My 'Mid-century Madness' Dress

I am SO excited to show you my latest sewing project--a 1950's shirtwaist dress! I don't know why it has taken me so long to sew up one of these 1950's classic pieces--but now I'm hooked (and hence the title 'Mid-century Madness').  I feel like I could easily make a 100 of these dresses in every single adorable printed fabric and never get tired!!

I was super lucky to be contacted by an amazing UK online shop called Fancy Moon to host a fabric giveaway on my blog (scroll to the end of the post to read more!) and also to get some fabric myself to review!  I had so much fun perusing the retro prints they have online and when I came across the 'Nutmeg Seeds Orange' print from Robert Kaufman (they also have this exact print in green) -I knew it would be perfect for this challenge!  It's 100% cotton and crisp enough for this shirtwaist dress but soft enough to gently hold all those skirt gathers!

I was very excited when I found some buttons in my stash that went perfectly with the fabric.  These are vintage buttons that I got from the lovely Sofia when she came to visit.  I used three buttons instead of two because these are a bit smaller than what I think the pattern calls for. 

I used a pattern I got in the Sew Weekly UK meet-up pattern swap.  It's the lovely Style Print 1283 pattern that Charlotte brought to the meet-up. This is my first time using a Style Print pattern.  On the back of the pattern it reads "Style Patterns Ltd: An entirely BritishProduction" (emphasis orginal)!  The pattern paper is a bit thicker than normal tissue pattern paper--which I found easier to work with. 

You can wear the collar up (like in the pattern photo) or down.  I really like how the collar was constructed as it's all one piece with the front facing with a smaller undercollar piece.  I did use fairly strong interfacing to get that crisp collar look!

I am on the look-out for more Style Print patterns.  I found the fit to be really good and the instructions were very clear.  I did muslin the bodice because it's the first time I've used these patterns.  I ended up adding an extra 1/4 inch to each of the side (I was paranoid of the dreaded gaping front) and lengthened the waist front and back by about 1/4 inch.  I also took about 2 inches off the skirt length.

A super big thank-you to David who woke up (after only 3 hours of sleep) to walk with me to the park in the wee hours of the morning to take some photos before work (our tripod is broken).  Isn't that sweet?  It's nearly impossible to get daytime photos now that the sun sets at 4:30pm!  sigh. 

The leaves are all turning colours and we did notice one of the trees had lost nearly all of it's leaves.  We are well into autumn now with winter hanging on the air.

I love how even without a petticoat, the dress still has that full skirt 50's look!  Though I bet it would look adorable with a couple of petticoats.  I've been wanting to get some after the series on petticoats that Solanah had on her blog. 

So, what is this about a giveaway I hear you say?  That's right! Tomorrow, I'll be hosting a giveaway for reader's choice of 2 metres of Fancy Moon fabric.  Nancy over at Fancy Moon is so nice that she's opened the giveaway to readers everywhere! YAY!  Check back tomorrow to enter yourself in the giveaway!

I'll also be hosting a giveaway this weekend for this Style Print pattern.  It's definitely a gem.