The “Gather & Go” Jersey Dress

After sewing with woven fabrics for sometime, I always find it refreshing and exciting to sew with knits! This week’s project is from a 1946 reissue pattern, Vogue 8728 which is still available on its website.

What attracted me to this pattern are its design element with the adorable gathered yoke and the fact that it can be sewn using woven or knit fabrics! I’ve never sewn a vintage pattern in knit before so it’d be interesting to sew one up. This resissue pattern has been available for sometime now and most seamstresses sewn it up as a summer dress. For this week’s Sew Weekly challenge, we are using our fall palette. So, while this garment is weather perfect for Singapore, I found it fun to use a fall color on it. My fall palette is made up of mustard, deep teal, rust, deep plum and fuschia and in reality I have already started using these colors for some of my projects such as the dresses here. How fun! What’s you fall palette and have you started sewing from them?

For this week’s project I chose a deep teal poly jersey fabric which is slightly stretchier than matte jersey. Here’s my “Gather & go” dress, so named because it does not take much work to complete after gathering the yoke and skirt. I was able to finish the dress after 2 and a half hours. Oh yes, I paired the deep teal dress with the mustard belt I made earlier this year for this blouse.

And as usual I show you my fave part of the dress, the gathered front yoke.

I think my dress turned out fine because I read quite a few reviews on this pattern and was blessed enough to learn from what other seamstresses shared. Otherwise, this dress could have been a disaster.  The trickiest bit of sewing this dress is probably the neckline binding. Two darts on the back bodice provides more shaping to the dress.  A common complaint was that there were too much gathers on the yoke and skirt, so I followed the recommendations and cut the yoke 2 sizes smaller and the skirt a size smaller. I also skipped the shoulder pads and since I used knit, I didn’t sew a zipper.  In the end, I was rewarded with gentle gathers and the flows they create, the texture and the fluidity they lend to the dress. I am quite certain that if I find time, I could make this pattern in a spectrum of colors and wear them any day! So, with the little tweaks during pattern cutting, this jersey dress is fast and easy to sew. A staple to keep.

More photos and details on my TSW post here. Next week on The Sew Weekly, the theme is tickled pink. So, if you have any pink fabric or even just a hint of pink in your stash, this might be a good time to take it out and sew away!

Have a blessed week my sewing comrades!