McCall’s Wrap Dress Sewalong!

What an exciting week – I finished my coat and McCall’s Patterns also announced their newest sewalong: The Wrap Dress!  What’s so exciting about a wrap dress sewalong, other than the fact that a wrap is the greatest wardrobe staple ever?  I’m co-hosting the sewalong with McCall’s Patterns and another blogger, Ruqayyah Davis of ReDpants Designs!

Wrap dresses are easy to make, now that I understand how to adjust them to fit my chest and not gape, and I have quite a few in mind to make for the spring and summer weather that will eventually (hah!) arrive here in Boston.  Here’s an overview of the sewalong schedule:

2/16: Announce sewalong
2/23: Try before you buy: Do wrap dresses work for you? Social media: hashtags, Flickr, Facebook, badges for blogs
3/2: Choosing your fabric. Cutting and working with slippery/rolling fabrics like ITY, silk jerseys, etc.
3/9: Making a muslin if necessary; how much ease do you want?
3/16: Sewing and working with knits. Finishing seams with and without a serger
3/23: Sewing the neckline area and preventing gaping
3/30: Making the sleeves; hemming the skirt; finishing up
4/6: The Big Reveal!

It’s a long timeline, but that way it’s easy to fit it in to your busy sewing schedule and make it a stress-free sewalong.

For patterns, it’s really up to everyone individually on which Vogue/McCall’s/Butterick pattern you want to use, as long as it’s for a knit dress – those are the easiest to fit, and the closest to that classic DVF wrap dress look.  They all pretty much have the same fundamental construction steps.  Last night I went “fabric shopping” through my stash and discovered I had enough yardage to make a full-skirt version out of this fabric:

This is an ITY knit I bought from Metro Textiles a few years ago because it was so pretty, but didn’t have a plan in mind on what to make with it.  Luckily, I bought 2.5 yds, which is just enough to use for a swishy-skirted wrap dress.  I’m planning on blending the bodice of Butterick 5454, which is what I used for my first wrap dress and fits me well, with the skirt off of Vogue 8379.  Why, you ask? The bodice of Butterick 5454 doesn’t have gathers around the bust, which would be difficult to fit on me since I have a small chest and gathers create extra fullness I don’t need.  I love the flare/a-line shape of the skirt of Vogue 8379, so I’m going to try to pattern-Frankenstein the two together to make a new dress pattern!  This fabric is also a little on the sheer side, so I’m planning on underlining the bodice with a swimsuit lining tricot leftover from swimsuit sewing last year.  I’m very excited to get started on this and to share some tips and tricks along the way!

Are you planning on participating in the new sewalong?