#i just assume everyone participating has some sewing knowledge but. friends from main may in fact. not

[bismuthburnsblue]

hi, its another part of design a dress! time for a bonus poll, andddd some very preliminary patterning notes !!

to recap, we are making: a sleeveless, circle skirt shirtdress, with a wing collar & dotted mesh overlay.

so, first off! i bought little pink flower buttons that i think compliment the fabric quite nicely!

and i was thinking, maybe there should be piping around the collar? i feel like the wing collar is the main feature of this dress, but it might blend a little too much into the rest, but putting hot pink flat piping around it will really highlight it! if i did do it, id be doing it pretty much as narrow as i could make it, just a hint of a line.

There are 2 dilemmas with this though- the first, obvious one, is i worry itll maybe look too pyjama-y. Thats the most common context you'd see piping like that, and not the image im trying to evoke. The secondary issue is with there i stop. The collar is gonna run directly into the buttons and right down to the hem of the skirt, leaving no clear stopping point. i could taper it off at the roll of the collar, or go down the shirt section of the buttonstand and disappear at the waist, or i could go all the way down- though i think maybe thats too far? i would be interested to hear what you think!

And now some fun notes about the very start of the pattern! i still dont want to commit to a timeline on this, but it is sparking my interest right now, so i may dip into some mock ups soon :)

Im thinking that im gonna use my Flora pattern as a jumping off point- princess seams seem like the sensible choice to me- doing darts with two layers of fabric is always... fiddly, so i think im going to sacrifice some of the impact of the print to have those be two separate pieces (technically i Could pattern match. but i wont.)(its gonna be hard to do with the shape of the pieces & inefficient on fabric usage, which is already a problem because its directional) theres gonna need to be some adjustments made- mostly to the centre front panel, between the grown on button stand & collar, but i think the bones are good!

Ive been studying grown on collars a bit too- its hard to find specific information for wing collars, but i think the concepts the same. im going to have to do a complete facing for the collar because of the layers (this is also why piping should be a straight forward add in, theres already a seam there anyway), and i was thinking of dragging it across to make a bastardised neck & armhole facing. it should give a nice clean finish to everything that way! technically, i could just do a complete lining, but i think id at least like to try it this way & see how it goes! Ive poked around very roughly with the way the fabric needs to fold and i really think it might come out looking good!