Trend ‘Square’ dress in Selvedge and Bolts linen.

If you’ve read my blog in the past you’ll know I’m a fan of Trend patterns. Lucy is a pattern-cutter and designer based in London and I always make a bee-line for her stand when I go to the Knitting & Stitching shows. At the show last autumn I fell for the Square dress which, as the name suggests, has a square hem and diagonal seams. There are no bust darts because it uses bias cutting to create the fit and because there are no fastenings it’s actually a fairly quick make and would suit a dressmaker with a little bit of experience. If the lack of darts might cause you a problem I definitely suggest you toile the top half of the dress so that you can assess whether you personally need to carry out a Full Bust Adjustment (FBA) Lucy has been working hard to extend the size range across her patterns and as one of the newer styles the Square (TPC23) comes in the more extensive range sizes 8-22.

I bought a copy of the Square (and a skirt pattern too) and shortly afterwards my friend Dibs who owns Selvedge & Bolts online fabric shop asked if I’d like to choose some fabric as a gift in order to write a review of it. So with this pattern in mind, and my upcoming holiday, I picked out a fine linen in a tiny red/white ‘checked’ print. I was so happy with it when it arrived and it’s perfect for this loose type of style.

Before I cut into the beautiful linen I decided to make an initial version in some checked flannel which, at a guess, I’ve had over 25 years in my stash! You can’t rush these things…

Normally I’d try very hard to pattern-match the checks but there wasn’t enough to do that. The seams on the dress run diagonal but in fact only the back and front bodice are cut on the cross, the other rectangles of the skirt are cut on the straight grain so it’s much simpler than you might think to cut and sew together. The pieces are all quite large so there’s not much opportunity to cut many corners, and I didn’t quite have as much of the flannel as was recommended so I reduced the lower skirt panels (front and back are the same for this and the upper skirt panels, the front and back bodices are different though) To reduce the panel I simply folded out a parallel section through it’s longest side. This turned out to be advisable because at 5’5” the points would have touched the ground unless I was wearing high-ish heels.

I folded out a parallel 5cms segment of the lower skirt panel to reduce the overall length of the dress.

I cut a straight size 14 and made no other adjustments, the front and back are cut on single fabric and as they are asymmetric you’ll need to keep any directional-print in mind, especially if you reverse any pattern piece to fit it onto your fabric . It’s a straightforward make though so after the cutting out it’s a breeze. I would only suggest that you take care when pinning and sewing the diagonal sections together to avoid stretching the edges out of shape before you sew them. Keep everything flat on a table as much as possible while you do this part. The hem is a deep ‘grown-on’ one which you mitre at the points and this helps give the skirt it’s weight and fluidity. I was happy with the flannel version so I immediately cut the linen one ready to sew up.

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The linen sewed together beautifully, it’s quite lightweight and with a lovely drape. As the seams are such a feature of the dress I decided to use one of the decorative stitches my Pfaff Quilt Ambition 2.0 has to offer. After trying a few I picked out a sort-of diagonal grid design which echoes the print on the fabric.

I’m really pleased with how the linen dress has come out, the decorative stitches are perfect for accentuating the seams and it’s such a comfortable style to wear. I’ve worn the flannel version mostly with a roll-neck jumper over the winter, it’s very striking and has garnered many compliments. the linen had to wait until we had our recent holiday to be worn but it was perfect for warm weather and, best of all, it has pockets! I can’t wait to be able to wear it again in the UK…

The shoulders are designed to be wide so there’s plenty of bra-strap coverage if you need it.

You can see the deep hem in this shot, it’s ‘grown-on’ not a separate facing and you mitre the points at the front and back. This helps give the skirt a lovely weight and fluidity.

This such a simple-looking pattern but has so much scope to add drama, it’s distinctive without being outlandish and still be completely wearable…at least I think so!

Until next time,

Happy sewing

Sue