V9081 LBD

Marcy Tilton calls Vogue 9081 her Block Dress. It contains a cropped cardigan for knits and a dress for woven fabrics. The dress has two views. One is sleeveless and the other has 3/4 length sleeves. They also have slightly different *blocks* so you have several options.

The cover photos show view C in a subtle and sophisticated combination of linen in three solid colors. I messed around with my stash, hoping for a pretty combination in linen. Linen is my hands-down favorite fabric to sew, especially during the spring season when I've become tired of winter fabrics.

Instead I realized that I have a lot of black cotton in my stash so I harvested two. Each is Japanese, one from Waechter's in Asheville, NC, and the other from Josephine's in Portland, OR. Each is a different weave, with dominant black and smaller amounts of white. Each piece has an interesting (and different) front and back. They are approximately the same weight and drape though one is much denser.

Back with a little square from the other fabric.

During the preparation of the pattern tissue, I confused the measurements on the outside of the envelope with the measurements on the pattern tissue. Yikes! What was I thinking? Of course, the measurements on the outside are body measurements suggested for each size. And the measurements on the pattern tissue are finished garment measurements. So I attempted mid-course to convert a size 12 to a size 14.

This was a good time to remind myself that I sew for fun and that this is only fabric.

Now that it is completed, I'm pretty jazzed about it. It is a dress that I will feel good in. And I look forward to making it again, perhaps using the right size. I am pretty sure the size 14 would have been just right with no adjustments.

Inset pocket

Some notes:

• In her blog, Marcy described this as tapered at the hem. My bottom panel is a rectangle and not tapered. But I did have to ease it onto the upper part of the dress so that creates a taper starting mid-thigh. Probably I just misunderstood what was meant by a tapered hem.

  

• The unique pocket construction was challenging and it seemed the instructions were a little light here. You have to insert a concave right angle into a convex right angle, much like a Y seam. I was glad I had done similar things before.
• Marcy's blog mentioned something about the pocket being cut on the bias, but the pattern tissue for each pocket piece shows straight of grain. It probably made very little difference because the pocket is small.
• The pocket is adorable and worth the effort!
• As Marcy points out in her blog, this is also a great tunic pattern if you just leave off the bottom panel (or make it more narrow).

Here it is before adding the lower panel. I like this tunic too.

Another very cool design from Marcy Tilton!