I made a green dress… this is a dress that I’ve been meaning to make for ages! and have been quietly gathering suitable green fabrics as I see or unearth them. It’s actually been a very long term work in progress! since I identified what I thought could be the first suitable fabric about four years ago. I know, right?!
You can actually see it right here; it’s the leftovers from this little bag that I made for Mum, for her birthday back in 2018… this is what I think of as the “jade” green colour centre front of the skirt part… it was harvested from a pair of silk trousers that Mum had let go years ago. The “yellow” green raw silk was from the remnant bin at Fabulous Fabrics; as was also the “grey” green silk suiting remnant… although they were trophies from separate hunting trips… and the darkest forest green cotton corduroy was leftover from these paper-bag waist trousers, and originally from Minerva.
So obviously I love this pattern a lot, it’s the sixth time I’ve made it up! Here’s a little collage of all the V1316’s I’ve made… from left to right, top to bottom they are:
1; made from four pairs of old corduroy trousers; black, brown, grey and cream…I describe how I add pockets to the design in this post too.
2; made from blue corduroy, that I pre-overdyed with different dyes to be four different shades of blue… this one is probably my own personal favourite…
4; made using old denim jeans. This was the first one I did not line, and it is perfectly fine of course! This one is probably an equal favourite for me too! 🙂
5; made using yellow cotton canvas, leftover from the covers I made for Clara’s dog beds. The seams are defined with blue bias cut cotton. This seems to be everyone else’s favourite over on instagram!
6; my new one!
I’m extremely happy with my newest one! and I made a few slight mods, has well as the usual addition of pockets! Of course! I simply CANNOT live without pockets nowadays, sorry. I know this is a very well-worn lament that perhaps should go without mentioning yet again, and yet this is a sewing blog and so I guess it really needs to be mentioned. Sorry.
I lined the dress fully with light jade green lining fabric, and instead of using the same lining fabric to cut the shoulder pieces, like the pattern suggests and which I have obeyed for versions 1,2 and 3 in the past; I cut them from the dark green cotton corduroy, I also cut an extra centre front bodice piece and stitched it to the neckline of the dress lining… these help to keep the lining “invisible” because I’ve always found in the past that the lining has a tendency to peep out on this dress, no matter how carefully you understitch the armhole and neckline edges. This is such a simple fix and I’m glad it finally occurred to me!
Still pretty chuffed with these circa 2022 labels! The challenge with each garment is to find a good spot to put it!
