If you’ve read my previous blog post about the Tilly and the Buttons Indigo pattern you will know how much I love the pattern and how much I have hacked it. The dress I’m most requested information on is the gingham tiered version.
The fabric I used was a cotton gingham seersucker from Stoff & Stil, I ordered 4 metres as the fabric is only 43 inches wide.
So here’s the details on how I made it, unfortunately I don’t have many photos of the progress of making it.
Starting with the bodice – I kept the neckline the same but I straighten the front and back bodice at the bottom were the skirt joins, on the pattern there is a slight curve to it rises at the front dips at the back and the sides hit your waist line, the straightening just gives it a even line to attach the skirt to as this will be straight rather than curved like the original pattern piece.
Ensure you move the markings for the centre points to attach the skirt.
For the sleeves – I did add a little extra to the sleeve head to add a few gathers and more movement for me.
For the skirt – I did 3 tiers and the top one has pockets. The skirt is made up of nine panels, each one is 43 inches across and 11 inches deep.
The top tier is 2 panels, the middle tier is 3 panels and the bottom tier is 4 panels. This means each tier is 1/3 larger. It does also mean you may have some seams that are at the front of the dress but these cant really be seen. As the fabric was narrow it made it very easy to just cut the nine panels but if you prefer you could use a wider fabric and calculate the widths with less panels.
Also cutting this was made even easier as I torn the fabric to make the skirt panels, this can be scary but not only is it great for quickness but it ensures the panels are all even and cut on the grain.
Once the panels are sewn together in a loop ensure you add markings for the front, back, sides ect to match each tiers gathers to.
As the fabric was torn and not cut it gave me a beautiful perfect frayed hem that I loved so rather then give it a proper hem I left the fray and just added a row of stitches about 3mm above to stop the fabric from fraying more.
As the fabric of this is a seersucker it doesn’t need ironing so it gets a lot of wear, its comfortable and floaty.
Also if you’re not confident enough to create something like this hack yet Tilly and the buttons now do an add on pack for this pattern which will give you something very similar.
If you want to copy this hack please feel welcome, I’d love to see your versions, please tag me so on instagram @purplesewingcloud so I can see them!
Thanks for reading, happy sewing,
Samantha x
Purple sewing cloud 