SNYPH part two: 1940s wrap dress

In the latter half of 2014, I started to consider taking up sewing. There are loads of places in London offering beginner sewing classes, but I went with Sew Over It basically because they dangled this dress in front of me as something I could learn to make. I took their introductory class in January, their beginner dressmaking class in May, and just as I was starting to consider wrap dress-level skills within my sights, they removed it from the website entirely. I got a bit cross.

But then, in November, they put it back up and advertised a class for January.

Me: They're doing the class again! But's £150 and I just quit my job.
Boyfriend: Yeah, but that dress is basically why you started sewing in the first place.
Me: ...good point. Excuse me while I go and give them my money.

The pattern is based off a vintage 1940s pattern, so it has lots of little details - back neck darts, shoulder tucks, puffed sleeves, gathers at the collar and small gathered points along the waistline. Most of the things I've made so far have been pretty simple in design, so even though sewing these details is well within my skill set, it felt like quite a departure from the norm and I really enjoyed it. It's even made me consider busting the Vintage Vogue dress pattern out of my stash.

I made a size 14, grading out slightly at the hips. The dress is fastened with two poppers along the waistband, so there wasn't a whole lot of fitting to be done, but the one criticism I have of the class is that there wasn't enough time to get the poppers positioned correctly. It's actually really hard to do by yourself, and though the way I have them now still isn't quite right, I'm not going to attempt to re-do it until I have some help. The fabric is a crepe I bought in the Sew Over It shop - it drapes really nicely and I love the colour so, so much, but the static is INSANE. I've never come across anything quite like it. It sticks to everything and makes the most horrendous ripping noises when I take the dress off. It's annoying, because I have so many patterns that call for crepe and they sell so many strong solid colours (given the option I would cheerfully sew with nothing but strong solid colours), but I just don't think I can wear this stuff. Gah. I'm going to try running it through the wash a couple of times before I give up on it entirely. I will report back.

The instructions called for hand-finished hems on the skirt and sleeves. I did the sleeves by hand, but decided to try out my new blind hem foot on the skirt. Which sort of worked. I don't think I've got the technique quite right yet, and this fabric really does show stitching, but on darker or thicker fabrics I will definitely be doing machine-stitched blind hems again. I'm not a patient person, especially not when it comes to hemming, and I always feel like my hand stitching isn't particularly secure on longer lengths of fabric.

I will probably make another one of these if I can find a fabric I'd like to make it in, but what I'm more likely to take from this project is that sewing garments with details is actually really great and I'd love to do more of it. I'm not particularly interested in ransacking eBay for vintage patterns in my size (HAH) or spending hours grading them up once I've learned how to grade things (I think it's awesome that people do, but it's not for me), so quite how I'll go about it I'm not sure, but I'll be keeping my eye open for patterns and opportunities.

Yes, yes, I really like this dress. If only the static wasn't so bad. Is there a way to get rid of static in clothing other than rubbing dryer sheets all over it every time you want to wear it?