The ice mint dress

Wow! Summer!

What can I say? It's time for bicycle rides, barbecues, drinks with friends, but it is also time for renewed energy, longer days, and lust for new clothes!

After the Laurels, I wanted to work on a dress that adopted a true hourglass shape. I had found a gorgeous light cotton at my grand ma's and some appliqué she salvaged from a dress she made for my mum in the seventies. All I needed was the pattern! Now, this was before Colette launched the Hawthorn and this is why I picked up another pattern from Knipmode.

Knipmode is a Dutch magazine that works like the Burda. Melissa from Fehr Trade uses and reviews them quite often too. They usually have a lot of dresses patterns made for tricot and they also have very cool pants. For this project, I completely fell in love with this dress from the April issue. It has a very retro style and I love the lines on the skirt. And it has pockets!

I love the result! It feels quite precious and girly! I wore it yesterday to the cinema (World War Z was awesome) and today to work. I have received a lot of compliments in the hallways :) This dress is girly, comfy, light and precious in the same time. It was basically free! The fabric and lovely inserts were from my grand ma and the lining was leftover from a previous project.

This pattern only goes to a 46 (european size corresponding to 42 inches around the bust). Of course, I had to upgrade all the parts. I also had to adjust the neckline because it was gaping a little bit at the front. The rest did fit quite well.

I had to line the full dress because the cotton was too thin and you could see more than necessary through one layer. I have used a very thin lining, in a light beige color. To be honest, we had 30 degrees today and I did not feel too warm at all.

The pattern has a large V at the back. This is one of the details that makes the dress very flattering. It creates an illusion of a very balanced hourglass figure. The sewn in belt (insert lined with fashion fabric) has a contrasting color, also creating an illusion of a more "marked waistline".

I did my best to centre the pattern to keep things symmetrical. The pockets are such a cool detail too! I went a little crazy and hemmed my lining with a bias made of the fashion fabric. It is one of those details that make me smile. You would not find that on a dress purchased in the shop around the corner...

The last detail is the hem of the dress. I added a thin horsehair line to make it more rigid. That reinforces a lot the hourglass illusion.

Below, a few extra photos we took in the park behind our house. Our poor kitties were feeling so warm! Enjoy the summer everyone!