SEWN: THE PINEAPPLE DRESS OF HAPPINESS

Pineapples!

Another happy dress!

If you are on Instagram at all and have similar people in your feed as me, then you are gonna know this fabric well. The, by now ubiquitous, pineapple print linen from Darn Cheap Fabrics.

For me my obsession interest started with Emma's amazing midi skirt, then there was Kirsty's fabulous culottes, and Rachel's sublime Sewjourn make and finally it all got outta control. Myself and about a billion quite a few other Australian sewing bloggers also decided we needed to get our hands on some of that maddeningly covetous fabric. I don't even do linen (except the cotton/linen of my culottes obviously)!

But we do know I have a thing for fruit fabric (see here and here and there are a few more in the works). It's a disease I tell you. And I had to have pineapples.

This fabric turned out to be a bit tricky. It's a super heavy weight linen, with a lot of body and little to no drape. I ummed and ahhhed for quite a while. I had envisaged shamelessly ripping of Kirsty's idea of culottes, but this fabric and that silhouette were never gonna work on my frame. So I put it aside and powered on with my Sunshine on a Rainy Day happy dress.

And then, I had my answer. This fabric, and that dress, sans ruffles were gonna be best friends.

Was I right, huh, huh, was I?

There's not much more to say about this dress (details from my previous version), except that I left off the ruffles because one happy dress with ridiculously mega ruffles is almost definitely enough. Oh, and weirdly I had to take the bodice in 2cm each side from the armscye tapering to nothing at the bust line. It was gaping on this version. Now it's perfect.

I also broke my cardinal rule in making this dress. Never make the same pattern twice. Maybe it's not so much a rule as something I've just never undertaken. I usually love my makes so much that making another version feels to me like it might devalue the first (is this why I stopped at one child... now there's a thought). But I love this easy wear style so much I just had to do it again.

The only other change I made was to try and channel sophisticated Jillian. She doesn't get out much, so we'll give her a break. Woohoo!