Making Lemonade

Last summer, everyone loved Sainsbury's lemon print summer dress. From the picture, it looks amazingly wearable. I can see why they decided to make this style and why so many people like it. It's a light cotton, semi lined, has sleeves and a matching tie belt. The skirt is flared but not enough to require a petticoat. It sits at a few inches below knee length, neither too short or too long on most people. The lemon print is lovely, bright but not overly garish. At £18 it was also affordable, approximately 1/4 of the price of a novelty print 1950s dress and approximately 1/2 the price of most modern equivalents.

Photo from Sainsbury's website

I loved it but it looked awful on me. The waist and back were hugely baggy as expected. The waist of the dress almost reached my hips, putting the belt loops and tie belt at an unflattering level. The calf length just made my ankles look skinnier and my legs stumpier even with heels. What was worst was the arm holes gaped and ended a good few inches below where they should have.

Turning a dress for the masses into a dress for me sounded like my kind of challenge.

Cut-away cap sleeves would likely never work on my short torso. I decided to take in the sides of the top of the dress from where the sleeves started to cut away all the way to the waist. I'd also be able to take the dress in by more at the back than the front. In the shop, I measured the next few sizes and found a size 18 would be the right fit once I'd taken off those three inches from each side of the front of the dress.
 

After taking in the sides to also fit my waist, I had ten inches of extra skirt fabric. Instead of taking this off the sides of the skirt, I unpicked the skirt from the top half enough to gather the extra fabric in the seams. Because I'd taken the dress in more at the back at the front, I had more extra skirt fabric at the back of the dress than the front. I decided to redistribute this while keeping the seams aligned.

I sewed the skirt back to the top half, reattaching the skirt lining in the process. I replicated the topstitching on the rest of the waist seam. The gathering gives a bit of flare to the waist of the dress.

Lastly, I shortened the hem and lining to knee length, resewed the buttons securely and added some press studs to prevent gaping at the waist and neck.

So there you go. I like my version much better. But then I would. :)