Last night, some baseball game was playing instead of the shows I would have been watching, so I wasn’t allowed to slack off on finishing my dress. All I had left was attaching the embellishments and hemming the skirt, so it wasn’t a lot of work, just took a few episodes of Law and Order to complete.
Spent about $10 at JoAnn’s for more thread, twin needle (that I proceeded to break), and pearls, so in all, I spent $35 on this dress (including shipping and handling for the fabric). Not bad!
Ta-da!
The rosettes are a little different from the original since they seemed to blossom out more, I didn’t feel the need to the bottom petals like on the original. I used this tutorial here for these rosettes. It was pretty simple and they looked beautiful!
Close-up of embellishments
Pattern Description
Simplicity 2692: One shoulder dress with midriff panel and gathering at shoulder and around bodice and skirt. Essentially view C from this pattern with the shorter skirt.
Pattern Sizing
Initially cut out a size 12 (even though according to the pattern sizing, I’m a 14), but since I was using a knit rather than a woven, took it in about an inch on both sides to accommodate for the stretchiness of the fabric and the abundant amount of ease the pattern had.
Did it look like the photo/drawing on the pattern envelope once you were done sewing with it?
Pretty much! Although, I was attempting to replicate a dress that I saw on ModCloth, so I made some changes.
Were the instructions easy to follow?
Yes, however, this is the first Simplicity pattern that I’ve used that didn’t feel like the instructions were complete. For example, unless I majorly overlooked something (which is quite possible), for the view I used, the instructions to cut out two midriff pieces were missing.
What did you particularly like or dislike about the pattern?
I liked that this was a great, basic one shoulder top that can easily be adapted.
I didn’t like that the understitching took place AFTER you had sewn up the shoulder, which made it impossible to cover the whole neckline with understitching. I also didn’t like, for a lined garment, that the raw edges of the lining and fashion fabric were exposed on the inside. For this dress, it didn’t matter so much as I was using a knit fabric so I just overlock stitched the raw edges on the inside, but I think when I made it again with a woven, I’ll attach the midriff section differently.
Fabric Used
Solid Pink Jersey from MoodFabrics.com. It’s more of a flamingo pink than bubblegum. It was on sale for $7/yd, and I bought more than I actually used. Used the same fabric for the lining, the rosettes, and the leaf embellishments.
Pattern alterations or any design changes you made
Since I used a knit, I omitted the zipper. Also, gathering the shoulder with this knit was kind of a pain using the standard method of baste-stitch-then-gather, so I used the invisible elastic trick. Added some rosettes and other embellishments to make it look like the original design I was replicating.
Would you sew it again? Would you recommend it to others?
I have plans to replicate another one-shoulder dress with the same pattern, so yes, I’d definitely sew it again and recommend it to anyone who is looking for a basic one-shoulder dress pattern.
Conclusion
Aside from the construction oddities in the pattern instructions, it’s a good design. I really like that I could easily adapt it to suit my needs.
Twin needle hemming