Completely unexpectedly, here is my second finished
Coco. This time the dress.
Last week I started a muslin of a pair of Colette Clovers, but after sewing the muslin went a bit blah about the project and put them aside. I then cut out another
Kanerva, but didn't have the right thread to start sewing up so on Friday, so thought I'd cut out the fabric for another
Coco.
I bought 1.2m of this slightly stretchy knit from Tessuti when I was there in January (It's called Ocean scallop lace and is 4% elast & 96% polyamide). When I bought it I thought it might make fun leggings and even bought the
Megan Nielson leggings pattern to make them up.. but then got cold feet (or legs) and never went through with it.
On Friday it seemed right to cut this fabric as a Coco. My first Coco is quite fitted so this time for a dress version I cut straight down the side, omitting the slight tapering that happens as I was looking for a slightly more 'swinging' version. I didn't quite have enough fabric so cut the sleeves cross grain (?) which turned out perfectly as I used the selvedge omitting the need for a hem.
Before I knew it, the dress was cut and I was overlocking the seams. With my first Coco, I sewed then overlocked for neatening, but with this one I went straight to overlocking. This always causes me a bit of a problem with the sizing as I always find it hard to overlock at big seam widths. I need to get out the manual and read this bit again. I admit to running down the sides quite a few times until I was happy with the fit across the shoulders. My first one fit so perfectly that it was weird to try this one and find it so big across the shoulders. It is still not perfect with a bit of excess but not a huge deal. A product of a different fabric weight as well as no funnel neck perhaps.
By the time the sides were sewn up I knew I wanted to wear this dress to a party we were going to on Saturday afternoon. After all I only had the neckline and hem to do. Now Saturday mornings are extremely busy so this probably wasn't the best idea but my mind was made up. The clock was ticking. I put out a call on instagram to
Kelly and others as to how to hem as I don't love knits. Lots of suggestions were to just cut the scalloped edge, but given the weight and content of this fabric, I was worried about it rolling or fraying and Kelly suggested heming with bias tape.
I popped down to
Addicted to Fabric during Oliver's piano lesson and they convinced me to use elastic in the neck and as a hemming tape. It was genius. I probably could have stretched it a bit more at the neck for an even flatter result, but I like how it makes the neck sit really flat and I like the weight it gives to the hem.
The only thing I regret was that I originally sewed the neckline and hem using a zigzag stitch. I hate this stitch. I tried to convince myself that no one would notice it but couldn't. So after finishing it and dropping Oliver to a birthday party, drove with purpose home to unpick it and use my twin needle. Do you know how hard it was to unpick this!? Mmm, so unpicking finally finished I loaded up the twin needle but didn't change the stitch (because let's face it, now it was almost time to be leaving for the party and I was a bit panicky) and immediately broke the needle as the machine tried to do a zigzag. #$%! No spares. Urgh. So single stitch it was around the neck as I faced the reality that going out to get another needle would be unsafe!
The hem remains zigzagged and will forever because let's face it, no one is going to notice that part of the dress. I took these photos Sunday morning, recreating my look from Saturday afternoon. I really love the long socks with ankle boots look.. could be my Autumn style. I really like this look on me and think with the right fabric there might be another Coco in my life.
