Great Minds, Hatty!

I just came upstairs from reworking this issue, and saw that reader Hatty and I arrived at almost the same solution!


I really want a dress. The heart wants what the heart wants!

I pulled a skirt pattern out with the desired finished length, and found that the Burda dress is too long to start with! I marked the pattern at the desired length, and rechecked... Almost, but not quite enough fabric.

Throughout this problem, it also occurred to me that I will only be happy if the stripes match at the side seams. Now, you're thinking, "Seriously, Kristine? It's not bad enough you're already short on fabric, and now you want to match the stripe? Crazy girl..."

Yup, that's me. Crazy and stubborn. Just ask DH.


So, I replaced the (now shorter) pattern pieces on the fabric to make the stripe match, and can see that it's now the appropriate length of a long tunic (13" below the waist). Now, please remember that I have a single thickness of 72" by 20" left untouched, staring at me. Waste fabric? Nope...

So, that's going to be the lovely 6" gathered ruffle added to the bottom to give me the mini-dress length that I need. Yes, the ruffle will sport a vertical strip, but that's ok with me. An added point of interest, if you will. And if the ruffle looks awful... I will have a cute top (with striped matching at the side seams).

The solid lining layer underneath will just be shortened to the finished length of the dress. I think this is a blessing in disguise, as I like the look of this reworked design so much more than the original, which was a little boring. I feel like I cleared a hurdle in the "workroom" by "making it work", and now I can "carry on"! Yes, episode 2 of Project Runway season 9 is on tonight....