Most of the time, I only sew when I’m at my Dad’s place. I do have a sewing machine in Heidelberg, but I don’t use it much except for the occasional repairs. Rooms look like a tornado hit them when I’ve used them to sew, and my apartment is tiny. This would work if I tidied the place the minute I finished sewing! Ha. No. I’d never do that, and I rather prefer not to step over leftover fabric and sewing equipment in the room I work and sleep in all the time. Consequently, I sew at my Dad’s place. Of course, I’m only there a few days a month, which means I’ve come to prefer easy sewing projects.

In a nutshell, I was all over this dress when I saw it in the fall/winter edition of Burda Easy. I decided to make it immediately in a fabric I found in my stash. This jersey was given to me by my mother, who originally bought it for herself but never came around to using it. To be honest, I kind of side-eyed it because these types of busy prints aren’t my thing at all normally: there are flowers exploding everywhere! And weird faces in-between! (What the hell are these faces.) But then I figured there were two possibilities when I made up this dress. Either I wouldn’t like it – then I hadn’t used a fabric I’d regret cutting up. Or the simple shape of the pattern would go well with the crazy explosions and faces, and I’d end up with a fun dress for the last warm days this year.

As you can see, I ended up with the fun summer dress. I even came around on the fabric! Except for the faces. I’m not entirely happy with the pattern placement, but I was so intent on avoiding faces in my crotch and boob area that I didn’t notice that now I have basically two faces stacked on top of each other on my left side. Oh well. I’m not especially bothered by that really, in fact, it kinda makes me laugh every time I see it. The fabric feels really soft and buttery on the skin, so it’s got that going for it!

The pattern calls for a zipper, I guess because you can make it up in stretch and non-stretch fabric. I installed one I had lying around despite using jersey, but it was of course absolutely unnecessary. In fact, there’s a lot of extra fabric in the back. Otherwise, this is an amazingly quick project. It came together in just a few hours. I’m glad to have a summer dress with sleeves, which is another reason why I was drawn to this pattern I think. (I like wearing sleeves, even if it’s hot outside!) I also love the version with a Peter Pan collar and especially the flouncy dress variation. I already made up the latter, actually, and I’m going to post about it next week! Stay tuned!

You can go over to Me Made Mittwoch if you want to and check out the inspiring projects by other creative ladies!

PROJECT OVERVIEW

Pattern: BurdaEasy H/W 2016 Nr. 2A

Fabric: a lightweight jersey