Billie Jean Dress & Giveaway!

A few weeks ago I reached 50 bloglovin followers and over 5000 page views. Woohoo! To celebrate I asked Caitlan, from Indie Stitches, whether she might help me run a little giveaway. She said yes! We decided on the Billie Jean Dress from the local designer Bluegingerdoll Patterns. Billie Jean is a vintage inspired dress with off the shoulder straps and a choice of pencil or gathered skirt. Bluegingerdoll Patterns have also just released a new dress pattern called Winifred, go check it out.

For my dress I had planned to make up the pencil version and even bought some fabulous fabric. However I had some fitting issues and time was flying by so I decided to go with the gathered version for now. I used a vintage single bed sheet picked up from an opshop recently and there was only just enough fabric.

The dress is drafted with no ease so after some trial and error I ended up cutting and sewing a size 8 to give myself 1" of extra room. Next time I might need to use the size 10 as I had to sew up the side seams and zipper seam with 1/4"seam allowance rather than the 5/8 instructed. I NEED ease, otherwise known as food and movement room!

This was my first time sewing princess seams and I can't wait to try more patterns with them. After an initial few minutes trying to figure out how that big curve fitted into that little curve I clipped the S/A and eased the curves together. They sewed up really nicely (although I've still got room for improvement!). I LOVE the bodice on this dress. The sleeves, neckline and princess seams are beautiful!

And the skirt; it's so freakin' big! Before I shortened and hemmed it I felt like a barbie doll cake, and I mean that in a good way. I loved the look of the mid-calf length poofy skirt but thought a shorter skirt would fit my lifestyle better. I cut 4" off and used 1" for hemming. Do you think this dress is too fancy for everyday wear? I can't decide, but I want the answer to be "no, you can wear this dress everywhere!".

I love how it turned out! It's got a really feminine vintage feel. The fit isn't perfect but its pretty damn good. I feel ready to conquer the pencil version next...maybe. Well, I'll try anyway! I'll also try the lapped zipper next time. I had to omit it in this dress due to the tiny centre back S/A's after fitting.

So, the giveaway! If you'd like to win a copy of this beautiful dress pattern leave a comment between before next Wednesday (19th March). This giveaway is open internationally. Let me know what variation you'd make and out of what fabric. I'm so excited to be able to send off this lovely pattern to one of my blog readers! I hope you're not all giveawayed out after Sew Grateful Week.
Giveaway is now closed.