It was hard for me to believe, but after I finished making dress one, I realized the only other dress shirt I had in my donation pile was this women's shirt that my mother no longer wore. She had offered it to me a while ago but when I tried it on there was just something a bit too dated about it for my taste (and hers, too).
The upside to the shirt, however, was the textured design on the front and the flap of material down one side of the front opening that was concealing the buttons (the 'fly front' to be exact). Since this dress was made from a women's size small, I used the existing hem at the bottom of the shirt as the bottom hem of the dress.
The design is very simple, but I think it articulates the best qualities of the shirt.
This dress shirt belonged to my husband and I loved when he would wear it. The fabric is soft, isn't too thick, and is white with light blue pin-stripes. He wore it for years to work and he would still be wearing it if he had not gotten a small stain on the front pocket that I couldn't get out no matter how hard I tried.
Studying the shirt before I started cutting out my pieces, I knew I wanted to celebrate the best parts of this particular garment. I wanted to keep the box pleat from the back of the shirt and the button placket from the front so that it would always speak to the men's dress shirt that it was previously. Inside, I decided to keep the label because I thought it would be a good way to pay homage to the shirt's past life. (I have since opted to remove the existing labels.)
I added the front ruffle to disguise the buttons a bit and add a little visual interest and femininity to the dress. Overall, the dress turned out fine, but mainly it served as a highly useful test for a lot of issues that I have since worked to perfect.
My favorite moment was when my husband saw the dress for the first time and remarked that it was really special to see our daughter in something that he had worn so close for so long.
I have been making things for my daughter Adeline to wear off and on for a year now (she just turned two in May). I started last summer with a simple pillowcase-type dress after dusting off the sewing machine my Grandmother gave me five years or more ago.
I have never had a sewing lesson. In fact I have never even sat down with anyone and been shown anything about a sewing machine. Basically I just decided I wanted to sew and pulled out the manual and taught myself. As I was learning, I also found some great online tutorials that helped me figure out some of the important steps to making clothes. It has been amazing how fast the learning curve has been for me once I jumped in and got started.
The process of sewing a dress, for instance, is much like making a model in architecture. With each model you make, your craft gets better and better. You start to learn where you can take shortcuts and when and where it is best to give extra time and attention.
I am clearly not a professional seamstress. In fact, I am actually a licensed architect. Some of my favorite projects so far in my career are those where I was able to work with the original architecture to renovate it into something new and hopefully better- functionally and aesthetically. From this, it just makes sense that the sewing projects I was beginning to enjoy the most were those where I would use an existing article of clothing and repurpose it into something new for Adeline. My first repurposed project was a cardigan that was ill-fitting on me, but had nice colors and good buttons.
I was so very, very proud of this jumper for many reasons. One, it fit her! Two, the seams and stitches were nice and straight! Three, I recycled something instead of buying something new! And four, it made Adeline super soft when I hugged her! All good things. This was when the bug really bit and I started scouring the internet for inspiration on what I should make next.
Unfortunately, I found so many ideas that I was nearly paralyzed. Instead of actually making anything, I would spend hours looking at what other people had made. I stock-piled clothes that would have gone to Goodwill with the promise that I would turn each piece into something new for Adeline to wear. Collecting and looking, but not making. This is the key. You have to MAKE. I tell my students this all the time. It's not enough to think about your idea; you have to MAKE IT. Draw it. Model it. Make it. Stop talking and make something.
So I did. I took one of my husband's old dress shirts and made it into a dress. This design inspired what is now Little Grey Line.
