A New Summer Dress

This dress has been in my head for quite some time. It is a combination of several pieces: this Flickr dress, the fabric combination from one of AMH's Evening Empire dresses in her Little Folks voile line, and the Heather Ross smocked sundress.

It was fairly simple to make. Corinnea was kind enough to share some directions on her Flickr photo. I measured my chest and the desired length and made 2 panels with those measurements. I made the dress a bit A-line as well. I sewed the bottom strips on using french seams for a more finished look and to prevent too much fraying.

I followed the Heather Ross's shirring tutorial I had used for my daughter's sundress (detailed here) for the top and straps. Then I sewed the sides together and tried it on for fit. I ended up taking it in a bit more at the waist. Then I trimmed up the side seams and finished them off with a zigzag stitch to prevent fraying.

Overall the dress took me about 4 hours. The french seams added a bit of time, but I finished it in 1 nap time + 1 evening.