Black Hawaiian Dress: McCalls 6071

I finally finished two dresses today, ones I started weeks ago. Here's the first one. Because I have stubbornly refused to make a muslin, I keep having to alter over and over, ripping and restitching, which is very time consuming when the pattern has a band at the waist as this one does. Many alterations later, I ended up with...

I used McCalls 6071 for the upper bodice. But one reviewer said the pattern turns out VERY LOOSE, which is hard to tell from the photograph. But notice how the model is holding the LOOSE skirt in with the placement of her hand. I wanted a closer fit, so I took a band and skirt from another pattern. I also made the straps halter instead of straight over the shoulder.


For fabric, I used this very large wrap skirt from a church rummage sale: all in a bag for a dollar. There was plenty of fabric due to how far the wrap went around...


... Here is the design process... as I look back now, I like this dress better than what I ended up with. I must say I'm not thrilled with the way the bodice turned out. It seems to make my upper carriage look very narrow... Hmmmm ... I may tear it apart and rethink ... or not...



This closeup shows two things:
1. the gathering band that makes pleats on the upper midriff. The pattern added a bow, which I eliminated. It wasn't till I saw this picture that I realize the pleats ended up lumped in the wrong places. I'll go back and tack the pleats more appealingly.
2. I'm not pleased with the droop of the midriff band. It's over two inches wide, and on another garment, I reduced it to just one inch and the droop was eliminated. I think that I don't have 2+ inches of body in the space between lower bust and hip bone to accommodate such a wide band. I'm not going to change it, but I'll keep that in mind in future patterns.

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