Highland Thistle Dress

I LOVE this fabric and have finally been brave enough to cut into it and made myself a dress for the winter here in Scotland.  The fabric is a good quality knit fabric designed by Anna Maria Horner.

I was originally going to use the Colette Moneta pattern for this fabric but decided to use Butterick 5523 instead.  I have made this dress twice before (as a sleeveless and in Autumn colours) and I love how comfortable as well as neat looking this dress can be.

As the fabric makes me feel all Scottish and Highland-ery, I thought I would drive up the road to get some photos of it.  Our village is situated right where two rivers and two Glens meet, so we have lots of hills very close to us.  These photos were taken up the Glen this morning, even though it is freezing cold, the sun was shining a wee bit!

no filter here - this is exactly how it looks today!

When making this dress I added 1" to the front bodice to help make sure that the empire line stayed under my bust.  I also added 4" to the hemline.  I used my overlocker to make this dress, which was so quick and easy, but when it came to adding the skirt to the top, I forgot that I was supposed to keep the seam allowance so that I could enclose the waist elastic within it!  I had just let the overlocker cut it all off!  Oh well, I shall see how the dress goes keeping it's shape without the added elastic for now.  I used a stretch twin needle on my normal sewing machine to sew the hem on the sleeves and the skirt hem.

(the flash went off in this photo, don't know why, but it was my last one, too cold today)

The pattern is supposed to have a small tab of fabric with two buttons on the back, but I messed mine up and couldn't be bothered making another one.  It looks quite okay without it anyway.

the back is pretty plain

Whilst I was getting these snaps a full rainbow came out, so I shall leave you with my lucky shot!

Autumn is making me Blue

Like so many countries, Scotland is just beautiful in the Autumn.  The air now has a crispness to it that wasn't there a week ago and I love it.  

Long sleeved t-shirts have been a staple in my wardrobe ever since I moved to Scotland, and I have acquired quite the collection of these long-sleeved-lovelies so I want to let them be seen.  The answer came to me after I made Butterick 5523 in May this year.  I could make this comfy and practical knit dress without the sleeves and collar in a neutral tone that would blend in with lots of my long-sleeved-lovelies and let their colours and prints really sing.  But the colour would also need to go with my boots - I practically live in boots during the cold months and have 2 great pairs: tan and navy blue.  And so my blue tunic was born!

Lucky me - beautiful country!

I am loving this dress and have already worn it to work, to meetings and on this day for a long car journey.  It looks great with a blouse underneath too and the fabric is quite a thick two-way stretch knit that doesn't crease too easily and is very warm.

I still love the back tab and pleats too!

Construction

I added 4 " to the hem and made some cutting changes to the neckline.  The original pattern has a collar but without the collar it would be too low, so you can see on the right hand piece in this photo I kept a bit of fabric in the dipped curve of the neckline.  On both the back piece and the front piece I folded the shoulder pieces in to eliminate a bit of width on the shoulder - I folded it to the 5/8 stitch line (you can just see these folds on the far left and far right of the photo below)

back pattern piece and front pattern piece

Now that it is finished and I have worn it a bit, there are three things that I am going to change about this dress.  Firstly my stretch stitch.  I chose a stitch that does 3 stitches then jumps to the side for one zig zag.  I used this on my other Butterick 5523 and it worked a treat.  But this time it looks awful.  The point of the zig zag stitch is really visible.  I should have had the bulk of my fabric inside the arm of my machine so that the solitary zig zag would point inwards towards the seam allowance, then the 3 long stitches would have created a sharper more regular seam line.  I am going to do the waist, side and shoulder seams again.  You can see what I mean about the visible solitary zig zag points along the waistline in the photo below.

The second thing I am going to change is the method I used to edge the neckline and armholes.  I just made it up as I went along when really I should have searched for a tutorial first.  As soon as I had cut out my bodice pieces I stitched a strip of white woven tape to the stitch line, 5/8 from the edge.  Then I folded over the seam allowance to the back and stitched it down onto the woven tape.  It does give it a firm edge and from the outside I am very pleased with the way it holds the shape of the fabric.  But the problem is that I can see the white tape!  I should have used black or at least have folded the seam allowance over further so that it would cover it up. 

Thirdly I wish I had made it two sizes smaller.  Now that there are no sleeves there is a lot of gape in the bodice beneath the arms.  I am going to take in the side bodice.

All in all, I do love this comfy, just-throw-it-on dress and it will get a lot of wear this Autumn.  This is also the first of my Fall Essentials Sew Along completed.  One down, four to go!

Highland Tunic

About a month ago, I had been gifted a large collection of a friend's mother's tapestry and embroidery sundries in a box, and in amongst all the unlikely-to-be-used items was some khaki patterned, heavy knit fabric.  Lucky me!  I knew exactly the pattern I wanted to try with it:

Butterick 5523

I used my usual preparation format for this make: cut out the paper pieces on a Friday, the fabric on a Saturday and then do the sewing whenever I get a chance through the week.

 

Here are a few detailed photos of the front cowl and pleats and the back with tab and buttons.

The photo of the close-up button is the closest to the true colour of the fabric.
The only alterations I made to the pattern were to add 5" to the hem and the instructions said to press a fold into the collar, but I wanted it to flop/drape wherever it fell, so I just left out the pressing part.

The Highlands near our house

The colours in this fabric really remind me of the hills around my house, so I am naming this dress after the Scottish highlands.  And to that end, these photos are all taken from the hills above our village (on a day filled with intermittent sunshowers mind you!)
I am trying to blend in with the moss and lichen and my camouflage dress.

My mister REALLY likes taking photos of waterfalls, and this is really close to our house, so I indulged him in return for a few photographs of my new dress. 

We had sunshowers all day today, but it does make for an atmospheric scene.  In the photo on the right  you can see some of our village.

    

This is the first of this pattern that I have made.  The second one is a sleeveless version and can be seen here.  This is such a comfortable dress and so versatile for my country lifestyle.

Below is a copy of my PR pattern review

Pattern Description: 
A tunic style knee-length dress for knit fabrics. It has a cowl neck, long sleeves and empire line waist with pleated skirt.
Pattern Sizing:
The pattern goes up to a size 24, which is the one that I made.
Were the instructions easy to follow? Make any changes?
There is only one page of instructions inside this pattern envelope, as it is a fairly easy make. It does say to double stitch everything, but I just used the stretch stitch on my machine instead, as it is very reliable. The one thing I did change was to add 5" to the hem, as I wanted it a little longer, but the pattern as it was would have hit me on my knee, and I am 5'7" so this would have been fine too.
What did you particularly like or dislike about the pattern?
I really like the neckline. The instructions say to press the fold into the doubled over neckline, but I chose not too, I am going to leave it to hang and drape how it falls. I like the piece on the back with the tab and buttons as a feature. The pattern also suggests putting 1/4" elastic around the waist, and I wasn't going to at first, but once I had tried it on I decided that I would. Without the elastic the dress looked a little too maternity-friendly on me. Encasing the elastic into the seam allowance helped to bring the dress in a little underneath the bust. 
Fabric Used:
I used a fairly substantial knit, it only stretched in one direction and perhaps only 20%.
Would you sew it again?
I would sew this again, but I'd try it without sleeves so that it was wearable with a top underneath, just to provide a bit of variety.