Lockdown birthday dress a.k.a midcentury nightgown

After the success of my frosting-sew Christmas dress I decided to do the same for my 36th birthday this week. Obviously my new frock and I are not leaving the house to celebrate properly, but I wore it for some Zoom karaoke with pals and took these photos the next day as it’s extremely comfortable.

It’s another Friday Pattern Co pattern too, a dress hack of their popular Sagebrush Top. I was impressed by the fit and overall experience of making the Wilder which made me gravitate to this pattern of theirs too, though the puffiness and ruffliness of the blouse as designed is a little out of my normal style zone. Easily solved by a bit of hacking!

The first thing I knew I wanted was a square neckline as a few other sewers have done, then it was just a case of extending the top to dress length and doing a bit of de-poofing in key areas. Here’s what my altered pieces look like; I followed some useful reference photos from sew_nessa on Instagram here as she did a similar hack.

Front and back yokes, neckline squared off and widened a little, 1/2″ extra length added
Front and back, slashed & spread and 12″ of length added
Sleeves, slashed and overlapped by 1/2″ in 4 places to reduce some of the volume

I cut two each of the front and back yokes and did a clean finish for the yoke seams, which ended up looking rather pretty and giving some nice stability to the neckline. Finally I cut a ruffle 1.5x the width of the hem and 6″ wide to give a final finish. Yep, a lot of gathering in this project but luckily I don’t actually mind gathering unlike many sewists!

The fit is very loose but it fits well across the shoulders and this floaty fabric drapes and moves beautifully. It is Midcentury Modern Day viscose from Sister Mintaka, currently sold out again as it does every time she restocks – I was fast on the buy button this time rather than my usual dithering! Keep an eye on her Insta for restock news. It’s a little thicker than some of those flimsier viscoses you can find with a bit of a twill weave, enough structure to hold the frills and a delight to sew with.

It’s too cold to wear this outside at the moment anyway but I expect it will become a Spring staple.

3 thoughts on “Lockdown birthday dress a.k.a midcentury nightgown

  1. Lyn B

    I love this dress and totally understand the need for a ‘midcentury nightgown’! Good for watering the veggies before getting all presentable…and for going out too as it looks fabulous. Happy birthday Katie and thanks for the style hints.

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