Minerva Blogger Network - The Blue Christmas dress (with extra construction pics)

For my make this month I wanted something festive and chose this beautiful Prada (eek!) crepe.   I chose the fabric first and set out to find a pattern that would work and make the most of the gorgeous drape.  Retro Butterick 5707 fit the bill, with its cowl neckline.

The fabric has a shiny satin side and a matt crepey side.  I had intended to use both sides in the dress with the shiny side for the cowl, but loved the matt teal side so much that I only used the shiny side for the belt!

As I was too scared to cut into such lovely fabric without one, I made a toile of the bodice.  I lengthened the bodice by 3” (which I think may have been too much) and graded out from a 14 bodice to a 16 for waist and skirt. I did my usual ½” FBA.  The skirt is super long in the pattern – I’m 5’9” and it came to mid calf.  I had intended to use the long skirt as per the pattern but it didn’t look right, so I ended up cutting 3” off to make it knee length.

I bound all the seams with rayon seam binding as I wanted to treat such special fabric well!   After discussion with the lovely Tania, I ordered some Hug Snug seam binding from Ebay in the US.  It finishes the seams beautifully but adds no bulk at all.  It's great stuff - somewhere in the UK must stock it so if anyone finds a UK retailer please let me know!  However my application of it leaves a bit to be desired (hence why there are no close up pics in this post!)

After a total fail on inserting the zip by machine, I did a hand-picked zip.  I also sewed the sleeve hems and skirt hem by hand to avoid having stitching showing on the right side.

I made a self fabric belt using the shiny side of the fabric and a silver buckle from Minerva.  I love the belt (although it needs a press stud to keep it closed due to the slippiness of the satin – I didn’t think that one through well!  But it looks good!)

I’m a bit disappointed that the neckline isn’t as drapey as I expected – I think it would have been perfect in this fabric. It definitely seems like a more modern shape rather than a proper cowl.  I was envisaging a Mad Men style cocktail dress, but the end result seems to have lost a lot of the vintage feel.  I think I left a bit too much ease in the bodice, but it will definitely be better for eating a nice big Christmas dinner! But I think the end result is much more wearable than the full-on vintage style in the pattern would have been.

I do love the dress.  It’s very comfortable and doesn’t cling to tights due to the satin inside, so no slip needed.  I would say I can’t wait for Christmas to come so I can wear it, but I have far too much to do before then!  Still at least I know what I’m wearing!

If you like my Blue Christmas dress, you can make your own with the Minerva kit, which contains the Butterick 5707 pattern, 2 metres of the teal crepe and the silver belt buckle I used.

And for extra points if you got this far, how about some awkward pics of the "pretend to put the baubles on the  Christmas tree" variety?