As soon as I saw this cotton sateen by John Kaldor, I knew that it would become a dress. But what dress??? That’s one of the problems of having loads of patterns! Even if I adore the Kew dress pattern, I have already sewn two (here and here) so I needed to find another pattern. Then I thought that the Anza dress by Itch to Stitch would fit the bill for a dress that would be easy to wear.
The Anza pattern
This pattern offers two option: either a shirt dress or a jumpsuit. I must confess that I had second thoughts about sewing the jumpsuit instead of the dress. It could have been great with that fabric, but I wanted something quick to sew and a jumpsuit means to adjust the fit of the ‘pants’ part. I may sew an Anza jumpsuit one day though because that’s a nice one.
The Anza has nice dolman sleeves and a shirttail hem. You can add pleated breat pockets, but I didn’t.
Since I’m only 5’4″, I shortened both bodice and skirt. I used the golden ratio to find the right length. That was th first time I used it and I’m pretty pleased with the length I got with these flat shoes. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, have a look there.
Since Kennis always includes finished measurements in her instructions, I found out that I need a serious narrowing at the shoulders. As a consequence, it upped raised the sleeves a bit and the fit is great.
Details
I’m not a big fan of elastic waist so I let the elastic out and just used the drawstring.
The V neck is buttoned. I used some lovely vintage buttons gifted by a friend. You cannot imagine how heavy they are. Impressive!
The shirt-tail hem is great to lengthen short legs. And I think that adding leggings underneath for cooler weather will give a new life to my Anza this fall. Paired with knee-high boots and a chunky cardi, don’t you think it would make a cute outfit?
Dresses are actually rather easy to use. I’m still a wear-trousers-all- year-long girl , but I find dresses to be easy to put on and so nice to wear whatever the season is. I’ve sewn quite a few dresses lately: Mix It Ups by George+Ginger (black and floral), the Kew dresses by Nina Lee (navy and blue), and the Celeste by Itch to Stitch. All in all I wear them regularly and I feel pretty in them!
Do you have a favorite dress pattern or you go with the trend?
Pattern: Anza dress and jumpsuit
Fabric: Cotton sateen- John Kaldor
Notions: Fusible interfacing-Vilene G700
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