All posts filed under: What I wear

Goodbye Summer Henrietta Maria by Scroop Patterns thedreamstress.com

A Hello, Goodbye Summer Henrietta Maria

My summer wardrobe got a bit of a thrashing last year, as it got carried over into a Hawaii trip in June, and an LA trip in August, so by the time October came around and it started warming up  in NZ I was pretty short on summer frocks and tops. In anticipation of nice warm days, I started making Scroop Henrietta Marias – my summer wardrobe staple.  I made one with a drawstring waist in rayon crepe (learn how to add your own drawstring waist here), and one in a Liberty of London silk-cotton blend. I’m not usually a huge Liberty fan.  The prints don’t really make my heart pitter-pattern, and the new Liberty fabrics just don’t feel as nice as ones from 15-20 years ago.  Liberty fabrics are NOT cheap, and I don’t feel that the quality of the fabric is good enough to justify the price any more. However, this Liberty  IS from 15 years ago, is delicious to wear and work with, and was ridiculously, ridiculously cheap. Plus, I actually really …

Scroop Henrietta Maria with a drawstring waist thedreamstress.com

How to add a drawstring waist to the Scroop Henrietta Maria Dress

I’ve already shown how to add an elastic waistband to the  Scroop Henrietta Maria dress, but there is another way to add waist definition (other than the simplest of all: wearing a belt, of course!): with a drawstring. Here is how to create a drawstring on the Henrietta Maria.  This technique will work on any loose, straight-cut dress, so feel free to adapt it for other garments. You’ll be marking the waistband, working buttonholes for the drawstring to enter and exit through, sewing a casing  channel, and then threading the drawstring through.  Easy! You’ll need: Ribbon or twill tape for a drawstring – under 1/2″ wide, and long enough to go around your waist, tie in a nice bow, and hang down an attractive amount. 2.5cm/1″ wide single-fold bias tape, as long as the finished waist measure of your Henrietta Maria (measure around your finished dress, or refer to the Finished Garment measurements in the pattern) + 15cm/6″. Chalk or fabric markers for marking A french curve or ruler. A scrap of lightweight fusible interfacing, …

The Can of Worms skirt thedreamstress.com

The Can of Worms skirt

Sometimes sewing projects go to plan. And sometimes sewing projects seem like they are really simple, and then get more, and more, and more complicated… I’m sure you can guess which one this is from the title! The Can of Worms skirt  didn’t even start out as a skirt.   It started out as a dress that looked like this: I bought the dress while op-shopping with  Lauren of Wearing History after Costume College last August.  It wasn’t quite right: the zipper was a terrible mess, and it needed a sway back adjustment (SBA). But the fabric was amazing: hand worked embroidery, indigo dyeing and reverse applique.  I suspect it’s Hmong in origin. So I bought it, figuring I’d put in a zip, do a quick SBA, and everything would be fabulous. Haha.  Famous last words. I bought it in early August, but didn’t get around to altering it until mid  November, by which time I’d entirely forgotten about the SBA. So I unpicked the terrible zip, realised  that the stitching holding the skirt to …