not my favorites, so I hardly ever wear them. I took one of these, cut off the straps, and hand sewed it to the lining. I also used tailor’s tacks to attach it to the center front of the collar, like so:

It works really well.

I have another project in mind, but I’m moving from New Jersey to London, and move-related activities are cutting into my sewing time. DH booked the tickets today, and it looks like we’re leaving June 3. Hopefully we’ll get settled quickly and I can get sewing again.

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