Secret Blanket |

I made this dress back in December and, as I mentioned in my post about my December makes, I wore this to the Sew Brizzle Christmas meet-up, having made it the day before. This has to be one of the quickest things I’ve ever sewn up. It really only took a few hours to make.

The fabric is the same enormous remnant I used for one of my Coco tops and I still have more of it left! There must have been over 3 metres of it! It’s ribbed on one side, which was the side I used as the right side for my Coco, but for this dress I used the smooth side for the outside, except on the hem band and neck band, where I used the ribbed side on the outside.

The pattern is the free Jersey Dress designed by Emily from In The Folds for Peppermint Magazine. You should check out their range of free patterns if you haven’t already, there are some great ones! And it has pockets! As you know if you’ve read my blog for any length of time, you’ll know how much I love pockets in dresses. These ones are cut on the sides of the dress front and back so it’s even quicker to put together (and cut out) than if the pockets were cut separately.

I actually really like the over-sized, cocoon-y nature of the shape of this dress. I made the size 10, which was the closest to my measurements, but I woulc recommend sizing down a size if you want a slightly less over-sized fit. The only change I made was to omit the cuffs as my jersey just wouldn’t stretch enough for the cuff pieces to fit on the ends of the sleeves. It is stretchy enough to go over my head, though, which is good! It turned out leaving off the cuffs was a good move as the sleeves would have been too long if I’d added them. Plus I don’t like not being able to roll up my sleeves and I feel even if I could have got them to fit, the cuffs would have been reeeeaaaaally tight.

I do really like this dress, it’s like wearing a secret blanket because the fabric is quite thick. Also I’ve been wearing it with a top underneath (instead of a cardigan on the top) to give me an extra layer of warmth. I even wore it on Christmas Day, though I got too warm because it was a really mild day and my sister’s house is really warm! I feel like it’s also just about smart enough for work, and I got loads of compliments on the colour the first time I wore it.

I think if I made this again, I would leave off the hem band as then I think it would be a slightly better length on me. This does feel quite long and although that isn’t necessarily a problem, I think it would be a more flattering length on me if it was a little shorter. I’m 5’3″ for reference, in case you’re going to make this and want to know how long it is on a short person!