FINISHED! Lauren's Leaf Viviane

Tessuti has just received some of the Winter 2014 Liberty range so upon hearing this news last Wednesday I immediately went to the site and bought two pieces. This is one of them. Laurens Leaf in Blue. The fantastic thing about being in the Southern Hemisphere is that even though we are a season behind, with Liberty releases the fabric and colour palette are perfect for the current season in Australia. Thank you Liberty!

Here is the fabric story:

Lauren’s Leaf Liberty fabric was created from the leaf imprints of the world-changing indigo, upland cotton, hemp and white mulberry. Respectively, these plants have helped bring about Indian independence, fund an industrial revolution and produce the world’s first jeans. White Mulberry is the food of the silk worm.

My intention was to make another Burda wrap blouse with the fabric so only bought 1.5m but when I opened the package (a mere 24 hours later), I immediately changed my mind. The fabric was just so beautiful that I decided to try the Viviane dress by Republique du Chiffon.  I have been on a bit pattern buying binge with Republique du Chiffon. I have bought 4 from the new season release, with 2 still on their way from France. Fortnunately this one I was able to buy as an English PDF and get straight onto it. 

The pattern prints out overlapped, so you have to trace and add seam allowance. The pages printed out well and I had no problem assembling them. The pattern calls for 1.8m but I got lucky as I think I got a few bonus centimetres of fabric, so with an adjustment for my height and given the width of Liberty I was able to get the dress out of this meterage.  

I was nervous about the yoke. Not just because stylistically it is bold (and I was just a little bit worried about pulling it off), but also because of the quilting. Thank goodness for walking foot. The yoke is a wool batting with a voile (with interfacing underneath to help with the colour). I usually hide my stitching in busy patterned fabric, so I'm pretty proud of my efforts with this dress.  Especially with the sewing to attach it. But maybe not so much that I didn't clear off all the chalk before taking these pictures!  So now you will be subjected to close up photos!

Rue des Renards suggested after making her super cute Viviane that to get a good curve on the bottom that it would be good to make up a facing. So I did and it worked well.

The rest of the make is straight forward.  The instructions are brief but useful and even provide advice for when to overlock the seams.  I was amazed that the sleeves eased in as well as they did given the bodice had the quilted yoke, but it did. Afterwards I did consider overlocking the armscye seams together rather than separately (as per the instructions) but decided to leave well enough alone. Sadly, I had a brain freeze at one point where I didn't overlock the seams on the shoulders because I thought they would be concealed. Aaah, they aren't.

Other than an adjustment of about 8cms off the length of the bodice (using my other drop waist dresses as a guide,yes, I do love a drop waist: the Malvorosa and the Pattern Runway shirt dress) I didn't make any other changes to the 36.  It fits like it should (for someone who isn't overly obsessive about fit) and the little bit of extra width and flare at the bottom of the dress makes it fun to wear.

I admit, this dress style isn't for everyone. Ben said to me that it is 'special' which is his word for 'mmm, I'm not sure about it' and the boys said that they thought it was funny.  But I like it. I wore it to work today and it made me feel... well, happy and original. So that's a win in my book.