living in the woods and making stuff

I have a sewing machine, fabric, and time to sew! I got this piece of fabric from India, and was going to save it for a tablecloth or something like that, but I held it up as a dress, and loved it!

First thing was to cut the neck, square to match the pattern.  The dress is rather shapeless, and almost more of a tunic. There is so much complexity in the pattern on the material that I didn’t think that it was necessary to shape the dress itself.

I decided on gathering the sleeves to add a little finishing detail. Because there is so little shaping, it needed a little something to add dimension. 

I tried belting the dress, but the fabric pattern didn’t lend itself to the shape created, and the dress ended up looking a little bit top heavy.

The length is a little shorter than I would have liked, but I wanted to end the skirt at the end of the pattern on the fabric, so no choice there…

The border is really beautiful, and I experimented with my new machine to sew the border by machine instead of by hand. (I got to my room this morning, armed with all my supplies, carefully collected and selected, only to realize that I didn’t have a sewing needle…)

The machine stitch worked well though, and I am excited to have learned how to do it.

I think that the fabric was tie dyed somehow, and there is a strong band of white going around the dress. I am considering dying the fabric a little with some coffee to darken the band. I think that I will have to wear the dress a little first to decide if I like the band or not.

The material might end up being a little rough for a dress, but I am going to give it a try, and wash and wear it a bit. I noticed a tag saying that it was a bed sheet a little bit after I had cut the hole in the top for the head…