A spring Anemone

HI everyone,

Before indulging in my maternity wardrobe planning, I want to show my me-made-summer pretty things (at the moment, there is only one of them that still fits my little bump). I want to start with one of my favourite skirts ever: my Anemone!

As you may know, I fell in love with the beautiful patterns from Eléonore at Dear&Doe. It all started when I used their free Plantain back in January and March. Since then, I have finished 4 versions of it! But that’s another story… When you look at the patterns, they all really appeal to me because they look very flattering, cute and pretty.

I have however pondered about ordering (or not) to D&D for a long time because their size chart is not very large. Their larger size is 41in at the bust, 33 at the waist, and 43 at the hips. This means I would need to upgrade 3 sizes at the bust, 4 or 5 at the waist, and 5 or 6 at the hips (depending on patterns). Even after my many adventures in the upgrading world, I wondered if  wanted to invest into Indie patterns (and the price that goes with them) for woven fabrics with such a high risk of oopsies.

Well, one day, I just decided to try and I ordered the Anemone skirt pattern. I simply love the side peplums and the high waist, I thought it would really work for me. A colleague of mine also convinced me. That’s a funny story actually. I was checking patterns during my lunch break and I had the Anemone website window open. My colleague arrived behind me and said “Oh, that one is really something you would wear!”. I guess my colleagues see me as a peplum kind of girl…

Anyway, I ordered the pattern and I really enjoyed the packaging. It comes with two instructions booklets, one in French, one in English. It felt very odd, because if I am a native French Speaker, most of my sewing vocabulary is in English… The pattern is printed on a very large thick white paper that makes it really easy to measure and play around with upgrades. Would you guys be interested in seeing pictures of the pattern + the grading annotations I made?

I graded up 5 sizes at the waist and at the hips, to try out because I wanted to try and keep similar proportions to the ones of the original pattern. The muslin was quite nice (I forgot to document it) so I adopted these adjustments. My first idea was to sew a white skirt that I would be able to  use during spring and summer. I had the perfect fabric in my stash but I was afraid to use it directly because I wanted to use a few tricks I had not done with the muslin: add a lining, and add some boning along the seams around the high-waist. I feared that that portion of the dress would roll down and plastic boning would be a very simple solution for that. I decided to use some old cotton my grand ma gave me. She bought it 20 years ago for something like 2 EUROS a meter. What happened next is very funny. I fell in love with the end product! What I thought would barely become a wearable muslin became one of my favourite skirts ever! I love all the colours you can combine this skirt with, and there are some really pretty golden lines hidden in the pattern of the fabric.

I really like the way this pattern cheats and makes me look like I have a much narrower waistline! And oddly enough a flatter belly...

To make the lining, I just used the basic pieces of the skirt and shortened them. I really needed a lining because the waist is very adjusted and I wanted to make sure I could slip this on easier. I was also planning to wear it on colder days with tights.

We took the pictures back in May when we went to spend a week end with my family in Belgium. We were in a cute little town called Durbuy where you can still walk amongst medieval little streets and beautiful grey stone houses. They also do yummy ice creams in the summer and tasty warm wine in the winter if you are around!

Have you ever been to Belgium or Durbuy?

What is the largest grading you ever made?

Do you want to see the grading notes on the pattern?