I've got a very special project to share with you today! This is the last project of our Love to Sew podcast season and I have to say, we saved the best for last. We both made very ambitious projects for this episode and I am so excited to share more about mine. You can also see Caroline's incredible jacket over on the Love to Sew podcast website.
Head over to the Love to Sew Podcast website to listen to the episode.
When we were planning the season we chose the theme of scraps for one of the episodes and we knew we needed time to work on these projects because scrap-based projects tend to be a beast to make. Often you are working with a lot of small pieces and you are essentially creating a new textile with which to cut out your project. That is exactly what I did and it was quite time-consuming but the end result was totally worth it!
I used scraps from a fat quarter bundle from Fableism. I'm using their new ‘watercolor wovens’ collection to make some decorations for my wedding - specifically some really fun bunting! After I cut out all of the bunting triangles I had some awkward wonky triangles left over as well as one 2” (5 cm) wide strip from the top of each fat quarter. These fabrics were so gorgeous and I couldn't bear to get rid of any of the pieces so I decided to use them for my podcast project. This is definitely the fastest I have ever put my scraps to use!
I set out sewing the scraps together. At first, I wasn’t sure what direction I was going in and I just wanted to play around with combining the stripes and the triangles to see what size pieces I would get. I didn't worry about making all the points match up or making all the pieces the same size before sewing them together. I just paired up fun contrast coloured triangles and serged them. Then I added more. It was pretty slap-dash and very satisfying!
As I was sewing, I realized that a pattern with large rectangle gathered tiers would be ideal for this project because it was easy to put together big long rectangles using my scraps. I could visualize the different tiers being made from different sizes from the scrap pile. I used my serger to assemble all the pieces so that the seams would be finished on the inside.
I immediately thought of the Syd Graham Skyline Dress because it had the tiers I wanted and also a nice spaghetti strap finish. I really like the way the bodice is gathered into the binding and the way the back tie goes through a channel that cinches up the back of the dress. It feels very breezy and cool.
The pattern choice felt like kismet because the pieces were exactly the size of all of my scraps combined! I used the smaller triangles for the upper bodice and the medium triangles for the middle section. The bottom is a mix of vertical stripes and medium triangles. I think this gives each tier a distinct look and the dress has a nice flow from top to bottom. I momentarily obsessed over the fact that the triangles were going in different directions on the top two tiers than on the bottom but I’m glad I decided not to unpick it in the end. It adds more visual interest!
The dress was easy to sew once I created the pieces! It is a great summer pattern and I love how many versions there are in the community that use scraps and leftovers. It seems to be a popular design for this kind of scrappy sewing.
The pocket bag fabric and bias strap fabric were also pulled from my scrap bin so this project was 100% made from leftovers. How cool is that!? It is definitely one of my favorite projects ever and I am grateful that we challenged ourselves to do this! You have to see Caroline’s project, too. It is so amazing!
