After nearly a year since I sewed anything jersey, the onset of Autumn really brought a sense of a need to sew with jersey again! My 2 previous stretch projects were from Tilly and the Button’s Coco pattern - 1 top and 1 dress; both of which I love. The release of Tilly & the Button’s Agnes pattern lead me to seek out some jersey fabric to create some wardrobe staples for the Autumn/winter. Then I saw the Bettine dress which literally leap frogged all plans, I knew this was my kind of dress! The fabric I used for this project was originally intended for a Sewaholic Davie dress. This however I saw as more of a Spring/summer dress so had missed the boat with that one and will wait until next year to tackle.

The Bettine dress however appealed to me as I thought it would lend itself to wearing a thin jersey top underneath and I do love layering! It reminded me of a RTW dress/top that I have from the high st which I have had for years and wear loads either on its own with leggings or with a top underneath and tights. So all in all I couldn’t wait to try this pattern. I had read some reviews from other sewists who had said it was a relatively straight forward garment to make too - this added further to its appeal!!

The original pattern suggests using light to medium weight drapey fabrics e.g. Viscose, cotton voile, lawn or chambray. No mention of jersey. However, Tilly wrote a blog post on ‘Tips for making a Jersey Bettine dress ‘ and talked about it being a relaxed fit dress….SOLD!! … I decided to launch in and go straight for the jersey version.

The fabric I chose to use is a light to medium weight jersey from Guthrie and Ghani (another T&B/G&G combo for me - this is becoming a habit!). I found cutting it out really tricky, it kept slipping all over the place! I used my regular fabric scissors but whilst using them I was thinking a rotary blade and mat would be much more suitable. I see a letter to Father Christmas coming on! Tilly has a useful blog post on cutting knit fabrics here. Whilst we are on the topic of useful blog posts, Tilly has also written one on sewing with knits on a regular sewing machine here. Man I love her blog!! One clever lady.

Before I go into the details, here it is….

The long sleeve white top underneath is just a RTW jersey top which allows the dress to be worn at this time of year. A cardi would work equally as well but I wear a lot of outfits like this so here is my style!

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Last week I had the amazing opportunity to attend the first Simplicity bloggers meet up held in London at the Good Housekeeping Institute Dining Room.

Having seen the event advertised on Twitter, I jumped at the chance to meet May Martin, the highly experienced textile tutor and judge on the BBC series The Great British Sewing Bee and pick up some top sewing tips. It was also really lovely to put some ‘real’ faces to a few bloggers I had seen or read about and indulge in some sewing chat! How amazing to be in the same room with lots of like minded people all talking about sewing! Sewing geekiness galore!

The meet up was put into full swing by May Martin presenting several of her favourite Simplicity patterns including one from Simplicity’s ‘Amazing Fit’ range. The pattern includes separate pattern pieces for different cup sizes which sounded very intriguing and saves you needing to do any bust adjustments. May then held an interactive ‘master class’ workshop throughout which she shared some top sewing tips and tricks. These included semi concealed and invisible zip insertion, transferring pattern markings, the roles of different sewing machine feet and sewing curved seams. I would estimate that there was only about 50 people in the room and this combined with close up views presented on 2 big screens and May’s fantastic instructions and explanations meant that you could really understand and follow the processes being taught. Samples that May had sewn were also handed round the guests which helped to visualise the techniques demonstrated.

My absolute favourite top tip from May was related to invisible zip insertion. When finishing off the seam below the invisible zip, May recommends using an adjustable zipper foot so that you can get as close as possible to the seam line. This is the part when you have to move the bottom part of the zip out of the way and continue the line of stitching in order to finish the seam off. With a standard foot (that I have used until now) it is really tricky to get close enough. Can’t wait to try this one!

After the workshop there was time to browse over a selection of free patterns and were given our goody bags. What a generous offering - I have never seen a goody bag like it!! Just check this selection out (there was more!)….

There was also time to grab a picture with May!

It was such a privilege to be able to hear May speak about her sewing career. She was incredibly down to earth and so passionate about sewing and her role as a sewing tutor. I was very inspired and imagine that most people in the room felt exactly the same.

It really was a fantastic couple of hours and I met some lovely people so thank you to Simplicity for organising. Lots to reflect on and techniques to put into practice! Bring it on!

If you follow my blog you may well have read about my recent entry to this year’s Simplicity Star Sewist competition. If you know me quite well then you will have definitely heard about it - more than once!! If not, the initial background to the competition and preview of my make can be seen here and more details including pictures of my entry is here.

My entry

The results were announced by Simplicity via twitter on July 1st. There were 3 winners in total, one for each of the 3 categories (Best Vintage Make, Best Dressmaker and Best Newcomer). When I saw Scruffy Badger’s name as the winner of my category (Best dressmaking category) I was not at all surprised…her entry was awesome! - very inspiring and a truly beautiful outfit - quite unrecognisable from the original pattern. Some amazing pattern alteration skills and use of fabric demonstrated (in my opinion!!). Aswell as including the winner’s names the tweet also included a link to the Simplicity blog page where further details about the results were included. So I clicked on the link to read more. There were the pictures of the 3 winning entries. I read more. Then there was this intriguing paragraph:

“Having reviewed each entry, the celebrity judging panel were hard pushed to whittle down the makes to one winner for each category. So, we created a ‘highly commended’ spot for bloggers that just missed out on the coveted top spot, but produced a project that both the judges and Simplicity recognised as a great make.”

I read on…no pictures this time but a quick scan of the 2 highly commended entries in the Best Dressmaker category and I saw a link to MY BLOG!!! I was one of the 2 highly commended entries. I had to look a couple of times over but yes it really was mine. I was so happy! Whoopee!

So I am now able to proudly display this badge on my blog - Cool or what?!!!

I am really chuffed about this, having only been sewing things for myself for about 18 months. A real confidence boost and motivator to strive to keep learning and developing my skills. I also really enjoyed looking at all of the other entries; how one pattern can be interpreted and made in such different ways but all starting off from a common point. That really is the beauty of making your own clothes -the possibilities are endless.

That wasn’t the only positive outcome from the challenge though for me. It was also quite a technological advancement on my part - seeing the competition advertised was a driving force for me starting my blog in the first place as you had to have a blog to take part. Through this process I have also learnt loads! I am also now on twitter as this was one of the routes through which you could submit your entry. I am enjoying developing new links through this and discovering many new parts of the sewing community that I never knew existed - a whole new world indeed!!

So if you see a similar competition or opportunity advertised I would say go for it!!

Well until next time

Happy Sewing!

Lorna x