Getting free fabric doesn’t happen too often, and finding the perfect garment to make with said fabric is even more rare. I picked up this striped knit fabric at a fabric swap and I knew that as soon as I took it home, I wanted to try out a Collette Moneta with it. I remember this pattern was all the rage maybe 8 years ago, but I never got around to making one. As I sewed this one up, I wondered why I waited so long. It’s a great pattern, very simple to to follow and the dress sews up so fast. As with most outfits, the main challenge came from trying to match the stripes when cutting out the pattern. This fabric had many stripes to match up, but luckily not too many pieces to cut out.

I’m not the biggest fan of gathered skirts. I feel like sometimes they don’t look very flattering on me and can make me look bigger than I am, especially if not done right. This dress isn’t too bad, but it will never be my favorite dress because of the gathered skirt.

While I love that this dress has pockets, I also felt like they added a bit of bulkiness to this hips on this. This could have to do with the type of fabric and maybe a less stiff knit would have a different look.

This being said, I would definitely make this dress again. It’s a great casual dress that sews up fast and looks pretty good on basically any body type. The full skirt is very easy to fit, especially with someone with larger hips like myself. I also like the way the back looks, the neckline a little lower to show a bit of skin.

I used a double needle to hem the neckline, sleeves and skirt. It always ends up being harder than I anticipate to keep the lines even all the way around. I definitely had to unpick and re-sew a few sections, but I had less issues with “tunneling” of the fabric than I usually do and I think it’s because this was such a sturdy knit.

All in all, a great new dress for the spring, and you definitely can’t beat the price!