Last of the summer sewing: Burda 04/2020 #103 in cotton sateen

Talk about out of season - I am writing about this dress which I finished back in mid-September when the temperatures were still in the high 90's ℉. I never did have a chance to wear it. As with so much of my sewing this year it will go into my closet and hopefully see the light of day and social events in 2021. Even when I have gone places this year things were very casual - and wearing a pretty dress just didn't seem right. It's been a long year of social distance and now heading into winter we are trying to buckle down and do the right thing to get through it. While not going out to dinner, to parties, to meet ups, to the gym, to anything that you would put in the fun category (and even the not so fun - such as funerals or hospital visits) I think it has been worthwhile to keep the pandemic mostly at bay here in N. California. We have a high level of compliance with all the preventative measures and I'm grateful for that. Recently I saw this article discussing San Francisco's success relative to other cities and what the toll might have been had the same approach been taken all over.  In any case I appreciate our mild weather (for a multitude of reasons) so hopefully the outdoor coffee breaks and walks will continue this fall.  

Back to sewing - this dress is from the April 2020 BurdaStyle magazine. That issue was filled with things I want to sew. What is it about the April issue? always so many things I want to make. 

I'm not sure I will get used to dress lengths getting longer again, because I'm not very tall I think a hem that is longer actually makes me look shorter - I think due to less leg showing. I actually hemmed this dress and then decided to make it an inch shorter. Plus when I traced it out I already shortened it by about 3 inches. It is long!  

I love a square neckline and I have just about perfected the fit on Burda size 38, it fits me very well with just a few little adjustments. So if I do those adjustments on my tracings then I can sew it up just about as it. Sewing satisfaction :)  Although sometimes I do have to adjust the lengths, of straps or hems (see above: not tall)  

Here's the magazine image of the pattern. They also had the same dress as #104 with a straight skirt. You can see I changed the shoulder ties to plain straps, which is on the # 104. I thought the ties might be  just a bit too girly for me and also I didn't have any fabric to spare. Those full skirts do take up a lot of fabric. I wanted to make a matching fabric belt but again, no fabric scraps for that. 

Back view, it has that pretty V-neckline in the back.

These outdoor pictures were taken on a day in October when the air was finally clear - it was such a relief after the smoke filled months due to fires all over N. California. And keeping it real, here are some pictures of my glamorous fitting process. Sewing room mess and sneakers lending a fashion touch, haha. 

I made the front and back straps on the dress with a seam at the top which I could sew after trying on, to get the fit right at the upper bodice. A straight across front neckline has to fit fairly snugly and if the straps aren't right it will slouch a bit and not look good. 

I received this fabric from Minerva.com and it was perfect for a dress. It comes in two other color ways, this one is the turquoise. The description was cotton sateen with stretch but I think the stretch was very little - although perhaps just enough to make it less prone to wrinkles.

In keeping with the slightly retro silhouette of this dress and the pretty surroundings I decided on one very ladylike pose. 

So that's the latest on my last dress of summer 2020, ready for next year. The weather has turned chilly here (yes it does get into the 30's at night here in N.Cal) which I realize is not exactly arctic but cold for us. So I am sewing things that are more cozy. In fact our next online class in December via Hello Stitch Studio will be for the Toaster Sweater. I'm just about to make a sample garment or two. Doing these classes has been more fun than I expected - I think the getting together online to chat with fellow sewing enthusiasts is just what we all need right now. The class is structured so that Tues. evenings are instruction and garment specifics, and then the Thursday evening sessions every logs in to sew (or not) and chat, ask questions, vent about real life - whatever, it's a sewing happy hour 🍷.

Time for a twirl and then back to regular life. 

Happy Sewing and stay well,
Beth

Today's garden photo, taken a few weeks ago but yes, we still have some roses blooming. They don't know that autumn is here. Sometimes I still have roses at Christmas. We are supposed to get some rain tomorrow and oh I hope that happens.