Deconstruct - Reconstruct

Remember this shirt? Well, I wore it twice maybe and then decided that it really was the wrong fabric for the style (and that I didn't like the style, but more on that later). So it sat on my sewing table for a few weeks. Then one night I bit the bullet and started ripping out the stitching. I carefully detached the bodice pieces and the sleeves. I also opened a few inches on the sleeve seam and the remaining side seam.

I found I had more than enough fabric from the old bodice fronts for the new bodice pieces and a little extra to add to the bodice back to bring it up to the shoulder seams (sorry, I forgot to get a photo of that bit - although I am pretty pleased with myself). I had plenty in my stash to cut a binding piece for the new neckline edge. And voila! I now have a cute comfortable top that suits my style!



And now, thanks to Cidell, I want to make this dress. It's Burda 10-2009-119 and I don't know how I missed it before. (I would include a link to the line drawing, but Burda has yet to update their archives.) As I was walking to an appointment this morning, I realized that there is a waist seam. Boo. My "waist" is not my narrowest area and certainly not something I'd like to highlight. Here is a perfectly lovely dress from Banana Republic to illustrate what I mean.

Yeeouch!

I thought about trying to change this to princess seams, but then it hit me that it would probably be easier to simply raise the waist seam to an empire waist. What do you think? Empire waists are far more flattering on me as long as there is not so much fabric that it looks like maternity wear. I think the tucks will mitigate that. I'm heading to a fabric store to look for inspiring fabric to keep my momentum going.

Oh! and if anyone would really love to have the Jalie pattern in the top photo, I'll send it to you!