Made By A Fabricista: When in doubt, trust the description!

So happy to be back this year, posting on a blog that has taught me so much! If you have read any of my previous posts, THANK YOU! If not, let me make a quick and honest introduction. Actually, these three last words can define my sewing tendencies: quick (I love instant gratification projects), honest (I acknowledge flaws and errors), introduction (I am far from being a pro). And one last thing: I love colorful and flowy fabrics that go so well with the eternal Floridian summer.

The project I am sharing today has all these qualities! I made it a couple of years ago with one of my first Fabric Mart purchases. I found the fabric sticker to tell you precisely what it is: a great Polyester/Lycra Tropical Floral Print ITY Knit. At the time, I was an absolute beginner, so I purchased fabrics by just trusting 100% of the website description. Let me tell you: it works!

The ITY Knit Fabric section on the website says that “ITY knits are easy to sew with and quite popular for tops, dresses, skirts, and flowy pants. They come in a wide array of prints and solids. It’s great for traveling too because it does not wrinkle.” All true!

This fabric was definitely easy to sew. I had little-to-no experience with knits at the time I made this dress. I followed a free tutorial from BBlueDIY, which includes instructions to make your pattern. Knit doesn’t fray, and this one doesn’t even roll up, so I could sew it quickly. You can make this dress if you only know how to sew straight lines! I slightly modified the pattern by adding a waistbelt (in a beginner’s world, that counts as a modification). I opted to sew the bottom hemline with a decorative stitch for some reason. I guess I was still discovering my sewing machine and wanted to innovate a little! In hindsight, I would probably have made a subtler choice. Even an invisible stitch would have made the dress more elegant.

The colors on this fabric are vibrant, and the flowers are very detailed. The colors described on the website were: “Cool Silver/Amber/Ocean Blue/Sea Green.” I wasn’t sure about that “silver” component: the fabric looked white to me. Even in the pictures, under the sun, this dress looks white. But in person, the fabric base is - very light – silver, indeed! Unfortunately, there was no way to reflect that in my photographs. But one more time: the fabric description was on point.

Finally, saying that this fabric is “great for traveling because it does not wrinkle” is an understatement. My dress looks freshly ironed in these pictures, right? The truth is: it had been rolled up and squished at the bottom of my suitcase for a week, just before I took these shots! Another truth: it may look like a sunny summer day, but it was 44 degrees at that moment! But I was traveling, the setting was dreamy, and it was worth it! As they say in French: “il faut souffrir pour être belle [No pain, no gain!]”

As I usually do, I want to end this post with some “thank yous”. First, thanks to my photographer. This time, I was lucky to be photographed by my dad, on a beautiful winter morning, in a quaint street of Torroella de Montgrí in Spain. Yet another great thing about posting on this blog: it creates memories with the people I love. Thank you, Fabric Mart, for keeping me on board for one more year! And thanks to you, for reading! See you in my next post!

INES | @bynunis

Unfortunately Fabric Mart Fabrics sell out quickly!
You can find similar fabrics by shopping the following category, ITY KNITS.

Made By A Fabricista: A Tipsy Martini Transitional Three Piece Look

Hello Sewing Friends! It’s Sharon with Sharon Sews with my latest Fabricista make – a three-piece set I can wear as the weather transitions to fall here in Texas. It may look like a summer outfit but there will days filled with sunshine and high temps well into November. At first glance it looks like a nice, lightweight jacket, top and pants. But look closer – it’s sewn from the designer Tipsy Martini cotton sateen that was originally used by the designer for a pajama set. Now I could have sewn myself a pair of pajamas using the Closet Core Carolyn Pajama pattern (available at Fabric Mart) and replicated the designer pajamas. But if I had gone that route the only ones who would have seen this adorable kitschy fabric would be my family. This print is much too cute to hide out at home. This Tipsy Martini cotton sateen fabric was lovely to sew. I used black thread, an 80/12 universal needle, and Palmer/Pletsch Perfect Fuse Medium interfacing (link here). Note that this is a rayon fu

Made By A Fabricista: Hooray for Cozy Fall Sews!

Greetings, all! I am in such high spirits with the best-of-all-seasons just beginning and change is finally in the air. I always rejoice when the sweatiest time of the year passes and we can all take a deep breath and gear up for cozier times. Neighborhood Patterns is a new-to-me designer, and I came across them on Instagram in late summer and fell in love with the Plain Jane Skirt. This is such a simple A-line skirt, but with nice details like large inseam pockets and an optional drawstring, and though I’m sure I could draft this style myself, the appeal of having it all done for me was too tempting to pass up. A sew such as this is a lovely palate-cleanser and this was the first project I sewed after returning from a cross-country trip. Perfect! The gorgeous plaid flannel is exactly what I want to be wearing in the fall. The fabric is SO soft and a pleasure to snuggle up in. Because flannel does not have much body and is prone to stretching or shifting with all its mechanical give,

Made By A Fabricista: Quilted Jacket Chronicle

What do you get when mixing the best things about apparel sewing and machine quilting? A quilted jacket! It's funny that I elected to sew myself a quilted jacket for this Fabricista blog because I don't consider myself much of a quilter. I can count on my hands the number of quilted projects I've made over the last few years. While I fully appreciate the end product of quilting, I don't normally gravitate toward starting quilting projects. That's why making a quilted jacket is a new and exciting project for me! It gives me the fun of making a quilt on a much smaller scale. If you are an avid apparel sewist and are new to quilting, this is the perfect project to take for a quilting test drive! For my quilted jacket, I used the Seamwork Easton Jacket pattern. I decided to stick with a solid-colored fabric for the jacket's exterior and ordered 4 yards of Dark Umber Brown Lycra Stretch Canvas Suiting from the Fabric Mart website. I wanted a contrasting color for the

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