149. Vogue 2975 (finally!): Modern Muumuu Done Right

Wish I'd kept better count of all the summer dresses I've sewn so far.  Maybe I'll re-cap at the end of summer.

I bought Vogue 2975 to make a summer dress from 2 years ago!  Never quite found the right fabric for it, or maybe I didn't have a very clear vision of what I wanted mine to look like.  No vision problems this year:  Summer 2009 is obvz going to be the summer of barely-shaped muumuus!  In Las Vegas, I got my hands on a gauzy, bright floral-printed cotton and saw the muumuu potential.  

Side note: last summer I tried my hand at McCall's 5654 and it was a total, complete muumuu.  Don't feel comfortable wearing it and I may need to refashion it into something else.  It taught me that I need some shaping in my muumuus, at least fitting at the bust and definition at the waist, even if there is tons of ease at the waist and hips.

Back to Vogue 2975... 

It met the new muumuu requirements for fitted bust and definition at waist.  Well, this dress in size 6 is fitted at the bust if you have a 33" bust.  I don't, so after I made my usual petite alterations of taking an inch from the bodice in the waist and another inch in the hip, I put the dress together and tried it on, and it gaped at the bust.  After exploring a number of options for reducing the excess fabric (pinching an inch from the front and an inch from the back, taking in the princess seams, taking a fraction of an inch from every vertical seam all around), it became clear that the excess fabric was all in the front, and, surprisingly, taking two inches from center front was the best way to go.  So, at least for this dress, I've added an extra pleat at center front.  I don't particularly like it when I stand back and look at it, but the floral is so busy that it isn't distracting or obviously bad in any way:

Funny, too, I omitted the zipper.  It still slips on over my head.  Taking it off requires a little negotiation, but not much.  Worth it to me to skip the zipper.  Also had to add some pockets.  This dress is so full that some fluffy, puffy, rounded, elasticized pockets called out to me.

I like the shape of this dress, I like wearing it, and I'd highly recommend this pattern even to beginners.  It's marked Average but that's probably a rating for the jacket.  The dress has only 5 pattern pieces but looks much more complicated.  I made this at my mom's house and she doesn't use tracing paper, so marking out the pleats took a long time -- I marked and sewed some of them incorrectly, had to unpick them, and start over.  

If I can find the right cotton I would like to make this again in a LBD version, with a pattern modification to reduce the front by 2 inches.  Hopefully this doesn't mess up the pleat placement too much.  I'll keep you posted if and when I get to that point.  :)

My review of Vogue 2975 on patternreview.com here.