Make & Mend: Gardenia Dress Progress.

I just finished doing the mock up of my to be gardenia dress.

Grading this pattern was fairly straight forward, sans the shoulders and sleeve which I always have problems with.

A couple of changes so far that Ive made included the center of the garment. As you can see by the vertical dots that go down the front, I added a few inches more than the pattern had because I think it will be easier to simply fold the facing for the front of the dress than attach another piece.

Also that will cut down on some of the bulk from a folded seam.

I have to move the shoulder darts over about an inch from the original placement. I think thats kind of odd, considering this *was* a grade from a 40" bust. Geeze, How wide were the original shoulders of this thing. Shoulders are my weakness. Depending on the pattern, that allotment of 1/2"-1" of shoulder seam length to the sleeve makes all the difference on my frame. I wish it didn't but I guess we all have our hard fitting areas.

I thought about cutting down the back as well.

On Onda it drapes a bit more than I liked, but on me, its fairly okay. I did lengthen the back (and front) by 1/2". Good call, I'd say.

The gored skirt is probably my best success on this so far.

I LOVE the way the back looks. Its my best drape of my be-hind, ever! Yay!

The front of the dress fold over to the side, and the front gore of the skirt has a smaller half piece that is connected to the side gore piece. With my alterations I plan on taking the fold excess and extending it to the hem. NOW I can do the altering part. Squeee!

Oh, Im going to have so much fun with this!