Pattern by: Tilly and the Buttons

Sizing

I followed the sizing in the instructions and found it true to size. This is a summer dress so hasn’t had too much wear during my autumn-spring pregnancy, but because of the stretchy fabric I would say it would work well at any stage. I’m currently in my ninth month and it’s really comfy.

This pattern has a 1.5cm seam allowance, so as I didn’t use my sewing machine with its seam allowance guide – just my overlocker – I made sure to factor this in. Last time I made this dress I completely forgot about the seam allowance and overlocked the whole thing at the edge of the fabric, then couldn’t work out why it had ended up so big and baggy. I had inadvertently added an extra centimetre of ease to every seam.

Instructions

As always, Tilly and the Buttons patterns are beautifully simple to follow with a handy jargon buster glossary. The Agnes comes with lots of extra tips on sewing with jersey – useful for anyone using a stretchy fabric for the first time.

Customisation

As this was my second go at this dress I made a couple of adjustments – mainly just shortening the sleeves and length. The first one felt a bit mumsy to me.

I used a beautiful bamboo fabric from The Fabric Store in Eden Terrace, Auckland. I found it in the sale, so the whole thing only cost $17.28. I did find that the fabric at the belly bobbled where it rubbed against the edge of my desk – check out my post on banishing the bobble for how I dealt with this.

Recommendations

There is some extra fabric where the sleeve meets the shoulder seam on both my versions, so I would probably adjust the pattern to make the top of the sleeve less pointy, with a more gradual curve. It’s not major, but to me it just takes away that totally professional finish.

My husband really likes the contrast between the horizontal stripes on the dress and the vertical stripes of the neckline.

Time

A very quick sew, especially if you only use the overlocker and don’t pre-sew.

Final verdict

I definitely recommend this pattern for a simple and super quick make for pregnancy.