The Hera Dress

Happy Wednesday!  I hope everyone's week is going smoothly - I'm transitioning to a new department at work, so things are a bit busy.  But it beats being bored, so I'll take it!

The first half of the week has been pretty uneventful; I've made a couple of trips to Joann's Fabrics, went on a bike ride on Monday to take advantage of our fleeting gorgeous weather, made it to the gym yesterday and just general kicking around.  Nothing terribly exciting, although I did start the daunting project of reorganizing my sewing corner.

I'm set up in the breakfast nook off the kitchen, which is great because it has a ton of light.  I also like being on the main floor of the house, close to everything (I watched WAY too many scary movies in my teens to be sequestered upstairs).  The space is a good size, but I'm not using it in the most efficient way, especially since it's also an office space.  So last night I pulled out a stash of my "everyday" patterns (the rest are boxed up and stored), and I've started going through my fabric horde to plan the best method of storing.  Next step, figuring out shelving and reconfiguring furniture.

Sigh.  At least it's raining again, so my motivation for indoor projects will be higher.  I need to get this sorted out, especially because I've signed up for the One Week One Pattern challenge from Handmade Jane.  This will be my very first sewing challenge, so I'm pretty excited about it.  If the vacation project reinforced anything, it's that I work better under pressure!

So today, I'm posting yet another dress I cranked out for the Great Vacation Project, to try to incorporate some of my backlog of already-sewn pieces. 

Several months ago, I grabbed this fabulous peacock fabric at one of Joann's many 30% off sales...

 

It looks a bit brown, but it's a subtle gold surrounding the feathers.  I kept in my stash, waiting for the right project.  After a wildly successful test of the Flora dress, I knew I found it.

Once again, the ladies at By Hand London offer a FAN-FREAKING-TASTIC sew-along on their site, that outlines both the v-neck and tank versions of the pattern.  I skipped the paper instructions altogether, just followed the online tutorial.  Easy-peasy.  I especially love the instructions for inserting the tabs - I think any of the large commercial patterns that try to pull that off would give someone a stroke.  These instructions were a breeze.



wanna-be Mad Men pose

Because I only had 2 1/2 yards of the fabric, I made a 1/4 circle skirt cut on the straight grain. My rationale is that it was more important to me to have the feathers in the correct orientation - I'm happy with it.

Some quick notes about the process... I self lined the straps so it wouldn't matter if the underside ever showed.  The bodice is lined with a remnant of inexpensive quilting cotton, and the lining is tacked at the waist seams and whipstitched (haha, my handsewing suuuuuuucks) at the zipper tape.  The zipper is, once again, a normal zipper inserted using the invisible zipper method.

NO idea what face I think I'm  making

The wrinkles in the back are from sitting, not stress wrinkles.  Promise.

I serged the hem and left it at that.  Super lazy, yes, and I was going to finish the hem after vacation.  But suprisingly, I get a ton of compliments from people that think it's a decorative stitch, so I'm just leaving it alone.

And thank you to my co-worker for snapping pics of me during our lunch hour.

So there you have it!  A quick update to break up the mid-week slump - the dress is a bit rumpled from sitting most of the morning, but it really is a lovely dress and a gloriously fun pattern to work with.  This is the second of four Floras I've made up so far, and I'm really enjoying working with it.  I have experimented with an unlined bodice finished with bias tape, but that's for a later day.

Halfway to the weekend!