Gold and Green Anna

I had this gold and green brocade in my stash. Once upon a time I must have bought it for a specific project, but it was long enough ago that I have no idea what that was. Oh well. Free fabric, am I right?

It turned out there was enough for the midi length Anna, even with lengthening the bodice and needing to use a "with nap" layout. Hooray. It may be a little on the stiff side for the skirt to hang as it might otherwise, but I think it looks fine.

That white blur is my dog. He never slowed down
enough for me to get a picture that wasn't blurry.

Am I the only one whose pets decide fabric out on the floor to cut means it is time to go crazy? The cat started stalking the dog, and the dog decided he needed to play with the cat's pyramid bed. So yeah, cutting took a lot longer than it should have.

While I'm not a terribly fast sewist, this is a pretty quick project. In a portion of one afternoon, I got the remaining pieces traced, the fabric cut, and everything but the zipper and finishing steps done. (Well, and I decided I'd like this dress more if I lined the bodice, so I didn't cut/sew the lining the first afternoon, since that required a trip to the fabric store - as did the zipper.) Oh, and I serged the edges of everything too, since this brocade frays like crazy.

I'm short enough in my legs that I was able to cut quite a bit off to get a decent length when I hemmed this. I imagine in 60" wide fabric I could probably get away with 2 1/2 yards.

One thing I struggle with is getting my seems a consistent width. I don't know why this is so hard for me. I guess I need to slow down? Anyway, my skirt pieces were not matching up with the bodice even remotely correctly, so I had to go back and make some seems bigger, and others smaller. Even then my skirt section was a tad bit longer (er, wider?) than the bodice, but I figured I could even that up at the zipper stage. 

I did manage to find some bemberg lining at Joann Fabric, so that's what the bodice is lined with. (I didn't line the skirt - I'm one of those weirdos who wears slips.) For some reason I selected a creamy color, which maybe wasn't the best choice. (There weren't a lot of choices.)  I think this is my first item lined with Ambiance instead of the cheap poly or acetate junk so I'm interested to see how I like it after more wears. At the moment, I like it - it has a very creamy soft feel to it. I wound up stiching the lining down to the bodice around the neckline - not top-stitching it, but more like a modified blind hem stitch. It doesn't look amazing on the inside, but it's basically invisible from the exterior (while making the whole thing lay flatter and seem more secure.)

I realized after I finished sergimg the skirt panels together that I had been planning to add pockets. Oh well. Not going to unpick serging for it. I'm generally of the opinion that everything should have pockets. (I recently saw a shirt that had pockets. Want.)

There is some gaping in the front neckline. It can be pinched together in a huge mess, but is relatively unoticeable when left to its own devices. 

I wore this the other night for an event at my museum, and got a lot of compliments. My favorite was a woman who really wanted to know where I got it, and thought it had a great vintage look.