Ready to Wear Copycat

Shirt dresses are a wardrobe staple for me- particularly for work.  I purchased a sturdy navy corduroy from the Fabric Store to make another of these wardrobe workhorses for cool weather.  But, as often happens when sewing basics, I put this project off in favor of sparkly, shiny, new sewing projects.  Then, I stumbled across this brilliant ready to wear twist on a shirt dress here and I found the inspiration I needed to finally make this up. 

Let the pattern hacking-drafting begin.

First step in copycat dressmaking is to examine the pattern lines and scour my patterns to find the basic structural pieces.  When does hacking turn into drafting? I kind of based my pattern on Simplicity 2246- but very loosely. I changed up the front closure. The Simplicity pattern has a separate button placket and I was planning on using big buttons- like the inspiration dress -and a button placket would be too fussy.  I also added fish eye darts in the back for subtle shaping similar to the design I was following.  Then, I drafted the simple drop waist skirt piece. I didn’t simply draw a straight line rectangle.  The top piece needs a slight curve from side seam dipping in the middle.

Pretty straightforward- but then came the collar

I gained – the hard way - a bit of collar wisdom working my way through this.  I actually made and applied two separate collars- before landing on the final outcome.

There is plenty of collar terminology to wade through: applied or grown on, stand or flat, convertible or non-convertible.  On top of that there are a bunch of collar names: Peter Pan, shawl, Eton, mandarin etc. 

I never use the collar included in Simplicity 2246 because it is a one piece mock two piece stand collar- which I find a little unusual. I am generally most fond of a traditional two piece stand collar- despite the associated sewing challenges. On the inspiration dress, there isn’t a stand collar piece in front.  However- notice the bit of a stand in back – this is a mix of stand and flat collar.  This is exactly the collar construction I used in the Foreman jacket.  When you wear the collar open, you get a lapel look, and you can also wear the collar buttoned up.  This is called- appropriately-a convertible collar- because you get two collar looks.

I first gallantly made an attempt drafting and installing the mixed stand convertible collar with a back stand, but when installed the collar would not roll smoothly.  You can’t press or mold faux leather- so the drafting needs to be spot on. So the easier and ultimately successful solution was to draft and install a simple convertible collar.  Gertie has simple instructions for drafting a convertible collar here.

I am very pleased with my copycat look, and super happy with this riff on a traditional shirtdress. PS- notice the red nose- outside temperature is 20 degrees Fahrenheit!