Two Essex Farrow Dresses

I made these two dresses in the past week or so. I had been dreaming of a super classic black linen Grainline Farrow dress for ages, but I’ve been trying to rein in my fabric buying habit so I was exhibiting self-restraint…until I found this Essex linen/cotton for $11/m at a discount fabric shop and I couldn’t resist! I also picked some up in this lovely blue to make my mum a Farrow of her own.

I’m making five bridesmaids’ dresses (including one for myself and one for my sister) for my uncle’s wedding in late August – more on that whole project in future posts – and I was thinking my mum deserved a new dress of her own, even though she wasn’t going to be in the wedding party. My mum is a definite “blue” person, so it was good luck that this blue was one of the three colours of this fabric in stock.

I am pretty proud of my point matching on this (and my own dress below) but I can’t take all the credit. This fabric is SO stable and easy to work with that I could sew with this all day long! Mum was pleasantly surprised by her unexpected new dress, and said she’d definitely wear it. I didn’t make any fitting adjustments, since this A-line really only needs to fit in the bust/shoulders. Excuse the dog hairs in the photos below, Sophie the golden retriever was determined to be a featured guest of this photoshoot.

I made a few alterations for my own version. I took in the shoulder seams by 1/2″ on each side, and lowered the neckline by 2″. (Side note: the beautiful trees in the background below are by Kelli MacConnell and you should check out her printwork.)

I have a French curve ruler that I tried to use to make a lovely curve on the neckline, but in the end I am an amateur at such things and my freehand sketching turned out better than my ruler. My first attempt looked more like I traced a round bowl onto the neckline, which is not exactly the look I was going for…

I’m really excited for it to warm up around here so I can wear this on a regular basis! I think it’s going to become a go-to item for me – it can be casual but I think it’s really elegant as well.

I also tend to bash through hems because I get that anticipation of being able to try the thing on and just want to be done, but I’m trying to fight that instinct. For these two dresses, I really took my time and I’m pleased with the results. This might not be “proper” or whatever, but I always find things work out better for me if I’m doing a hem and do the final hem fold FIRST and press that up. Then I go back and in this case, just tuck the raw edge in so it meets up against the fold I just made (or in other dresses, unfold it and press in the 1/4″ required). That way I can be more sure that the overall hem is more even. I find when I tuck in the raw edge first I end up being really sloppy and get overly confident in my eyeballing skillz and then the hem gets wrinkles in it. But this time I bullied myself into being patient and going slow, and I’m glad I did.

I also used this opportunity to try out an all-in-one facing for the first time! I am definitely not the world’s biggest fan of facings (although I like how they look). The way they’re always flipping out and going everywhere drives me crazy. So I thought maybe drafting an all-in-one facing would help with that problem. I traced off the tops of the patterns pieces and then took out the seam allowance from the center front so that I could cut it on the fold instead. I also feel weird about calling this “drafting” – to me I feel like I need to be doing math and calculations and geometry to being actually drafting anything, as opposed to just tracing around and making an arbitrary decision as to the curve of the bottom edge. But I suppose it IS drafting and I shouldn’t downplay knowing how to do things. Sewing it was easier than I anticipated, as I just mentally treated it like a partial lining and pulled it through the shoulder seams as usual. (There are a bunch of tutorials for this out there on the interwebs.)

I had to change the way the top of the center back was finished because of having to change the order of construction with the facing, but I think it still looks pretty good! If you’re going to do your own all-in-one facing for the Farrow make sure you don’t sew the center back seam before you sew the facing, otherwise you won’t be able to turn it right way out. I DO recommend finishing the edges of the center back prior to sewing the facing.

My final note is that while I thought the Farrow would be really baggy and unflattering on me when it first came out, I gave it a go and I think it’s so great! I’ve made a couple before these ones, and I think it’s just such a beautiful design with the diagonal seams and the clever inset pockets. If you’ve been resisting it, I’m here to say that you should definitely just go for it.