Finished Project: Emery Dress

Emery

Oh, hi friends! Thanks for your comments on my Mad Men Challenge inspiration post. The collages were fun to put together and I think the process of making them actually helped me to narrow down my choice for my entry this year. More on that soon.

As I mentioned previously, I'm ready for some spring time weather, sunshine, and fun dresses. Luckily, I'd recently (oops, like 6 months ago?) picked up the Emery dress pattern by Christine Haynes. If somehow you haven't seen her patterns or Craftsy class online, perhaps you've seen the blog tour for her new book. The book looks amazing and seems like it will be a super helpful reference for many levels of sewist. Everything Christine comes out with seems to have great thought put into it, while also being chock full of pretty imagery and cute vintage touches. What's not to love? Well, after seeing about 387 adorable Emery dresses out on the internet, I decided it was about time I made my own.

Well, the hype is legit. I cut a straight size 8 and didn't make any adjustments, other than using the largest size for the gathered skirt, to get some extra gathering poufyness in there. The dress fits pretty great right out of the envelope. And it has pockets. Another thing I like about this one? The bust darts fell in the correct place, the back upper and lower darts are longer than most I've seen and really help shape the bodice, there's no neckine gaping, the cut and style play well with lots of fabrics, including fun printed quilting cottons, and IT'S CUTE!

I picked two coordinating quilting cottons from JoAnns and was excited to be able to browse that section without having to lie to myself that the fabrics would work! At the fabric store, quilting cotton always seems to have the most fun prints but is not necessarily the most versatile fabric, especially when all you want to sew is clothing. The Emery dress worked great with the cottons I chose and I'm eagerly planning my next version (in which I'll actually do a good job when setting in the sleeves and lining the bodice).

That's all for now, y'all. If you have a spare few moments, I highly recommend picking up the Emery pattern and whipping one up to add to your wardrobe. You won't regret it!