It was so exciting to come home to a parcel of fabric from Fibers To Fabric! It’s always a period of adjustment coming home from travels, but this got me excited to get back into my sewing room. I was kindly offered a choice of fabric from Fibers To Fabric so I picked a green and white Buti Print Indian Cotton. Buti print is a textile print that features small repeating floral or geometric motifs. The Indian Cotton is soft and lightweight.
Sometimes, I dismiss a pattern due to the recommended fabric requirements. Initially, I thought that I wouldn’t have enough for the Friday Pattern Co Canyon Dress. I had 3.5m of the fabric with 114cm width. I had such a strong conviction that the pattern and fabric were such a good match that I started the process of pattern piece Jenga. Looking closely at the skirt, I realised that the skirt pieces were chewing up my meterage. I decided to cut two pieces rather than four for the bottom tier of the skirt. I just used the full width of the fabric, and I left out the pockets. So happily, I managed to get all the pieces I needed to make the short-sleeved version of the Canyon Dress.
For my measurements of 38-inch bust, 33-inch waist and 40-inch hips, I decided to sew the Size Large with Cup B/C. My waist measurement is above the sizing of the L but it has an elasticated waist which gives more ease for fit.
I chose this pattern for the fabric because it needed something lightweight for the gathers but something with soft structure for the v-line placket and band collar. The best thing is that even though it has a dressy look, it’s an easy pull-on dress with no zip or button closure.
It’s very easy to prepare the fabric for sewing. It’s always important to start with washing the fabric. It helps with pre-shrinking the fabric so that there is no disappointment if the garment doesn’t fit after the first wash. I changed my needle to a 10/70 gauge sewing needle for the finer fabric. I also rethreaded my machine with matching fabric for my fabric.
It says in the instructions that there are YouTube sew along videos for the patterns, but I found that I didn’t need to refer to them because the instructions included with the pattern were excellent. It was easy to follow and I learnt a lot. I’ve never constructed a v-line collar before, so it was fun to learn. Everything came together without any problems. I sewed this slowly in parts as I was also returning to work.
The Canyon Dress was a wonderful introduction to Friday Pattern Company patterns. I’ve got the short-sleeved top already cut out. I had used it as a toile for my dress so I can’t wait to go back and sew it up properly. So happy that I didn’t give up on using this pattern because I feel that it’s such a great match for the beautiful cotton from Fibers To Fabric.
Thanks for reading and happy sewing!
X Em
Em Sew Happy Blog 