A Hybrid dress

What do you get if you cross the Colette patterns Truffle dress bodice with modified Anna dress-style sleeves and a half circle skirt?

This dress...ta da!



I knew that the Truffle dress bodice was a good fit and I loved the simplicity of the kimono-style Anna dress sleeves; both in terms of sewing and wearing.

I was also amazed and incredibly impressed when I saw the By Hand London circle skirt app so I thought a good way to try it out would be to make a simple skirt pattern for a dress that combined the two aforementioned bodices. The skirt is a half circle and it is the midi length.

You could make a similar dress by using any bodice that fits well and modifying the sleeves in the same way and then drafting a circle skirt to match.

There is no doubt a more accurate way of adapting an amhole into a short kimono-style capped sleeve but I just winged it and loosely traced the shape of the Anna bodice in this area.

Order of construction:

1. Sew bodice darts, sew shoulder seams (French seams), then sew sleeve/armhole seams.
2. Sew bodice side seams (French seams).
3. Sew bodice to skirt (French seams).
4. Sew in invisible zip at centre back.
5. Finish centre back seam.
6. Hem skirt - This BHL post was very useful.
7. Apply bias binding to neckline. I realise I'm often a bit slapdash by the time I get to the bias binding stage so I tried to take my time with it by closely following this Grainline studio tutorial intently.

The fabric was leftover cotton lawn from when I tried out the Licorice dress.

Here is to more hybrid garment construction in the future!