Alice In Wonderland

This is one of my most favourite recent dresses! I made it for a little 1 year old, but my own 3 year old, has since ordered one for herself…
I was asked to make an Alice dress (for an Alice in ONEderland first birthday party). This is what I came up with:

 

I used the Cottage Mama Vintage Georgia dress pattern as a base, then made a few adaptations. I curved the collar’s corners slightly; on the pattern they’re quite sharp.

 

I added the broderie trim on the sides of the bib (the pattern calls for piping there), and the hem of the overskirt. Of which I made more like an apron by only cutting the front piece and hemming the sides as well as the hem.

I think a lot of the Alice-likeness comes from the choice of colours; where to put blue, and where to put white, which looks like an apron over the top of a dress.

The back features a beautiful big bow, and snap fastenings. Snaps were my second option because I had an issue with the buttonholes… there was too much bulk in the seam to sew the lowest buttonhole; the foot just doesn’t go over it. So I had to panic, unpick the others, and improvise with KAM snaps. But I do really like the look of the pearly white snaps anyway – every cloud, eh?

The Georgia Vintage dress is a lovely pattern – probably best for intermediate level; some of the instructions aren’t perfectly clear for beginners and there are some techniques you want to get accurate, like the collar. I really dislike unsymmetrical collars!

Hope you like it…

Beth x