Enter… the Fleurlicity dress

Some of you may remember when I wrote about my Maison Fleur summer blouse, that I said I was scheming for another week of IPM… Well here are the results of my scheming, I teamed it up with a skirt and so (drum roll please, drrrrr…..) welcome The Fleurlicity dress.

I used the Maison Fleur blouse view 1 and combined it with Jennifer Lauren Vintage Felicity dress skirt. And the skirt has pockets!! I considered keeping the blouse at it’s proper length and having a drop waisted dress, but adding the circle skirt to this would have been a nightmare and I didn’t want gathers. The pockets would also have been odd at hip level. I also considered using view 3 blouse again, but it just wouldn’t have worked with this skirt.

This fabric I bought a few years ago. It’s a very fine cotton and I describe the pattern as covered in doughnuts The problem with this fine cotton, meant I needed to line the dress. This dress has taken ages to put together and mainly because of the lining!

For the bodice, I lowered the bust darts slightly, as mentioned in my blouse review. The side seams I obviously had to grade in so that the bottom of the bodice (at waist length) was the same size as the waist of the skirt. It’s still a wee bit big, but not terrible.

The skirt I didn’t change at all, it is the same size I made up last time. The only thing I had to do was piece the skirt. This is a 3/4 circle skirt and the fabric wasn’t wide enough, so I carefully pattern matched corners on the skirt. Can you see the seam? I am the Queen of pattern matching

The lining – ARGH!!! As mentioned above, this became the bane of my life! The blouse has facings. I used the main dress fabric to make facing for the neck – this facing is the back of the ties, so they needed to be in the main dress fabric. I squared off the facings and attached the fine white cotton something I had in my stash. Silly girl, I didn’t cut it long enough, so instead of a high waist on the lining, I pleated what I’d done onto a narrow waistband and attached a half circle skirt. Phew! Yes, this lining took way longer than the dress to make up!

I’m not completely happy with my invisible zip either. Somehow I’ve managed to stretch the zip while sewing and so the fabric has gathered slightly. I’ve tried pressing it out but it’s still not perfect.

The details
Fabric:  Doughnut patterned fine cotton lawn from Arthur Toye, Wellington, January 2014. Fine white cotton something I think came from Fabric-a-Brac, but really don’t remember! I think I used approx 3m of the blue for the dress.
Notions:  Thread, interfacing and a zip.
Pattern:  Maison Fleur summer blouse, view 1, size 16, graded in at the waist and the skirt from Jennifer Lauren Vintage Felicity dress, size 14.
Changes made:  Lowered the bust darts by half inch, took in the side seams of the blouse by an inch or more to fit the waist of the skirt and shortened the blouse to waist length.
First worn:  Photos at Truby King Garden in Wellington. It’s winter here and there was a strong cold wind blowing – not the weather for a summer frock! I’m not sure this will get much more wear until November time, but then it’ll be perfect for a windy Wellington summer day

Another one/recommendations:  I’m really happy with this combo dress. I’m looking forward to the summer when it’ll get a lot of wear. I’m pretty pleased with the fit, the waist is a little lose, and may take that in later. However all in all, I love it. I’m glad I’ve managed to find the perfect pattern for this fabric. It’s been sat there in my stash for three years and it was definitely worth cutting into it for this.

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