Actually these are the two Avid Seamstress shift dresses I made in August.
Above is the line drawing for the shift dress. The two test versions I made use bold fabrics but this will give you a better idea of why I tested this pattern to achieve a decent fitted dress.
Can you see how I was able to adjust the dress for a better fit?
The first version uses a cotton spot fabric from Spotlight.
This pattern has no darts at the waist so it looks baggy if you have curves.
Here I’m pulling at the pockets so you have see the roominess it has. I added those 3 buttons at the neckline to give this a more retro feel. If you don’t fix the waistline, just add a belt to it.
While there are pull lines on the back, there are darts that allow you to tweak the fit. The back neckline finishes above the bra line but I did raise the back neckline on the next version just to be sure.
Now this fabric was fun to work with. My curvy back allowed me to match a lobster or two across the centre back seam. That was fun.
Here’s the win I had once I added some darts at the waistline.
I added blue piping at the neckline and at the skirt seam to match the lobsters.
Here’s to wearing corporate lobsters to work.
velosews 