Careful readers of A Dress A Day (are there any other kind? I think not) will have seen this dress twice before; it’s definitely one of my favorites:
The buttons are probably my favorite part — they’re covered with another black&white alphabet fabric at a different scale:
There are a lot of things I’ll do differently when I make this pattern again. For instance, I don’t think the placket edges need to be edgestitched:
And when I first put in the zipper, I started the top too low and the fabric ripped at the stress point — you can see the repair below (I also replaced the zipper):
Here’s the back, it’s off-center on my dress form but not in real life, really.
This is from Butterick 7513:
Honestly, I don’t know why I don’t make this all the time, it’s super-comfortable and not very demanding. It might be because I tend to shy away from center-front skirt seams, but I’m getting over that. Maybe I’ll give this one another shot soon …
And in Hundred-Dresses-The-Book news, did I already link to this nice HuffPo slideshow? Check it out!
A Dress A Day 
Letter perfect.
I know a really stupid joke “17!”, but it involves jumping up and down and arm gestures, won’t work in a comment box.
That’s a good repair.
LikeLike
I just love the sleeves on this. fitting sleeves can be a nuisance – particularly if you are not a standard size and have to fiddle about with the bodice anyway. Dolman sleeves can solve this problem. To say nothing of saving time!
LikeLike
Great fabric, love the sleeves.
LikeLike
I never would have looked at that pattern and that dress and put two-and-two together. Just goes to show what impact fabric choice has on the outcome! Looks great.
LikeLike
Love your site (I was a beta-reader for your incredible book!) and I have a question…how many yards of fabric does this pattern call for? I’m off to Japan next week and I want to buy fabric and have a dress made for me when I get home. I need to guess on yardage as I don’t have a pattern. But I figured that if I calculated from a sleeved, wide skirted, calf-length pattern, I would have enough for that or something that needs less material.
Thanks for your help!
LikeLike
Ooh, thanks so much! Copies are still en route because I wanted to add a little something extra. 🙂
BUT: fabric. I generally buy five yards of 45″ and three of 58-60″ wide fabric, which is enough to make just about anything. If something is super-expensive I will take it down one yard and resolve to make something with a narrower skirt. 🙂
You may find this post helpful: http://www.dressaday.com/2007/03/05/howto-buy-fabric/
LikeLike