A 'Drapey' Japanese Bubble Dress

When I read about Japanese Pattern Sewalongs there is often a related increase in my sewing, and it was no different when Celina from petitapetitfamily.com and Mie from sewinglikemad.com wrote about their year long sewjapan series back in January.

This is the Japanese pattern book I chose as the dress on the cover is one of my favourites and sewn (& blogged) many times - a sweet version in ladybird corduroy & a pair of bubble dresses for twins.

This time I chose a drapey, pre-pleated fabric from my local fabric shop, though I had doubts if it would hold the 'bubble' effect of the fabric.

When it was sewn up, the fabric gave an a-line shape to the dress. My daughter who had wanted a more fitted dress was happier with this.

This bubble dress is easy to sew, and the Japanese instructions are easy to follow because of the detailed diagrams. My one issue with this pattern is the joining of the lining and the outer fabric which leaves an exposed seam.

As usual, I prefer a clean finish with all seams hidden, something that is particularly important for children's clothes.

For this version I cut the back pattern piece in two, rather than placing it on the fabric fold. (I listed the sewing instruction steps in this post). This allows the dress hem to be pulled out through the back seam and sewn so that it is hidden when the dress is finished . I then sewed an exposed zip and attached the lining at the same time to finish the dress.

The finish is so clean that the dress could almost be worn inside out.

The 'bubble' effect allows for the imagination of an active 9 year old!

We felt the solid colour of the fabric needed something else, so settled on adding ribbons to one of the shoulder seams. We decided that this brown stitched ribbon from janemeans.com would work. These can be left untied or tied in bows. Interestingly, after this was sewn, Burdastyle included a girls dress pattern in the March magazine which had wide ribbon on both shoulders!

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Fearless February & Serendipity

Participating in Steph's Tiramisu sewalong was a great motivator for me so I had been looking for ideas to 'encourage' my sewing in February. Victoria, who blogs at 'Ten Thousand Hours of Sewing' has been writing about challenging herself, and others, to sew projects that we have been putting off. She has come up with the Fearless February Sewalong and has lots of details on her blog, well worth reading. It took me 'till the very last day to sign up!

 

So what do I want to do for Fearless February? It's not a very long list, but I really, really want to be fearless about:

• Being a Pattern tester for Gather Kits. This is a first for me and I tend to make changes to most patterns I sew, so I hope it won't be too much of a challenge.
• Fun, frivolous sewing - the opposite of fearless! I have some lovely cotton fabric and trim from Abakhan Fabrics that I want to have some fun with!
• Drafting patterns. This is what I want to be most fearless about! I've pinned lots of vintage styles of girls dresses and coats, and want to try and draft a childs raglan-sleeved raincoat (like this, but with a hood) and depending how that goes, maybe a childs vintage-inspired dress!

 

Amazingly, once I had signed up for Fearless February, look what arrived in the post! Katie, who sews gorgeous clothes for herself, and her children and blogs at Kadiddlehopper held a giveaway and added an extra winner - me!

Not only did she send a beautiful piece of white fabric, but also 2 patterns and a book on drafting patterns for clothes! How incredibly generous, and what a coincidence that I have been thinking about drafting!

The book, Design-it-Yourself Clothes by Cal Patch, approaches pattern drafting by directly using our own measurements so I should be able to apply those principles to my daughters measurements, hopefully!!!

Here's to a very Fearless February!

 

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