Wednesday, April 17, 2013

Red Roses: A Jersey Dress for Clara


A few photos before I packed this jersey dress off to Clara. I used the "Kristina's Rose" stencil available from Alabama Chanin's downloads, and stenciled the design in dark red (plain old red I mixed with a little brown). Both the front and back of the dress have a border of about ten inches of roses. 

The roses vary in size from three inches across to about eight inches. I decided to approach it as a sampler of various jersey embellishment techniques. So you can see beaded stitching below,


 and below here is the wonderful couching technique, where you stitch down strips of jersey that have been pulled into ropes. I love this one and it goes really fast--and the ropes are remarkable easy to shape precisely.

I worked in two colors of jersey--the red of the dress, and a darker red from a tee shirt from Goodwill.


I did a bunch of roses from appliqued strips, sometimes laid flat with bugle beads on top, and sometimes done in random ruffles, with gathers stitched into the strip. This one's fun too.


And last, I finished the neckline in a beaded rosebud stitch.


I can't wait to see it on Clara when she comes home for summer!

17 comments:

Lisa said...

Wowee - I also hope to see it in its entirety when she comes home. That's a beauty.

Lisateresa

Sarah said...

What a beatiful color! I bet it will look georgous on Clara.

Flepandco said...

Just gorgeous Anna.

Mary @ Neat and Tidy said...

This dress is gorgeous. I hope we can see a picture of her wearing it.

Kara said...

So stunning! Love the sampler idea. As soon as finish hemming all the curtains...

Elaine said...

Your work is so beautiful, Anna! More and more I am becoming interested in trying this type of project myself. I would like to ask about caring for the finished garment. How do the embellishments respond to washing and drying. Can you share your experiences? Thank you!
Elaine

Julian said...

Absolutely GORGEOUS!!!! And that color will look stunning on fair Clara!
Christina

Marlaine said...

Several previous commenters have used the same adjective to describe this dress, but it's the first word that came to my mind, as well: GORGEOUS! :-)

WendyBee said...

Gorgeous! It makes me think of roses: American Beauty Red Roses, to be specific. We all would like to see photos of the dress on her, I'm sure.

the momma said...

Fabulous! Just fabulous!!

Kim said...

Absolutely stunning!

Anonymous said...

hi did you make the dress yourself and if so what is the fabric I have a couple of brought jersey dresses which could be wow with this sort of upgrade is it hard to sew with (not scared of the embroidery just the making of the dress) where do you get good cotton jersey thanks I've followed you from the begining and your skill level just keeps going up it's such an encouragement to someone great with a needle but scared of the machine could you advise a great machine for the likes of me who is overcome by the nasty tension fabric chewing monster who lives in sewing machines thanks grace

Carol said...

Anna: This is a work of art! (In MD)

Anna said...

I made this from Alabama Chanin's organic cotton jersey. I think buying a ready-made jersey dress to embellish would be a great start--but I'd made sure to use a quality garment that wasn't going to fall apart on me.

For sewing jersey I use my regular sewing machine with the stitch set to a shallow zigzag--but I do like doing the garment construction by hand, and this red dress is all hand-done. Honestly, once I know the pattern is fitted correctly, it's not even two hours of sewing to put it together *by hand*, and that's with pleats in both sides of the bodice.

Elaine, machine wash on gentle, lay flat to dry! Beaded garments I turn inside out. Everything's holding up just fine.

Elaine said...

Thank you for your reply! I have some cotton knit to make a top; I'm getting courage now to try embellishments!

the momma said...

Two Hours? To construct the entire dress?? You are crazy fast!

Lisa said...

I was poking around Garnet Hill's site earlier, and noticed the knit dress with the roses on the bottom. Of course, I've looked at this dress several times before, but never "got it" that they're most likely imitating Natalie Chanin. From what I can see of your rose dress, it's prettier.

Lisateresa

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