I know, I know I’m a little late to the frocktober party I hope you don’t mind.
The dress is vogue 8280, which is now, unfortunately out of print, with a full circle skirt, contrast back yoke, exposed metal zipper and a bit of piping for good measure.
When I started I had no intentions on deviating from pattern on this one, I had cut the fitted skirt pieces for my muslin. Maybe it was the vintage feel of the floral fabric I used for my muslin, or even because it was a glorious sunny day and I was feeling particularly girly (&am a sucker for a twirly skirt) the day I muslined this up, but somewhere during that day, all good intentions of sticking to the pattern went out the window, and I caved, I pushed the fitted skirt aside, and instead, went with a super twirly full circle skirt and contrast waist band.
I’m shamed to admit, that the hacking didn’t end there. I didn’t particularly like how the contrast sleeve detail ended at the shoulder and side seams on my muslin. In my final dress, I continued the contrast detail across the back of the dress and added some piping to break up the white a bit.
Unfortunately, during this additional hacking (I think I might have a problem haha) I forgot to shorten the bodice to account for the waistband. But I remembered a white belt I had from a similar style dress, which works well.
The fabric, has to be one of my favourites, Wing song by Michael Miller. The first time I saw this print was on a RTW dress. I couldn’t justify the almost $200 price tag so left the dress and a bit of my heart in the shop that day. Months later, while window shopping online fabric stores, I happened across it on Fabric.com and before I knew it had happened, a length was on its way to me.
The contrast, is a plain white quilting cotton from my stash, and is lined in silk satin, which I scooped up from spotlight for a measly $4 a metre earlier this year.
The construction.
The pattern is known for its crazy all over the place instructions, so I was super diligent in reading and re reading before I did anything. Fortunately, it came together with little trouble, and only required minimum altering to the darts and shoulders to fit which are both pretty standard on most patterns.
Overall, I really love this dress, it worked out how I pictured it (which is always good) and is a pleasure to wear. I can’t say if I will make this one again, as I now have 3 in rotation, but I highly recommend it, just make sure you know where you are in the instructions, otherwise it may get a bit messy.
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Great fabric combo! I like the back. Lucky you’ve got a white belt. I think a contrast at the waist makes it look more polished. Well done!
I had my eye on this pattern but decided that the sleeve treatments probably wouldn’t suite me. And now it’s out of print I’ve got a major case of FOMO 🙂 Oh well. Such is life.
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Love your fabric choice. The dress turned out really cute! I admire your sewing process. Happy twirling!
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Beautiful! I bought 1 metre and then went back for a second, and am hoping to get a dress out of it but it won’t be as lovely as this – well done!
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Amazing dress! And maybe this gives me the courage to upload my last dress for Frocktober!!!
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I love it, the fabric is gorgeous, I like the contrasting neck/sleeveline and..come on, the best part has to be that circle skirt, I am also a total sucker for those twirly skirts 😉
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I Think you made the right call, twirly bird skirt for the win! Beautiful
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