A Hawaiian Lonsdale (and love of all things sewing!)

I've been sewing up a storm recently so got quite a bit of catching up to do here on the blog! It's feeling surprisingly like summer in these parts at the moment so I've been making the most of it and not only do I have a very summery Lonsdale Dress to show you today but we've finally sorted out our garden so I've got a slightly picture backdrop for you...plus I think the sun's got to my head and I've had my hair cut shorter than it's ever been before!

I got this fabric in my local market in Bromley where there are a couple of fabric stalls once a week. It's totally worth the wait for them as they are ridiculously cheap and get beautiful quality fabrics. Last week there were John Kaldor knits and Henry Bertrand silks. This Hawaiian print I picked up before I really knew what treasures these stalls had hiding. The beautiful texture of it was actually what grabbed me first before the print. I had an inkling that it might be some kind of sandwashed silk but when I managed to obtain 3 metres for just £5 I thought that it couldn't possibly be. However, now I've washed it, sewn with it and worn it's lovely softness on a hot day I am in no doubt that it is indeed silk and I scored a bargain!

This was printed along the selvedge and I was so taken with the hand of the fabric during cutting that I decided to do a bit of investigating as to where it might have been produced, mainly because I wanted to see what else I could get my hands on! Unfortunately I didn't turn up anything in the way of more fabric, but there were business listings under that name based in Honolulu so it's quite exciting to discover that my fabric is an authentic Hawaiian piece!

The fabric sat in my stash a while as I hadn't quite been able to place what I wanted to make it into. Then I saw Lauren's amazing tropical Lonsdale and I knew I had to make a very similar and pretty shameless copy... hope you don't mind Lauren! I realised this perfect combination of fabric and pattern the week before By Hand London's Club Tropicana themed 1st birthday party and knew I had to get onto making this thing pronto! I got it finished in time and luckily it was a gorgeous day so to the party it went! I was glad I did have something slightly tropical to wear as all the sewing ladies attending had made an amazing effort with tropical outfits, you can check out the pictures on By Hand London's Facebook page. The party was as brilliant as you would expect with those girls; there was dancing in Elisalex's kitchen, Victoria was plying everyone with her special home-made punch and Charlotte was modelling their new upcoming pattern! The sun was out, there were 1980s themed party snacks and an amazing time was had by all.

Me (pre hair cut!) with Karen, Clare and Sally at the party (Photo stolen from Karen's blog!)

Talking about amazing parties with fellow spoolettes. Last Saturday the gorgeous Clare from Sew Dixie Lou very generously let a very drunken group of ladies who sew take over her flat for the afternoon/evening. If I thought the dancing was fun the week before, I hadn't seen anything yet! I didn't need telling, but if I ever needed proof that people who sew are just the best kind of people there are that was it! I'm so pleased that I started sewing and blogging as it has introduced me to so many lovely like-minded friends that I never run out of conversation or laughs with right from the word go. If you ever get a chance to attend a meet-up DO IT!

Interesting face...

Ok. Back to the dress. It's now the turn of Tasia from Sewaholic Patterns to be shown a lot of love in this post! Even though the Lonsdale dress is the only Sewaholic pattern I've sewn up I love it so much it puts Tasia right up there at the top of my favourite indie pattern designers. The thought that has gone into the drafting and construction instructions of this is just brilliant, it comes together so cleverly and you end up with a beautiful finish inside and outside without even having to think about it. My first two Lonsdale's were some of the very first things I made and coming back to this pattern now I've expanded my sewing repertoire made me realise even more what a talented lady Tasia is.

Lovely Insides!

The bodice is self lined and I used french seams throughout the skirt with the exception of the centre back seam where the zip is which I pressed under and stitched. I love how neat it is inside! I think it's probably my neatest make to date. I followed Tasia's tips from her Lonsdale sew-along and used stay tape and under-stitching along the top of the bodice and pocket openings to prevent them from stretching out or turning outwards. Yes this dress has pockets!

As with my first and second versions I made this up straight out of the envelope in the size 6. The lovely knot design at the front really helps eliminate any fitting issues across the bust as you can tighten it up or let it out as much as you want. The only changes I made were to shorten the length of the skirt (by about 4" I think) as I'm quite short and I prefer my skirts to sit on the knee or above and I eliminated the tie detail for the straps at the back. While this is gorgeous design wise most of the time here in the UK it's not warm enough to wear a summer dress all day without a cardi or jacket and so most of the time you just have a funny lump on your back! If you're interested in what I did I simply didn't add the loops at the back and made the straps up as usual. Then after completing the rest of the dress I put it on, pinned the straps in place at the right length, then cut the excess off and slip stitched the ends inside the dress by hand, turning under the raw edge as I went for a nice clean finish.

I'm really really pleased with the zip. The pattern calls for a normal zip but I chose to use an concealed one as I'm loving my invisible zip foot so much! It went in great and I added a little hook and eye at the top.

I was unsure about how to hem this as the a-line skirt has quite a curved hem and this silk is pretty lightweight and slippy. I started by pressing it up twice and attempting to hand stitch as I didn't want to spoil the lovely silk with a topstitched hem, but I got less than a quarter of the way round and was really struggling to get it to sit nicely. Then I remembered that I'd won some 'steam-a-seam' in a giveaway from the lovely Shelley at Cuckoo Chanel. Thank you Shelley, you saved my bacon on this one! I'd never tried this product before and was more than a little apprehensive so tried it out on some scraps first. It comes in various forms such as big sheets which you can cut down to the size and shape you want but I had a little roll like tape which was the perfect width for my hem. You stick it along one side peel off the backing tape and then stick the other side of the fabric to it. At this point it sticks temporarily and is quite easy to peel off and adjust.  Then you press it down with a warm iron and it sticks permanently, even in the wash! The permanent word is slightly scary I know but I'm really pleased with the finish result. You can't tell that it's not sewn, it was so much quicker than hand stitching and the weight of the tape gives just a little extra body to the hem which I love!

Hem outside and inside

Ooof that turned into a long post, had a lot of gushing to do! I'd best get outside and enjoy the sun while it lasts, fingers crossed it's some time yet so I can get a lot more wear out of this!