When Vanessa Pouzet published her latest skirt pattern La Bohème, I got slightly over-excited: the pattern was published on Thursday night, my skirt sewn on Friday morning, photographed by my 8 year-old son on Friday afternoon and blogged on Saturday  – you must think that I am completely crazy! But appart from the fact that this pattern is just perfect, I owe you an explanation…

A few months ago, I volunteered myself for the Minerva Craft Maker Team. Each month, Minerva Craft offer to the team a selection of fabric. By chosing one, the maker agrees to contribute an article to the Minerva Craft blog. As I love both sewing and writing in English, with on top some free fabric on offer, this was far too tempting! For an obscure reason, I decided to start contributing from February – as we are away on holiday for two weeks soon and in the middle of renovating our bathrooms, committing to a 4-week deadline is definitely not the best idea I had… Oh well… I chose this spot crepe fabric, which I particularly liked for its vintage look.  It is described as a medium-weight, I thought I would make a dress (my favourite ever garment to make and wear by far) out of it so I ordered 3 meters.

When the fabric arrived however, my plans for a dress evaporated: the fabric was far too soft for the mid-season strucured dress I had in mind; and slightly transparent on top, so it would have required full lining – arrggghhh! But it would work wonders on a skirt: I started dreaming about something long and vaporous, initially in the circle skirt department, then with ruffles… And then, TADA, Vanessa published this amazing pattern and my fabric’s destiny was sealed!

This skirt is amazing, static…

… or in motion…

… and let’s not even start twirling about!!!

This is my fourth Vanessa Pouzet garment. Having already sewn the adult cape, the child cape and the Sister Mini skirt, I was fully confident it would be a super smooth, super satisfactory project – and it was!

• The pattern is PDF only but it is extremely easy to print and assemble – it took me no more than 30 minutes! So if you are allergic to PDF pattern, you should definitely reconsider, these are my favourite ones by far!
• The explanantionbs are crystal clear, you can’t make any mistake if you follow them carefully – and they are also full of hunour!
• Everything falls paerfectly into place…
• … and the finish product is just so stylish!

No I promise, I am not being paid to say this, I am just an absolute fan!

As far as technicalities are concerned:

• It took me about four hours to make this dress, from printing to taking pictures.
• The two longest steps were cutting the fabric – an absolute nightmare with such a soft fabric; and hemming the skirt – meters and meters of slippery material to deal with!
• I shortened the skirt by 2cm but I did not follow the patern’s instructions: I assembled the skirt and the ruffle together, tried on with my heels (of the height I will wear with the skirt, this is absolutely essential) and cut 2cm from the top before assembling the belt.
• I also diverted from the pattern for the belt: I only cut one piece of fabric of 150x20cm (insead of 2 pieces of 150×10) and I thermolined the belt to give more rigidity to my fabric.
• Despite the fabric being slightly transparent, I did not feel the need to add any lining, as the front overlap does the job!

So absolutely no trouble with the pattern but quite a lot with my fabric – although completely worth if! I love the fact that the fabric is so light and a bit transparent, it makes the dress very special.

In summary  :

• Pattern: La Bohème skirt by Vanessa Pouzet (sadly only available in French for the moment), a floor-lenght wrap skirt with an all-around ruffle. The pattern in only available in PDF but Vanessa’s are the easiest PDF to print and assemble I have ever used!
• fabric: this white spots on black background medium-weight crepe fabric from Minerva Craft. Definitely not easy to cut and to hem, as it slips quite a bit, but totally worth the effort! It is slightly trensparent but with this skirt required no lining, as the wrap does the job.
• Sewing level: completely feasible for beginners, as there are very few pattern pieces, no major technical difficulty and the explanations are crystal-clear!
• Love level: I am crazy about this skirt, such a beauty, in particular when moving!

After a very positive initial experience of the Vogue patterns (see my articles about the V8630 dress here and here), I continued my exploration of their Custom Fit collection with their V9327 dress: perfect for the winter with its high-collar, its long cuffed sleeves and its midi circle skirt.

These beautiful details really appealed to me – and they look exactly the same in real life as on the drawing!

As I explained previously, being a UK size 8 with an E-cup, FBAs are my worst nightmare; and the Vogue Custom Fit collection is my latest best find, with its 4 cup options (D is perfect for my E).

Although my measurements indicate a 12 top/ 14 bottom in Vogue, I decided to cut a 10 as I had eventually done with my two previous Vogue dresses (from reading other reviews of the Vogue patterns, it seems to be quite a common thing). I made a muslin to check the fit of the top and the sleeves and appart from adding 1cm ease at the underarm (quite a common adjustment for me, disregarding the pattern brand), I MADE NO FITTING ADJUSTMENT WHATSOEVER! How good is that?

The only change I made was to fully line the dress. The pattern only indicates how to line the top, but adding a skirt is pretty straightforward – and there was no way I was having an unlined wool dress!

The fabric I used is 100% wool suiting fabric from Crofmill, my go-to online shop when I want rather classical high-quality fabric at a discount – this one was £15/m, very reasonable for such nice wool! The pattern needs quite a lot of fabric though, due to the big skirt – the enveloppe said 3.5m, I used 3m. The fabric is black with very fine lines of blue and silver, a beauty!

As with my other Vogue experience, the instructions were crystal-clear; and the final dress looked perfectly like the enveloppe drawing, so absolutely no surprise here. I am very pleased with how this dress turned-out and it is so warm and cosy I am sure I will get a lot of wear out of it – plus it is a perfect match with my new favourite winter jacket! ( this one is not handmade I’m afraid…)

In summary :

• Pattern: V9327 from the Vogue Custom Fit collection, with a high collar neck, a fitted bodice, sleeve cuffs and a long circle skirt. The collar and sleeve details are beautiful in my view; and I adore the big skirt!
• Fabric: I made this dress in a 100% high-quality wool-suiting fabric from Croftmill; the lining fabric is a cheap one from E-Bay – but antistatic, this is absolutely essential so that it does not stick to tights!!!
• Sewing level: intermediate in my view. There are quite a few curved-stitch lines for the collar and invisible zip, otherwise very straigtforward but long, especially if you decide to fully line the dress. The explanantions arte crystal clear though, I particulalry appreciated therm for the cuffs.
• Love level: I absolutely love it, so much my style! I don’t think I will make another one this winter though as there are quite a few other Vogue Custom Fit patterns I want to explore.

Yes, very typical of me, after sewing a first version of the Vogue 8630 dress, I had to immediately sew a second one! And there is no hiding with this collar: despite the very different fabrics, the dresses do look very similar:

Here are the two version of the V8630 dresses I have hand-sewn from the front, in a Channel fabric and a velvet fabric

Two handmade versions of the V8630 dress seen from the back

As I mentionned in my previous article, I was over the moon with the fit of my first V8630 dress – so much so that I even wondered if the fabric was being forgiving! But no, I can confirm that even in a less stretchy fabric, the fit is still impeccable!

A side view of my V8630 dress, in a black textured velvet and with a silver piping around the collar

Detail of the collar of the V8630 dress, enhanced by a sliver piping detail

I won’t go through all the technical details of putting the dress together again, as you can find them here. The main difference is (quite obviously) the collar: I added silver piping all around, to have my usual touch of bling on this otherwise very sobre fabric. What do your think?

The pattern adjustments are the same for both dresses (very few for such a perfect fit in my view):

• slightly larger sleeve head (+1cm)
• slightlly longer bodice (+1cm)
• massively shorter skirt (-15cm) – I wonder if I actually went a bit too short on this one, oh well…

The V8630 dress, with a substantially shortened skirt and a silver piping collar detail

The fabric is some sort of velvet, bought from Bennytex many moons ago, lovely and warm for the winter.

The dress is once again fully lined. To attach the lining to the dress at the sleeves, I used the wonderful technique recommended by Republique du Chiffon for lining the Michelle jacket (see step 11) – a bit complex at first but really worth it for a neat finish. I tried to use it for the hem as well but my dress and lining must be slightly misaligned, as it does not work… I ended-up hand-stitching. Next time I’ll be more careful!

I think I have fulfilled one of my year-long sewing pursuits: finding the perfectly-fitted dress pattern. What do you think? – this is without any bust adjustment whatsoever!

My dress size is a perfectly standard UK8 / French 36, I am even the standard height for most French Indie patterns (1.67m), but my bust is my sewing nightmare: 32E/85E, arrrrrgggghhhhhh! I love it otherwise but it has created many many hours of adjustment nightmares.

For a while, I used this great FBA tutorial by Annie Cotton (creator of the Artesane company), which I must admit worked very well, but took so much time for each new pattern! And I never felt I had managed the perfect fit in the end. I actually reached the stage where I would avoid making a dress from a new pattern just because of the hours of FBA required!

But at Christmas, I got this genius idea: why not look for patterns with the FBA built-in? (don’t ask me while it took me so many years of sewing dresses to get there…) After a fair bit of googling I  discovered the Vogue Custom Fit collection and I was in awe, which offers within its patterns the full top options for A, B, C and D cup – Vogue has drawn everything for you! And within the different patterns on offers there are so many things I would love to make this winter! To be fair you need a bit of imagination, as the patterns are not always shown under the best light – so imagine a different fabric and shorten most skirts is my advice!

In any case here are my absolute favourites:

=>Version A of the one in a light black wool with a white lace collar:

=>Version F of this one in burgundy velvet; or version C in light wool (PLAIN fabric in any case):

Before ordering all the patterns of in the collection, I was very reasonable and I tried my favourite: V8630, version B. I happened to have a Chanel-ish fabric in my stash, bought from Les Coupons de Saint Pierre at the beginning of the season, which seemed perfect for this pattern.

I re-took my measurements and was a bit puzzled by the sizing, which made me feel enormous (but apparently that’s the way it is with Vogue) – so I cut size 10 at the top going to 12 from the waist down; and a D cup. I really shouldn’t have bothered about the size 12 as after a muslin, I readjusted everything to a size 10.

And that was it! Appart from slightly enlarging the underarm (1cm, no change to the sleeve itself as their is plenty of ease to accomodate this); slightly lenghtening the bodice (1cm); and massively shortening the skirt (-16cm) to avoid the grandma effect, I made no adjustment whatsoever!!! And the bust and back where absolutely perfect!!! I could hardly believe my luck!

Given the Channel-ish nature of this fabric, I frayed the end at the hem and at the sleeves; and secured with a stretch zizag.

The collar is obviously quite a big feature of this dress – not sure yet whether I will redo it, as it makes putting the dress on a bit convoluted. It is very pretty though.

Overall I am over the moon to have found such a perfect pattern. On top of the perfect fitting, the explanations are crystal-clear and the finish is impeccable – the dress is fully lined and looks nearly as pretty in the inside as it does in the outside (I did a lot of hand-stitching, for once…)

Fingers crossed that all the Vogue Custom Fit range patterns will prove to be as good…

In summary :

• Pattern: V8630 (Google online to find the cheapest option for your country, mine was Amazon) from the Vogue Custom Fit collection, with a standard fitted bodice, a straight midi skirt and a large overlapping collar. Changing the skirt would be completely straigthforward, removing the collar far less so as the bodice has a very low neckline on its own.
• Fabric: Chanel-ish and quite heavy, this thing is a bit of a nightmare to sew as it frays so much – the pattern required no overlocking whatsoever of the sides (due to full lining) but I had to do it as I was cutting each piece to avoid excessive fraying. I also used my portable vacuum-cleaner non-stop! I used a basic synthetic lining fabric for the inside, which does the job perfectly.
• Sewing level: Vogue calls it Very Easy, which I think is a bit harsh on the beginners. It is very straightforward but requires a bit of experience for the back invisible zip, the collar and the zillions of darts; and also a lot of patience, especially if you make a muslin beforehand, which I highly recommend!
• Love level: I am very pleased with the fit achieved, not so sure about the collar and the straight skirt, but I’ve definitely sewn outside of my comfort zone and my tried and tested style on this one.