The White Wendy Dress

Tuesday was one of those days when a simple task that should have taken a couple hours ended up taking all day and still wasn't done and when any news was not good news. The great thing about those kinds of days is that there's plenty of room for improvement.

Cleaning the jewelry section took a little longer than I expected but now absolutely everything has been sorted into labelled jars. It's the beginning of a system that I am sure will be fine-tuned as I learn more about doing the work but for now, it's more organized than it was and this is good.

 

My friend Wendy is an amazing dresser. Her ability to put together and accessorize outfits inspires me and luckily we have the same body shape and similar taste. I've learned so much from her. The other day, she was wearing this white dress. The upper section is knit and the lower two are woven and between the upper and middle front pieces, there are inseam pockets. I told her when she took it off, I wanted to copy it and that's what I did yesterday.

The garment is symmetrical which made it easier to copy by folding on center and tracing each section. To do that, I lay white paper over my pressing surface, pin along the seam lines, and then mark the pin positions with a line of pencil dots that I then connect to get the shape of each piece. And then...

... I use a French curve to smooth out the lines. As you can see above right, copying can end up with some wonky lines that need to be reshaped. I sized up at the same time since Wendy is smaller than me and I wanted more width. I also...

... wanted the length to be just below the knee instead of just above so I added three inches to the middle and bottom sections and then cut apart the pieces and added seam allowances. When I traced the garment, I traced to the neck at center and to the underarm at the side and then used my favourite t-shirt pattern to draw the armhole, shoulder, and neckline shapes that I know work for me. On the original, the front has three sections and the back has two. On mine, both the front and the back have three sections.

Right now, I'm test sewing my draft and so far it's fitting together well. The top is a grey knit with a vertical, white pin-stripe that is hard to see. The middle section is linen and the bottom section is cotton - all remnants. It's basically a free dress! Next, I want to audition some fabrics for the neck binding and possibly for patch instead of in-seam pockets and figure out what sleeve length I want. I needed a fun, nurturing day in the studio and it was just perfect. YES YES!

Talk soon - Myrna

Grateful - a studio day