Y-dart Dress

I am still progressing through my Craftsy course "Patternmaking + Design: Creative Darts & Seam Lines".  I feel like I have been stuck in Lesson 3 for quite some time now.  This is one of my drafts from Lesson 3 - the Ydart. 

I'm really pleased with how this dress turned out.  I never thought that a sheath dress could be so comfortable.  It is so comfy that I didn't feel the need to get changed the moment I got home today, and did my usual afternoon chores (ferrying children, feeding chooks, hanging out washing, watering plants) still in the dress.  I did get changed to cook dinner because I tend to splash a bit in the kitchen :).

The fabric is a summer garden cotton pique from EmmaOneSock.  The print was a little difficult to place, as the pattern repeat was unusual and there were dark areas, light areas and large red areas.  The back almost seems a different print than I used for the front of the dress.

I added a little bit of width to my sloper at the waist, and that seems to have resolved some of the crinkling in the back that I got in my previous dresses.  I am wondering if I can take some of that width back out of the back darts, rather than at the side.

Instead of using the skirt portion of my dress sloper, I used a skirt sloper that I made 6 years ago.  It has 2 darts front and back, with the back darts bigger than the front darts.  I had to make a few changes to get it to fit the bodice.  This has resulted in a skirt that doesn't have all the pull lines across the hips and buttocks that my previous dress had.  It seems to fit more nicely around the tummy as well.

The down side is that the back seems longer than the front and the side seam does not hang straight.  I think that I can work with this though.  Six years ago, my weight distribution was a little different to now, so I think if I redraft my skirt sloper using this same method and some new measurements, I might be able to tweak the draft a little.

Of course, there will be times where I will need the original one dart skirt portion of my sloper - say when I want to eliminate the waist seam or if I want to line up darts on the bodice and the skirt - but I think that having a second 2 dart sloper will give me flexibility in my designs.

It is hard to see the Y dart in my printed fabric.  The Y dart originates at the centre front waist and then the top lines of the Y radiate towards the bust point.  It combines the waist and bust darts.  There is no need for any bust darts from the side of the dress.  My "Y" turned out really neat.

It is a bit strange working my way through this course, as it means that my sewing plans are not directed by the seasons or fashions or latest patterns or what I see on other blogs (perhaps leading to a little bit of FOMO - fear of missing out).  I will also end up with more dresses than I need.  I enrolled in the 3 pattern making courses last Christmas (bodice sloper, darts, necklines). I have done most of the bodice sloper course (still need to draft the knit sloper) but I am not even halfway through the other courses.  I feel that I am making real progress with both my fitting and drafting though, so I will continue for now.