I've found over the last two summers that I'm turning more and more to dresses rather than shorts and shirts - its just more comfortable without that waistband around the waist and I don't have to keep hitching up my pants...and now that the kids are older I'm not doing as much crawling around on the floor so dresses are not so impractical. However this has not yet carried over into my winter wardrobe. One of the reasons is that I am a frog and really feel the cold so want as many layers of warm snuggly clothes as possible, however I really don't like leggings. I'll wear them for exercise if I have to but there's something about the whole skin tight right down my legs feeling that I really don't like. So therefore no leggings has meant no winter dresses. But lately I've been thinking about whether a long skirted dress would be warm enough in the right fabric. I don't know if it'll be warm enough for deep winter but for September/October/November I might be able to get away with it.
My biggest worries was how a print would look on a long sleeve long skirt dress - would it be too much. One way to find out - try it!
And then I saw Sarah from Wandersitch's leopard print dress. Long sleeves - check! Long skirt - Check! funky all over pattern - Check! and it looks great. I decided that I needed one of these in my wardrobe.
Sarah's dress is the Kielo Dress by Named Patterns. When I first saw this pattern I thought it looked interesting, but I figured that it probably wouldn't suit my figure so dismissed it from my mind. However the more Kielo's I saw the more I was intrigued and I decided that I may as well give it a go.
Which brings me to my next dilemma. Pattern buying. I hate buying patterns especially really expensive Indy patterns - invariably they don't fit my weird body shape and require a tonne of alterations anyway so after much deliberation and study of the pattern drawings/photos of the dress on the web I decided to go ahead and draft a version of the dress based on my block.
This was really quite a simple process (or it would have been if I hadn't run out of paper half way through - I finally had to resort to using up my roll of baby wrapping paper and then taping lots of little off cuts to the side to make it wide enough).
The fabric that I chose for this dress is a stable knit. Its a relatively heavy weight with an almost (but not quite) terry texture on the back. The front is just slightly fuzzy and printed with a zebra print with faint streaks of blue throughout.
I used a different neckline to the Kielo dress as a high round neckline really doesn't suit me. So I cut my neckline in a V instead. I also cut a facing piece which I used to finish the neckline and then top stitched it in place with a twin needle.
The seams were all overlocked and the bottom and sleeve hems were also finished with the twin needle. I didn't put in the back vent as in the end it wasn't necessary and I was too impatient to get it finished.
So the conclusion. Its certainly a different look for me. It's really comfortable and I quite like the look when wrapped to the front - I don't think I could get away with any of the other styling options I've seen for the Kielo though!
It's definitely warm enough for Fall - I'll have to wait and see about winter. Overall I'm really liking this dress and I'm definitely happy I gave it a try. The kids and husband both used the word bathrobe when they first saw the dress - but that seems to be the same with any full length, slightly fuzzy thing I make so I've decided to ignore them.
Looking at the photos I really think some colour blocking would work well with this pattern - something to break up the all over look - especially in the back. We'll see what I can come up with!
This dress looks great! I love that you have the skills to draft things on your own. It’s impressive, and it gives you the knowledge to make things just as you like them. I hope this works for fall for you—it looks like it should, and the wrap sides must make it feel like a cozy blanket! That’s a win in my book!
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