I made a shirtdress. Actually, the fabric I used was liquid drape rayon challis and it made my dress look rather a blouse-dress than a shirtdress. Yet I'm very pleased with it! The pattern is Wenona shirtdress which was recently released from Named patterns.
I think Wenona is a very modern&pretty shirt dress without being excessively(peculiarly) fashionable. I love my first Wenona... it does suit my everyday perfectly and also fulfills my wish to look special in a good way. I love the fabric itself too. I'm not too sure whether it is appropriate to wear Eucalyptus flower print in this time of year, but still, I really love it for my autumn wardrobe. The hand of the fabric is soft and fluid. The feel of its lightly nap-raized surface is smooth and warm. Gorgeous, gorgeous!
By the way, I basically followed the original pattern and its instructions. Though there was no problem with the process of sewing this dress at all, there is one thing that I'd like to mention about the pattern here. It's about sizing. For this shirtdress I used size 34 in the end, while my measurement size is 40 in the size chart.
I started with a muslin using size 36(two size smaller than my measurements) and I'd say it was very roomy, I mean, very. I guessed the style was intended one to be like that, but I decided to use size 34 because I didn't wish my dress to be particularly loose fitting. And it was OK-ish in the end as you see in the photos.
Named has charts of finished measurements along with size chart, which is very great, and I suggest you not to forget to have a look at the finished measurements before guessing your size by considering the size chart and your measurements, if you happen to start your Wenona. I couldn't foresee the looseness by looking at the sample pictures of the pattern, but it was like that.
Now that I shared my dress, I have another version of Wenona here. My friend Naomi, who is a very popular quilt teacher, made her a shirt version in a crisp linen combination.
She was wearing it when we met a week ago and she was so stylish in this contrasting version! I asked her to let me use one of her photos to share it with you, as I thought that there might be some of you who are interested in different version of Wenona pattern too. Her blog post about the shirt is here (in Japanese). Thank you, Naomi.
Happy sewing to you!!
Hugs,
yoshimi
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Wenona shirtdress pattern
Wenona (PDF) from Named
chosen much smaller size, shortened sleeve length, added belt loops for belt.
Fabric
Anna Maria Horner Pretty Potent Rayon Challis Eucalyptus Lime, which is a fruit of my very first international fabric shopping. oh well.
57" x 2.5yds
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