Pattern: combo of Renfrew by Sewaholic and Vogue 8138 (OOP)
Fabric: sweater knit from Fabric Place Basement

Leggings: DKNY
Boots: Franco Sarto

I don’t own anything designer.  Probably the closest designer items I own are a Michael Michael Kors blazer and a Marc by Marc Jacobs iPhone cover.  I love looking at designer clothes for inspiration, like the Calvin Klein top I used last year, or even going into Nordstrom and inspecting the inside of garments for construction details and ideas.  As I was snooping around my favorite local fabric store, this fabric jumped out at me.  It makes me think of the Italian fashion house Missoni, know for their famous zig-zag and geometric knitwear.  So, in a sense, the fabric inspired me to make a dress styled like the Missoni dresses I’ve seen in Neiman Marcus, but for a fraction of the $1,000 price they usually retail for (seriously, I made this for under $30).

Knowing I wanted a simple silhouette, like many Missoni dresses, I looked in my stash to see if I had a simple knit dress pattern, but everything I pulled out had some kind of styling to it that wouldn’t lend itself well to this funky print.  You know where this is going…

Oh good old Renfrew, how I love you.  I took the top of the Renfew pattern and the bottom of my Vogue dress pattern and combined them together at the waist, grading seams where necessary.  I had some tweaking to do at the sides to make it a bit more fitted than my Renfrew tops, attached the long sleeves, and hemmed the dress to a shorter length that I’ll be ok wearing in warmer weather, sans leggings.  I’m thinking that these colors will make my faux Missoni dress a great transitional garment when the weather decides to get a little warmer.

While I may not have used real Missoni knit fabric for this dress, like Sarah’s version, I still feel like this dress is special and fun to wear.  I’m looking forward to getting lots of wear out of this in the coming months!

Where do you look for sewing inspiration?