In my rather large pile of UFOs (unfinished objects) I found this rather Amish-looking linen dress that was in desperate need of a face-lift.
It was intended to be practice for a loose shift dress (using Simplicity 1280) with long bell sleeves and a fabric belt, similar to this one. Of course, the slubby linen I chose to work with was completely wrong for that silhouette, but rather than abandoning the burlap sack I had made, I attempted to give it more structure. I added open darts to the front and back, slimmed down the sleeves and it still looked horrible.Flash forward about six months and I was ready to look at the sad, sad dress again. Figuring I had nothing left to lose on this one, I went ahead and chopped off one sleeve past the shoulder seam. It looked good! I chopped off the other sleeve and the dress already looked 10 times better. Other changes I made were to take out several of the darts I put in, add an armscye dart to take in excess fabric in the arm hole and shorten the hem by about 3 inches, curving it up toward the side seams and letting the back dip a little lower than the front. What a difference!
I think it looks much more updated and wearable. In fact, I wore it today![surow][sucolumn size="1/2"]
[/sucolumn][sucolumn size="1/2"]
[/sucolumn][/surow]Although I really want to be done with this project, I'm sort of thinking it could benefit from some patch pockets and two darts in the back to take in some of the excess fabric there. I also don't love the neckline...it seems way too big, so that the bias binding on the little cutout juts forward.
Or maybe I'll just call it done and move on! What do you think?