Made by a Fabricista: A Fruity Spring Dress

After a year in yoga pants and sweatshirts all I want to sew are dresses. Big, over the top, wonderfully floaty dresses. I loved this fruity chiffon border print from the moment I saw it and knew it had to become one such dress. Much like florals, I absolutely adore fruit prints on fabric, so to find a fabric with both was a real treat.

Chiffon is one of those fabrics a lot of sewists seem to be afraid of, and I don't blame them, it can be very tricky to work with. However, I strongly believe in doing difficult things, because the end is so worth it and you have the chance to learn new things along the way.

I've only sewn with chiffon a couple times before so I decided to go with a pattern that didn't have any tricky closures and or require a lot of careful fitting. I ended up settling on Simplicity 8872, view A – a maxi length pullover dress with a tiered skirt and cap sleeves.

I started with a small bust adjustment (SBA). I do this with nearly every pattern because I tend to fall into a sewing A cup and most patterns are drafted for a B or above. If, like me, you fall into this category I highly recommend learning how to do an SBA. I personally think this video from Sew Essential is a great place to start.

The next tricky bit was lining. I used a peachy pink acetate lining that really softens up the white background of the chiffon. Because this chiffon is quite sheer, I ordered an equal amount of lining as the main fabric and used it to fully line the inside of the dress. I sewed facings cut from the main fabric to the bodice lining pieces and then treated them as one piece, this allowed me to line the bodice but still only have the main fabric visible around the V neckline. I cut the skirt lining pieces a few inches shorter than the main fabric and without the tiers.

I wanted to highlight the bold colors of the border of this fabric so I used it on the cap sleeves and to define the bottom of each skirt tier. Border prints are great because they can do a lot of heaving lifting in the design of your garment. I finished it with a rolled hem on my serger, which took a full eight minutes of non-stop sewing due to the nearly 4 yards of hem!

The end result reminds me a classic 70s prairie dress in the best kind of way. I believe however, that thanks to The Great British Sewing Bee, we're now calling this style a “buffet dress” which is fine by me. I have the perfect dress for Sunday brunch!