Sew Over it City Break eBook: The Molly Dress

Following on from my review of the Sew Over It City Break Capsule Wardrobe, in particular the Molly Top, here's the sequel, the Molly dress. 

I don't usually wear this sort of dress- i.e. Knit and a shift sort of shape but I've recently discovered some tights that I can tolerate; they are not tights in the classic sense and let's not even talk about the name but they work for me, and this opens up wardrobe possibilities with some autumn and winter skirts at a length other than maxi.   I used fabric from Sew Over It, a present from my husband was some fabric of my choice for my birthday last month.  I knew this would work with this style as I think it is in the eBook.  It's a soft stable jersey called City Stripe. A mix of fabric snob and sensitive skin has always put me off this fabric like this with a high manmade content but this is lovely quality, has a great feel and is a dream to work with.  It's very stable and behaves itself beautifully at all times.   I had quite a bit left over, maybe a skirt next?

I have a couple of tips for handling the stripes.  Firstly, for stripe matching when cutting out my top tip is to draw a vertical chalk line on the reverse of the opened out fabric, place the front or back main piece against the line. Pin in place and cut out the half up to the fold line, then flip it over the fold.  Match the stripes, pin again and cut. Follow the pins and you can just about see the underarm area in the camouflage picture below!

My other tip is to hand baste the neck band firstly in half to keep it folded, then hand baste it to the dress neckline. This then allows you to be very precise if sewing with an overlocker and to keep an equal distance from the seam and the parallel stripe the same all round without having to worry about anything slipping - with this level of contrast any deviation would be rather obvious.

Construction/Alterations 

I cut a size 8 as with the Molly Top but I did make alterations.

1. Did a rounded high back adjustment of ¼" using the Fit for Real People book.

2. Added ½" to the hem so I could take up a slightly deeper hem than the stated ⅜"- final length only slightly added to.

3. Added ⅜" to arm length to make them slightly longer for colder weather. 

4. Tapered side seam from just below underarm with a reduction of ½" at the waist front/back and on each side and tapered down to the hip  The lower skirt width is unaltered.

5. As with the Molly top I used a longer length for the neckband as the fabric wasn't especially stretchy and used the Colette neckband tutorials My neckband was 90% of neck seam length, plus seam allowances.  The neckband width was reduced by ⅜" on each long edge.  

My photos are a little lacking in smiles, I had a heavy cold at the time and I wasn't feeling my best (all recovered now) and that rather belies how happy I am with this dress!  It's comfortable and easy to wear and has that chic style that a navy stripe so easily creates.