The ongoing saga of the Liberty shirtdress, and a red skirt

Long time readers of my blog might remember my Third Time Lucky Blouse from last year. I had bought a vintage Liberty shirtdress that was several sizes too big. First round: Resize it, second round: remake it into a M6696 shirtdress with a straight skirt, forgetting I have hips, third round: blouse with a mandarin collar. As I said in the post at the time, I realized I should have tapered the placket at the neck to make the collar sit properly, but I was happy to wear it high buttoned. However, I only ever wore it the one time, and back to the pile it went. I had enough left over scraps to piece together the collar sections, and once I'd sewn it together, I unpicked the top seam on the collar stand, and sandwiched the collar in before hand stitching it in place. Two hours worth of work, and finally the blouse is wearable, and the saga of the liberty shirtdress comes to an end.

 Every year my grandmother's retirement village has a big spring fete. I al ways end up at the craft stall (when not at the books). Most of their stock is handmade items made by residents, but this year I was lucky on the sewing front. I bought a large amount of vintage zippers and bias binding, patchwork scraps for my hexagon quilt,  and this red fabric. It seems to be a wool, but it's light enough for summer.  I managed to just cut out  Simplicity 6862, the best ever skirt pattern and I
added in a side seam pocket out of some old red floral from my first dressmaking project. Nice and simple. It's going to go with a lot of my blouses.

That's all to say on that. I've been loving reading everyone's plans on sewing in 2017, so I'll be back in a few days to share mine. Needless to say, it's a lot of vintage florals!

A Half Shirt Dress

A few weeks ago I found this lovely floral  fabric at the opshop. It seems to have been a dirndl skirt that had the waistband taken off, so there was a lot of fabric to work with. When deciding what to make, I went with my favourite dress pattern McCalls 6696, as it just fits so well, and I love a shirt dress. I shook it up though by turning the pattern into a half shirt dress- one that only buttons to the waistband, and closes with a side zip. I used this great tutorial by Idle Fancy as a guide. If you love a good shirt dress, do check out Mary's blog, she's the one who converted me to McCall's 6696.

The other slight change I made was to not have a working button band. I simply sewed on the buttons, and ensured I left enough room to get it over my head. I've just popped in a safety pin to ensure the neckline sits neatly.


I love the details that go into a shirtdress, I hand sew all the insides, which can take a while, but I got this dress churned out in about a week, I think I just very much wanted to wear !

This photograph probably gives the best idea of the true colour. The Burda pattern was my first choice, but in the end I wanted a quick make without the challenge of pattern fitting.
McCall's 6696 both days so far. I will try to be doing daily Instagram pictures, but my iPad charger is playing up, so it will probably be weekly blog round ups. I have a lot of almost finished garments lined up as well, so there should be a lot more to share over the coming weeks

Third Time Lucky Blouse

 This blouse has been  very long time in the Last year, I found a Liberty 1960's shirtdress in the opshop. Of course I bought it, knowing I could turn it into something wearable.















Attempt one: I detached the bodice and skirt, added some darts to the bodice, as it was a few sizes too big, then I sewed it all back together. I wore it like this for a while, until one day y husband admitted it looked a bit frumpy. I'd been thinking the same, the whole thing didn't fit well, so back to the sewing pile.

 Attempt two: M6696, straight skirt version. The whole thing was a jigsaw of pattern pieces, but I got it made up until the point where you handsew down the button plackets. But I had forgotten to account for hips. My hips are quite large, and I had stupidly cut a 12 all over, where I should have graded the skirt out. There was no way that skirt was fitting down there. So I had to unpick all that work. Luckily I caught it before the handsewing had happened.









Third time lucky: using the skirt fabric, I cut an extension, and attached it to the bottom of the blouse section. Finally, wearable.

M6696 makes a great blouse pattern, and I'm hoping to make it again. I went with a mandarin collar partially because of fabric shortage, and partially for something different. I realise now mandarin collars really only work when the placket is curved to open the shirt at the neck. But I found a little gold brooch and wore the shirt completely buttoned up. It was comfortable, and looked good.

The buttons are from the original shirt dress. I am so happy this is finally finished and wearable. Whilst I would have loved it as a shirt dress, it's going to be a great blouse.

The perfect shirtdress

I am so excited to have this dress finished, and ready to show you.

This is McCalls 6696, in the remainder of my bridesmaids dress fabric. When I was doing the wedding sewing, I bought ten metres of this gorgeous green, pink and cream floral. Because I was cutting out the dresses together, I ended up with a lot left over, and decided to make myself  a dress. I wanted something different from the bridesmaid dresses (which were BHL Anna bodice on Simplicity 2444 skirt), and decided I wanted to go with M6696.

After making my earlier version, this one was incredibly straight forward. Changes were minimal. I have eliminated the back gathers on the pattern, replacing them with the Simplicity 2444 back darts. I also shortened the bodice. Unlike my earlier version, I had enough fabric for the entire fullness of skirt. I also added about four inches to the skirt length, so it finishes mid calf. Unfortunately, these photos didn't turn out full length.

The buttons are plastic pearl-like shank buttons, which look great, an was much easier than trying to match the green.

Not too much else to say about this one, except I love it, and suspect it will be on high wardrobe rotation.

Vintage Floral Shirtdress

A long held sewing dream has been realised. I have finally made M6696. After seeing many amazing versions, especially all of Mary's and Heather's (I would steal both of these lady's wardrobes in a heartbeat), I knew I had to get hold of the pattern. I finally bought it a few months ago and it went on the back burner til after my thesis was finished.

Though the plan is to make many of these dresses, my specific plan was to use up the rest of my bridesmaids dress fabric. But because this fabric is very special, I knew I needed a wearable muslin first.

At first I wasn't too sold on this fabric. I picked it up very cheap at a market a while back (it was either fabric-a-brac, or the closing down sale of my local vintage shop). It's very 60's/70's, and was also very narrow. And even though I am a massive fan of florals, I felt it was a little too girly. I thought a shirt dress would work well, as the more structured lines would make less girly. However, after making and wearing this dress, I love the fabric. Funny how that happens.





I made a few minor changes to the pattern. I really do not like the back gathers that come with the pattern, so I modified the back pattern piece to the darts of Simplicity 2444. This was also a trick I did with my wedding dress. Secondly I shortened the waist half an inch. This makes a massive difference. I am finding a few of my older dresses are too long in the waist, so this will be a standard adjustment from now on. For reference I cut a size 12 with the A/B cup.

I also modified the skirt slightly, but this was to do with the width of the fabric. The fabric wasn't wide enough to take the full pleated skirt. I deliberated on using the straight skirt option, but I was concerned it would need a bit of fitting over the hips, so stuck with the fuller option. My modifications were very unscientific. The waist seam just fit across the width, and then I folded in the rest of the pattern to fit.

The dress went together really easily. I used Four Square Wall's collar tutorial and it went in smoothly first go. I hand sewed down everything.

Pattern: McCall's 6696

Size: 12A/B

Fabric: Vintage floral, picked up second hand

Adjustments: Back gathers to darts, shortened waist, narrowed skirt

Notions: Pink shank buttons from Reverse Garbage

Wear with: pink pearl set, and pink ballet flats

Make again? Yes, I am hoping this pattern will become a TN.

Hoping to be back soon with the bridesmaid dress fabric version