Two in one: Ogden Cami and Vogue 1537

It is still winter in New England (in April!), but this bright red dress and singular sunny day has given me hope!

I cut the pieces for this dress back in January, when a month of knitting and embroidery away from my sewing machine had left me with a greater appreciation for slow sewing. Not only did I trace the pattern pieces (a first for me), but I also hand-basted silk organza into each facing piece and thread traced all the dart markings: this fabric is so loosely woven that any attempt to mark it creates a hole. I bought this fabric over a year ago at Nalli’s in Chennai; it appears to be digitally printed on a textured silk. The lining is a rayon I bought on ebay and dyed raspberry after I accidentally pre-washed it with a dark red.

Since graduating college, the fancier part of my closet has little use, and without a deadline these dress pieces lay in a box until a friend pulled the remaining fabric out of my stash, pointing out it was too good to waste. I managed to squeeze this Ogden Cami out of it, although I had to cut the facings out of another leftover piece of silk charmeuse. Overall, I squeezed two garments out of a 2 meter (and only 45 inch wide!) piece of fabric! The tank top was a quick sew — it only took me an evening. I added this tiny patch so that it’s obvious which side is the back, and, of course, who made it!

For the dress, I cut a size 12 and graded to a 14 at the hips. The trickiest part is definitely joining the curved facing to the lining, but it’s a beautiful detail and absolutely worth it! I used long basting stitches to ease the curves into each other and had a blast using my edge-stitching foot for some perfect under-stitching (that no one will see).

I completely ignored the printed instructions for construction order. Other than the ladder in the back, it’s a very simple style — after constructing the lining and sewing the darts, I turned the dress inside out through the straps the same way I usually do in constructing a sleeveless bodice — making sure to leave off the ladder until the dress was the right way out. Towards the end, I peeked at the instructions and noticed it was somehow constructed such that the shoulder seams are sewn last. I’ve never seen this before, but it might be a good way to construct and test for fit without having to pull the whole thing apart! — it does seem like it involves a little hand-sewing. While the dress is fully lined, I still zig-zagged every seam allowance inside since this fabric frays like nothing else — I am still finding fluffy silk bits around the room.

When I first tried this on, I was not pleased with the fit and overall effect, but I think it’s just a style I’m not used to, and it’s grown on me a lot, especially after seeing these photos.

Thanks to Menaka for these photos!