Tag: Vacation Dress

Sewing a Vacation Dress: Challenges and Triumphs

On By qplourdeIn Sewing Projects, Travel Fabric, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Between winter illnesses and long vacations, I’ve been unable to get near my sewing machine. But as luck would have it, I recently realized I never got a chance to write about my vacation dress from last fall. This past November I got married in French Polynesia. This seemed to be the perfect excuse to finally make use of some fabric I had bought in Hawaii a few years back. I could picture it perfectly: a summer dress using Polynesian-style fabric for another Polynesian vacation. While I had some triumphs figuring out the semi-confusing instructions on this dress, the end result was not as perfect as I hoped.

When I saw the pattern cover of New Look 6557, I figured I found the perfect pattern, since my fabric looked very similar to the photo on the front (view B). The print does fit this dress style rather well, but that is not the whole story. The first issue I ran into was when I washed the fabric for the first time. The red color bled into the white, which gave the whole thing a pinkish hue. This happened despite putting a color catcher in the washing machine. I couldn’t believe the fabric bled so much. I guess the quality on this fabric was not as great as I thought. It makes me very nervous washing this dress in the future, but I guess it’s just something I need to be aware of.

I’ve been noticing that New Look doesn’t seem to have the best instructions and illustrations to go along with them. This was apparent when I made my wedding dress and there was a similar issue here. The construction of the bodice was a bit confusing, especially around the back facing piece. I had actually cut out a bodice with some test fabric because I was unsure of the size and I’m glad I did, because not only was the sizing off, but it took several tries to figure this whole thing out. It was a bit unclear as to where the back facing piece was supposed to connect after the sides were attached to the front. I finally figured out that you had to attach it to the seam and then to the top edge, keeping the front sandwiched in between and free so it’s not sewn inside. After this is sewn, it’s flipped to the inside.

You also had to make sure the back facing has a space at the top. This is where the straps are placed and sewn in. This was one thing I really liked about this pattern – sewing the straps after the bodice has been constructed, made fitting a lot easier. I’ve made other dresses in the past where I basically had to guess the length. No matter how many times I measured, it was very stressful to ensure the straps were the right length when you weren’t entirely sure where the bodice would land on your body. Here you could try on the bodice, then place the straps in the hole, pin the right spot where they won’t fall down and sew them in from the inside seam.

This was also my first time doing a lapped zipper. Although there were some basic instructions, I did some research to make sure I was doing everything correctly, as the measurements are very precise on each side. This is not my favorite zipper type, but I feel confident I could do this one again if needed. There is a lot of info on the internet, which is good because I wasn’t quite sure what a lapped zipper was at first.

The other issue with this dress happened when using my tailor’s chalk to figure out where the zipper would go. My mistake was using my red chalk, because obviously white wouldn’t have worked. I guess maybe yellow would have been better? Too bad I don’t own yellow chalk. Anyways, the red stained the dress, and all the brushing in the world could not get it out. No problem, I thought, I’ll just wash it again with some stain remover. Still there. I even tried using some baking soda to scrub the fabric, which lightened the stain a bit, but unfortunately I could still see it. Since I know it’s there, maybe I’ll always see it. Hopefully in time, it will fade, but another disappointment with this fabric from Hawaii.

All in all, I think this is still a great summer dress. It really fit in with my vacation wardrobe in Bora Bora. Despite this fabric being problematic (and possibly cheap) I do like this print a lot. It does remind me of my time in Hawaii and tropical vacations in general. I just wish I had anticipated the issues with the fabric before I worked with it. I guess there is a lesson here to test things out with your fabric. And always use a color catcher.

Key West dress: My return to the machine

On By qplourdeIn Sewing Projects, Travel, UncategorizedLeave a comment

This spring, my sewing took a back seat to other, non-fiber related projects. That Larkin bomber jacket was really hanging over my head as the weather got warmer and warmer. The need for outerwear was gone, but I was determined to finish it this year and not put it off for the fall. I did eventually finish the coat. I like the result, but there was a slight issue with the zipper. I will go into that another time, as I don’t have any photos of this jacket as of yet.

This month, I was also able to quickly complete a dress for the summer, just in time for my future father-in-law’s birthday party. I had bought some colorful fabric when I was down in Key West in 2019 and I knew I wanted to make some sort of vacation dress with it. The store was called The Seam Shoppe and it was a cute little fabric store that had some great tropical themed prints. I failed to remember that this fabric wasn’t just colorful, but there was a big “fish” theme in the print. Oh well, it’s still very pretty and I love the feel of it. I decided on the Veronica Dress from Seamwork as I liked the simplicity of the style. The skirt ended up being perfect on it, but the top may be a bit too big. The fabric is probably rayon, so the dress will still feel nice and cool in tropical weather, but I’m wondering if I should have gone for a more strappy top. I still think this dress is a success and it fits pretty nice.

There is some elastic in the back, that gives it a nice shape. Matching some of the panels on this was pretty challenging, so it mostly matches in the front and sides, but the back is pretty mismatched. There wasn’t anything too crazy about this pattern, although I did find a video on YouTube that gave step by step instructions which I found helpful. The pattern directions didn’t have the best explanation for finishing the seams or installing the zipper, so the video was a great resource to follow along with to make sure I was doing everything correctly. The most confusing part was actually sewing in the neck facing, as these instructions were very confusing and the drawings didn’t really help too much. You have to sew the facing to the zipper tape at the top and then fold the sew allowances in when you sew the facing on at the top so that when everything is flipped out, it will be a clean seam.

I was terrified I was interpreting this wrong, and it took a few extra minutes of trying to figure out how it would work before I was able to sit down and sew this. Luckily I didn’t end up having to unpick anything and I got this stitching correct, but I was pretty anxious at this part. This sew-along was a life-saver, especially since Seamwork didn’t seem to have one on their website.

I finished the dress just in time for the birthday party and was able to show it off and try it out before I took it on a real vacation. I think this one will be coming with me to French Polynesia this fall.

Summer sewing is in full effect right now, as I just finished nice floral tank top for the season and I’m currently working on a retro-style romper! No real summer travel for me this year as I’m saving up for my destination wedding/honeymoon. I’m thinking maybe this summer I should focus on sewing up fabrics I’ve gotten on past travels, like this Key West fabric. It’s a good goal anyway!