Notions Of Fabric

I know people say this every year, but how is it the end of 2019 already? It has been a big one for us in many ways. We had to leave the UK for a few months to get new visas at the beginning of the year, I lost a job, I got a new (better) one, we have travelled, I have seen much theatre, and as usual I've bought more fabric than I've sewn! Of course, this is a common problem among sewists and I will do a post in a week or so with my intentions for the year 2020 but for now this is a wrapping up post! In terms of sewing, I did a lot in the beginning of the year. It helped to pass the time while I was back at home for 2 months, unemployed and with my family at work every day. And that period of time was a real eye-opener for me! I made three projects which were challenging me in different ways - piping and pattern matching, trousers, and many buttonholes! After that, and the successes which I had with those, I realised that I need to challenge myself more in my sewing. So then ...

Here today I have a dress from the vaults. I was inspired to make this dress following a rewatch of the TV show  Dollhouse   It was cancelled too soon, in my opinion. The premise of the show was that there are "actives", people with their personalities wiped so they can be imprinted with other personas in order to be assigned engagements with the rich and powerful. A great show, would recommend if you haven't seen it! Eliza Dushku played the lead, Echo, and she had a wide range of personalities and therefore costumes in the show. This costume was from one of the season 1 episodes (I can't remember which off the top of my head, unfortunately), and I was immediately caught by the horizontal centre darts and the flattering shape of the bodice. So I went looking for a pattern to be able to replicate it! The pattern I found was a vintage Simplicity crop top pattern ( 8130 ), which features a vertical centre seam, as well as side panels, and four horizontal darts on the fro...