Vogue 8315 - Black dress with bow, lace and cuff details

AKA: The black dress that never ends

Okay, finally done with this dress!!! It took 3 weeks of sewing! That is a long time for me to spend on one project. It wasn't particularly difficult, just lots and lots of seams and hand sewing. That skirt has 12 pieces and the long sash is sewn on early so there is a ton of fabric to keep up with. Since I added a lining to the top I had to hand sew the underskirt in place. I also had to really think about the sequencing because this is a mock wrap and the top lining had to come together with the underskirt with no exposed seams.

I moved the invisible zipper up as far as I could in hopes of hiding it under the collar. It still shows. Oh well, I'm okay with it. Only the tab shows and I wear my hair down a lot.

Here are the cute french cuffs:

I was VERY weary of this big bow. I don't like bunches of fabric at my waist. My body type is a square and I don't need any more padding in that area. But because the fabric has a bit of stiffness, it holds the bow close to my body and doesn't droop forward. It DOES take me a while of adjusting to get the bow just right. This bow in the picture needs some attention...

Here's the lace peeking out from under my hem. I would prefer a thicker lace here but had a really hard time finding black lace. If I ever find just what I'm looking for it will be replaced.

Here's a picture of the front insides. I put bias tape along the front facings for a smooth finish and around the armhole seams so there are no exposed seams. That small silver dot is a front snap.

Here's the pattern picture. I made view A, the black dress. I guess that's pretty obvious, though.

I am so excited to be through with this and move onto another project.

We had to take these pictures inside since the sun was right in my face. Anyone who's been to my house before might take notice of our new french doors. They need to be painted, but are such an improvement over the sliding glass door that was there before. That was the first thing I wanted to change when we moved in and it only took us 7 years to finally get around to it!