As previously mentioned, I have been doing a lot of spring and summer sewing but the weather has conspired against me wearing any of it. However, today is lovely so here is one of the many new things I have to wear.

I was given the book, Stylish Dress Book, for my birthday and have been really keen to try one of the garments. I have long been looking for a ’70s style tent dress (some of you will remember them!); they are comfortable and hide a multitude of sins. Well, the Stylish Dress Book has a dress which sort of qualified, Dress F, and hence this dress.

I used a piece of cotton fabric from my stash (hurrah!), which I’ve had for some time. It is a remnant from Potter’s and it has a border which ran down one selvedge. I had the choice of cutting the border off or making the dress across the grain and utilising it at the hemline. I really like the border so cut the pattern cross-grain. This also left me with the dilemma of how to lose as little of the border as possible in the hem. I used a piece of binding and made a false hem and think it has worked pretty well.

The dress is basically A-line with very attractive split sleeves. I added pockets, using a slightly heavier fabric to try a keep the shape of the skirt as the fabric is actually quite flimsy and I didn’t want it flopping around my legs. This has actually worked!

Halfway through making this dress I saw Handmadebycarolyn’s post on her very classy version (and she even screen printed her own fabric!) and this did spur me on – in fact I have made two of these dresses, so the next will be revealed shortly.

The details:

Dress “F” from the Stylish Dress Book

Printed cotton fabric – remnant from Potter’s

Shoes are Ettore Masotti from Claremont

The next bit of this post is a bit blah, but I am including it for my sister and niece who live in the UK and who are probably interested. If you are bored by bags for car roofs, stop reading now.

In addition to sewing clothes, I often get to make interesting items such as …er… bags for a car roof! Yep, son Archie has a sun roof which doesn’t resemble in any way a James Bond car sliding automatically into the boot, but which has to be manually removed and stored in the back of his wagon, which means that it scratches the paintwork. Whilst he was in Sydney recently, Mark wrestled the roof off and I fashioned a  bag for each piece. I made them from blockout curtain lining, sourced from an opshop, and whilst they don’t look elegant, they do the job! This photo shows one half of the roof in a bag, with the other half waiting for its cover.

A tight squeeze in the back of the car… but hey it works, so he had better use them!

Little update – he arrived home and asked me why they weren’t cut to the shape of the roof. Grrr!