Embodiment of professional

I have an embarrassing story to tell. I went to a conference yesterday, Monday. The company that was sponsoring me was kind enough to put me up in a hotel for Sunday night so that I wouldn't have to wake up at the first glimmer of sunlight in order to make it for the Monday session. Excited that I had finished a shirtdress, I knew that nothing else was even in the running for my Monday outfit.

Come Monday morning, I took a shower and when I went to put on my dress I realized, with much shock and dismay, that I had forgotten to bring a bra! True craziness ensued as I figured out exactly how one can manage to look professional without a bra. I ended up wearing a tank top (the one I used to sleep in, yes, I am also the embodiment of clean) underneath the dress to sort of help smoosh and hold the girls in place. I think it ended up okay. When I got home I asked B if it was noticeable and he said he could hardly tell. Whew!

That being said, I came home and took some pictures of the dress. But this time, I put on a bra and took off the tank top (it sort of clashed anyways).

Burda WOF 06/2007 #139

Pattern: Burda WOF 06/2007 #139 -- New style for a feminine classic! Evelin Brandt's new-look shirtwaister has short, slightly puffed sleeves. The waist seam has been decoratively dropped and the skirt section is slightly flared. A wide black hemband and a narrow black petersham/grosgrain belt are great eye-catchers.

Size: 38

Fabric: 2.5 yards of cotton voile from Fabric Mart. I was totally drawn to the watercolor-ness of this print.

Construction Details: I used thread tracing for this project as there are many subtle curves and it was my first time doing this sort of collar so I really wanted to do what I could to make it turn out right. I also underlined the dress with a thin black cotton fabric. Both of these decisions resulted in a much longer project time than expected (this was one of the garments I tried to make for my vacation).


Two things that I find a little wonky are:
1. The collar. You can't really tell in these pictures but it sort of sticks up and doesn't lay flat like the Burda model's dress?


I went back to the instructions and it recommends a "lightweight fluid dress fabric." Is cotton voile not considered lightweight and fluid? Confused. Please help. It might be my interfacing too but I used a pretty lightweight knit fusible which I thought was appropriate. Maybe it wasn't?

2. The sleeve cap. The front of the sleeve cap didn't quite fit to the body. The instructions make no mention of having to ease this half of the cap and the line drawing doesn't show any gather lines but I definitely needed to ease the cap in, in order for it to fit. I double checked my traced patterns and they are exactly as drawn so I'm not sure what happened here either.

I made a self fabric tie and braided it so that it would stand out from the busyness of the print although I will probably end up wearing this most with store bought belts. I wore the braided fabric belt to the conference and I think it still looked okay.

The buttons were so hard to pick out. I'm really bad at these details and it took me forever to find something I liked. I ended up with shell buttons because I think they sort of pick up all the colors in the dress without camouflaging into it. I'm still open to ideas if you guys can think of a better button option.

And lastly, I obviously hemmed it shorter than the Burda dress and omitted the bottom band and zipper. I can easily pull the dress on over my head when the top is unbuttoned.

Overall: I really like the fit of this dress. The bodice is great and I think very flattering. I don't know if I'll make it again anytime soon, but if I ever need another shirtdress I'll definitely keep this pattern in mind.