Pretty dresses! Who doesn`t like to sew pretty dresses! After making a few pairs of jeans I was really in the mood to sew some prints, so the new pattern on the test drive from Designer Stitch came at the perfect time. The Kate Tea Dress was originally only the dress option but during the discussions on the testers group Ann, the designer decided to add a few options more, I love options on a pattern, always extra value.
The original design had a circle skirt option, so to make it possible to use a border print, Ann Grose, added a gathered skirt option and from there also an option for to make the top only and a waistband to make a skirt only.
For the version above, I used a stretch cotton with a border print. The pattern has cup sizes so I started with size 3C. I made my muslin out of the same fabric because I wanted to be sure of the fit. Based on the fit of muslin I made a few changes: I kept the bust area as size 3 but at the shoulders, neck and the waist I went with size 2. I also made a swayback adjustment of 1.5cm and took out 1-1.5 cm at the CB at the zipper from the neck down tapering to nothing. In the black/white version, I also lowered the armhole by 1cm, much better than the other two versions.
Also in my muslin, I had some extra fabric under my bust and an easy fix for that was to sew the waist darts a bit rounded to contour my body better, that worked perfectly!
After getting the fit right it is just a matter of sewing! So I made a total of 3 dresses,:), enjoy sewing, you know :)). This dress is made of a cotton sateen stretch, and that bit of a stretch in all the fabrics I used makes the dresses really comfy and nice to wear too. I messed up a bit with the skirt on this one. I wanted the circle skirt option and after I cut my bodice I realized that the pattern was not fitting on my skirt, it was better to cut on the crosswise grain, I think, but I thought I will do something to fit it on my fabric on the lengthwise grain. Yeah...that was a bad idea and I had to adjust it back and now I have a kind of A-line(-ish) shape skirt, which I kind of like :))
And the back :)
I added pockets only in my gathered skirt version. Also in this version, I took my time matching the print at the zipper, it was worth it.
I enjoyed sewing all the invisible zippers in this dresses and a few things I always do when sewing invisible zippers are: interfacing the area where the zipper is going to be placed, I sew first the zipper with a regular zipper foot to have it secure and after that I sew one time more with the invisible zipper foot. It works great every time.
How pretty, all lined up! :))
This version is made out of a cotton stretch, and here I had to cut the skirt on crosswise grain and I let it a few days on my mannequin before I hemmed it.
Of course, the twirl pictures that you must make every time you sew a circle skirt :))))
I sew this version so fast, in one evening, so to give it a bit extra attention I sewed the hem by hand...that is for me extra attention :))), also I could not decide on the thread color :)) so like this, is invisible.
So, happy me, three dresses in my closet and three fabrics out of the stash and again a well fitting pattern, all good things!
Kate tea dress is now available at ............. and for a limited time on sale!
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Love your dresses!
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