Duro Dress-Done!

My dress is done!!!! I have to serge finish two areas-where the top attaches to bottom and the bottom band attaching to skirt.

Will I make this dress again? Probably not. Was it worth making this one? Yes! Will I wear this dress? The right moment or occasion.

This dress is getting a lot of attention. I first read about it on A Dress A Day Blog. Since then I have seen several dresses made up. Now Simplicity Patterns has a similar dress. I decided to give it a try, even though I know that this is a style that perhaps is not the most flattering on me nor is it something I would normally run into a shop to buy, much less sew.

It was worth making though. Mostly because I used some sewing techniques I have not used in awhile-gathering fabric and attaching to another piece. Changing gathers to pleats when not planned and doing it to solve a problem.

The dress top is gathered to the midriff section and the front skirt area is gathered to the bottom of the midriff section. After sewing the dress top to bottom, I tried on the dress and OH MY GOD! I looked like a pregnant woman. No way, no how would I go out in public much less wear this around the house like that. At this point, I might have said, forget about it and stop working on the dress.

I have read where others converted gathers to pleats and thus I decided to do the same. I removed stitches from the front skirt piece attached to midriff piece, removed the gathering stitches and then pin fitted pleats attempting to match up pleats on both sides of the center skirt front area. I think I did a great job with this simply by sight and pinning. This worked great and dress is not all gathered in the center front. If one is skinny and has a flat tummy, you can wear this with all of the centered gathers.

I also did not follow the pattern instructions for sewing bands, facings, etc. Those instructions assume you do not have a serger as they never say anything about serging edges for finishing. If you don't have a serger, then I think you can still do it differently but you will have a nicer finish using them. Since I do have a serger, I simply sewed facings together and then attached pieces to each other, serge finished edges and eliminated a lot of slipstiching which I just hate to do.

I will wear the dress to some "girls night out" or "girls luncheon". I will take with me to ASG in a couple of weeks, I think I will have an opportunity to wear it there. I could use some new sandals though-coral or yellow ones!! Hmm, got to find a shoe sale.

Here are some photos of the completed dress. I will have to put my "game face on" as Carolyn, A Diary of a Sewing Fanatic did and showed off some of her fabulous completed clothes. (Note: I cannot get photos to post at this time. Blogger says they are, but they are not. Hopefully later.)