BWOF - 3-2008-115 - Floral Summer Dress

I found this really pretty flowery pattern at one of my favourite fabric store near Marché St Pierre in Paris. The store, which sadly doesn't exist anymore, sold a wide variety of fabric in 3x3 meter pieces for very good prices. I thought it was perfect for style 115 from Burda 's March 2008 issue.

This time I had to be careful with pattern matching, since there was a nice long seam down the middle of the front and the back (with a zipper). This took me a bit of figuring out. So instead of folding the fabric in half and cutting the two symmetrical pieces at once, I cut on eside first, then layed it out on the rest of the fabric, matching the pattern, and traced the other half right next to it (also taking in account the seam allowance ). I don't know if there's an easier or more logical way to go for pattern matching but that's how I did it.

I had a bit more fit issues with this one. As usual I took about 1/2 inch along the side seams. The back was a bit loose so I deepened the back darts. In doing so I actually lost a bit of ease and it is not the most comfortable dress from the waist up, also because the fabric isn't stretchy at all ( I can't really raise my arms too high). The cleavage line is a bit loose as well but despite of all these little imperfections, I am happy with it.

When I first finished the dress, my boyfriend B. thought it was a bit "garden partyish". We lived in Paris back then, at a busy street corner with no trees in sight and it was the middle of winter. I actually wore that dress for the first time a few weeks ago to a friend's b-day here in Vancouver. She had decided on a "flower power" theme for the evening and even though the style isn't quite 1970's, the dress is definitely flowery.
The dress was a hit, and in sunny, green Vancouver, it didn't actually look so Garden Partyish after all...