No. 124 - The Sally Shirtdress by Serendipity Studio
Below is my version of this wonderful pattern. I first found the material on-line at
Pink Chalk Fabrics. Although I have never been to the shop, the next time I am in the Seattle area, I plan on visiting. It looks like a wonderful shop on Bainbridge Island. Anyways, my husband bought me a gift certificate and I knew when I saw this fabric, it would be perfect for the shirtdress.
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| Front view |
The pattern is fairly straight forward. It has a front, back, sleeve and collar. The bottom trim on the sleeves and hem can either be ruffled or a flat piece of fabric. I opted for a little ruffle in some red and white polka dot coordinating fabric I found at a local quilt shop.
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| Back view |
I made a size small and it was very roomy. The roominess is taken up by the pleats. The 8 pleats around the front and back requires a little math calculation, but it's nothing too difficult. You can adjust the height and depth of the pleats according to where your waistline is. I pin fitted mine first, to make sure the pleats were coming out the way I anticipated. I wanted the pleats to end just below the bust and right at the bottom of the belt - which they did!
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| Close up of buttons and belt |
I also made the covered buttons and the belt. I just happened to have in my stash the perfect belt buckle as well! I think it was given to me by a friend a few years ago, but it matches perfectly! One note on the covered buttons. I purchased some new button covering kits by Dritz and they were terrible! My buttons kept falling apart. I've never run into that problem before - especially with just some thin quilting cotton. I ended up taking them back to the store and using some old ones I already had in my stash.
Before returning them, I did a size comparison on the new ones to the old ones and discovered that the prongs on the new ones were much shorter and not as sharp as my older ones - hence the problem. There wasn't enough "teeth" to grab and hold the fabric. I e-mailed Dritz about the problem but never heard a reply from them. Keep that in mind if you purchase some new button covering kits. One thing I didn't try was interfacing the piece of fabric - that might have made a difference, but I doubt it. Now when I'm looking at yard sales, I will buy as many old versions of the button covering kits that I can find!
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| Another view of the front |
This really is a cute dress and very comfortable to wear. I opted for the ruffle trim on the bottom hem and on the sleeve.
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| Close up of hem |
I feel like June Cleaver in this dress! Especially with the pearl necklace and earrings!
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| Sleeve detail |
I hope you will give this pattern a try. I'm sure I will be making another version soon!
Happy Sewing!
