How to create a color block dress, starting with McCalls 5927

Color block styles always catch my eye. I seem to look at so many patterns as the possibilities for color blocking but it is not very difficult to adapt an existing pattern to make your own version. Recently I was writing a post for Craftsy and after rummaging in my remnants I came up with enough scraps of fabric to make this dress.

It helps to be kind of short but this took very little fabric. I think there were some irregular cuts of the darker blue adding up to maybe 3/4 yard and then about 1/3 yard of the lighter blue. It is ponte knit so was about 60" wide but still - my final design was based purely on what I could do with the fabric.

Considering all that I am rather pleased with this dress. I don't have many items sewn with ponte knits, they are not really my favorite although sometimes the colors are great. And they don't show the wrinkles as this dress can attest. Shortly after finishing it I had to go to Sacramento for the day which is about an hour by car, plus it was scorching. That is the exact combo for lots of wrinkles but this dress made it through perfectly.

The details on how to adapt the pattern are all included in my post today on the Craftsy Sewing Blog so check it out if you want the details. I think it is one of my better explanations - I hope !

Here's a look at the back which has the same color blocking as the front. Argh, my camera drives me crazy. Does everyone else struggle to take photos for the blog or other places? And then have a zillion stupidly labeled photos in their computer which cry out for culling and organizing.  Project I never get to.

I started with this pattern which is a good one. It has different bodice fronts for the cup sizes but as a style with only waist darts I would be cautious with the larger cup sizes.  It has pockets in front (I have a sneaky feeling it is almost the same skirt block as this Butterick pattern. But I didn't want the pockets, mostly to conserve fabric so I changed the front to pleats and also changed the back skirt dart to pleats. I see this all the time on RTW dresses and it looks so cute plus HOW EASY to sew and look good on a variety of shapes. Note to self for future.  

Side seam color matching. If you're gonna do a color block dress the intersections have to match, right?

And now a look at the dress on me. I don't like this photo but it was the best of a bad bunch. And it was still about 102 degrees in the shade at 6pm so no wonder, we were all feeling a bit limp that day. I actually think it is a bit tight but I was speed sewing to get the Craftsy post done. Although when I look in the mirror it doesn't seem tight. Photos can be so....informative (I was going to say cruel)

Back to the topic of patterns. WOW...........just wow.  So many great comments and lots of interesting opinions on traditional patterns, indy patterns, pricing, availability etc.  I will definitely write about this more in the coming months. Two things really stood out to me. First, now I know why people on vacation here in the US make a trip to the big box store to buy patterns at the US prices. Secondly, I can't believe that Simplicity patterns are so often unavailable outside the US. That is odd to me as they are really a basic here. In fact this morning I was looking at the Simplicity site (which is terrible, could it be any slower?) and I think I will try buying a PDF version just to see how it goes. Now my business side is driving me and I am really curious about this pattern marketplace, 

Thanks for all the comments and contributions to the discussion. 

Happy end of summer sewing (is it almost fall? that went fast)

Beth