I have been admiring all the Cocos being shown off in blogland, but I think the ones that tipped the balance for me were those by Did you make that? Karen has made a heap of Cocos and they are all divine, so I finally bit the bullet and bought the PDF version of the pattern, and then did nothing with it! I thought I was going to need to buy fabric and I’m trying so hard to be good, but then I found this fabric in my stash, and all was finally well!

This is a reversible double knit, (same fabric, different colour, previously used on my shingle dress). I bought this piece as a remnant and was really hoping to get the Coco dress out of it but it was such a teeny tiny piece of fabric that I didn’t have a hope, so I made the top version. You will note the contrast bands in the sleeves – these are because I couldn’t get full length sleeves in one piece out of the fabric, so I cobbled them together. I think it looks like a deliberate design feature, don’t you?

This should have been a quick and easy make, but working out where to put the contrast bands and then having to do stripe matching, dragged it all out. Next one will be something with no pattern matching and no fabric shortage issues! Looking at the photos I may have misplaced the pocket a bit – I think I was trying to align it with the contrast bit in the sleeves, but it looks a bit odd. I may have to tweak this.

The photos were taken at the Matilda Bay Reserve and I have not noticed this Aboriginal information before. How lovely is this?

For those of you not from Australia, the Aboriginal culture is the oldest living culture in the world, dating back more than 60,000 years. There are at least 250 distinct languages, and the art is of course famous for its diversity and age. The reference to “welcome to country” is for visitors to the area, where local Aboriginal people formally welcome them onto the land (or country). The Nyungahs referred to on the sign are the traditional owners of the land and they comprise a nation which encompasses the south west corner of Western Australia. Oops, I can see that I’ve got a bit carried away, but needed to put this lovely sign into context.

The details:

Fabric is a reversible double knit from Knitwit, Nedlands

Pattern is the Coco top

Trousers are the Barb pants from Style Arc

Shoes are Neo from Marie Claire