A LBD is a “Little Black Dress.” This is a timeless fashion staple known for its simplicity, elegance, and versatility.

A Little Black Dress can also be seen as a really boring dress if you get it wrong.

The term LBD refers to a black evening or cocktail dress, usually cut simply and often short. It was popularized in the 1920s by Coco Chanel, who designed it as a modern, accessible garment that could be worn for many occasions.

Today I have my own Summer LBD using this fabric from Minerva’s core fabric range. I’ve been able to use this fabric as part of my monthly Minerva Brand Ambassador work.

I was able to use the black Minerva Core Range Broderie Anglaise Cotton Fabric which is available in 6 shades. I really wanted to work with the black colour so I could have a timeless Summer dress for the coming months.

I can style this dress with heels for evening fun or with Summer sandals to wear during all the fun gatherings in the lead up to Christmas.

After reviewing the previous makes using this Minerva Core Range Broderie Anglaise Cotton Fabric, I could see this fabric might need to be lined. It’s a lovely fine fabric and I chose to use a Cynthia Rowley dress design from Simplicity 2215 (2011).

In a previous post I did show you an earlier version I sewed using Minerva fabric, again for Christmas, and trying a Mad Men version. I got plenty of wear from that version.

This time I tried to sew the same black dress on the sewing pattern.

All the body modifications I made in the previous version were really handy to sew this dress again.

What I love about this fabric is it is 135 gsm – floaty and light. This is also a wide fabric 147cm wide so I was able to get the full skirt width for front and back cut in 2 lengths.

The embroider is a large floral. When you look at it close up, it’s really lovely and does run one way, but you’d never know because this is black on black.

What you can see on my version is how the embroidery is on the bodice because I’ve lined the bodice in white fabric from my stash.

Once I finished the dress, I decided to line the skirt with a Summer print for my own modesty and also to make you think, ‘where are those colours coming from?’

You can guess that as this is a ‘plain’ fabric’, it leant itself to a bit of detailing like the skirt pleats.

In this version, I didn’t sew all the skirt pleats. I am short so I sewed just enough skirt pleats that my shape can handle.

Then I found some really cute dark silver flower buttons and had to put those on the bodice, so this all ties together nicely.

Pattern modifications:

You’ll laugh when I tell you this.

I added enough width on the bodice to cater for my waist. I think it was about 4 cm to the front and back bodice.

Well, when I was fit testing this dress as I sewed it, I ended up taking out the additional bodice width I added to the pattern.

Honestly that’s a good outcome.

The other modification I made was to lower the front neckline by 3cm.

Again while fit testing the bodice, The neckline was too high for me.

The hem is one aspect of this dress that I keep rethinking. Is it too long?

Now that I’ve sewn this dress again, I want to use up some of my poplin fabric to make maybe one more version of Simplicity 2215. It always sits front of mind for me to use a pattern at least 3 times once I’ve made it fit my shape at the time.