And Sew the Year Begins…

… and what a great beginning to the year, as far as sewing goes.  I have made my very first copycat dress.  A copycat Mod Cloth dress at that.  I couldn’t be happier!  Maybe it is more like my version of Mod Cloth rather than an exact copy.  What do you think?

The dress in question:

It is the ‘Firework Your Magic’ dress from Mod Cloth.  You may remember seeing it on my blog here last November.  Let me just say I found this material before I found this dress, so you couldn’t believe how happy I was when I saw this dress while browsing Mod Cloth’s site last November.  It was the ultimate dress inspiration.  You see, just a couple weeks before this dress find, I was browsing fabric.com and came across the prettiest fabric I had come across to date:

I very much wanted it, but it was a little pricey for me at the moment, considering I would need at least 3 yards of the stuff.  It would have to wait a couple more weeks.  (I have never spent more than $10 a yard on fabric, not that I am cheap, just that I kind of doubt my sewing skills under pressure.  This stuff was pretty much $11.00 a yard.)

Fast forward to the end of November when I was invited by Mod Cloth to come up with a fall layers style board, and the dress in question was found.  I now knew what I wanted to make with that wonderful material.  Since I had some birdhouse fabric that needed to be bought right that very second, I added this stuff to take me over the free shipping limit, and started searching for a v-neck dress pattern that would be my copycat.

I wasn’t having much luck in the pattern search.  I started thinking that another Sew Serendipity would be a fine make instead.  I knew how to do that one practically with my eyes closed so I wouldn’t have to worry about messing up the most beautiful fabric in the world.  Then one random afternoon, I was browsing my blog stats and found that someone came across my blog by searching for a Simplicity 3833 (last January’s Dress).  I couldn’t remember which pattern that was so when I googled it, I found the Marilyn Dress.  The PERFECT pattern for a copycat version of the Mod Cloth dress I wanted to make so badly.  It was meant to be, as far as making dresses goes.  😉

I was nervous to cut into it tough, so the this was the second try.  I thought after making The Marilyn Full of Marbles that I would downsize, but didn’t want to wait any longer to get this dress in my regular wardrobe rotation.  The first one fit well enough, so I began the project at hand.  I won’t go into any details about the make, it was pretty much the same as the first go, which you can read about here.  I decided to add a contrasting hem because I like the look of it with the pattern, and it lengthens the dress to be exactly where I wanted it to be.  The material was wonderful to sew, it has a nice weight to it; definitely doesn’t feel like cheap Walmart stuff.  It was worth the splurge.  And now, I have my very own Mod Cloth-looking dress, with the satisfaction of knowing that I made it myself.

I know my color scheme is a bit different than the one pictured above.  I had a hard time deciding because the fabric site had three versions:  this one I went with, a less vibrant version  – like Mod Cloth’s – and one in blue.  Oh, the choices sometimes make me want to get one of each.

I have a few differences in my version.  The front waistband is pointy compared to the straight edge of the original.  And, I carried my band over to the back, unlike Mod Cloth’s version.  Then there is the bottom hem band and a gathered skirt.  You know what though, I like mine much better.  And when the weather warms up, it will make a nice summer dress as well.

I couldn’t be happier about the dress, and my abilities of being able to make something that looks pretty good, if I may say so.  A whole year and a half of serious sewing is paying off.

Here’s to another year of dressmaking, and fabric splurging!

P.S.  I am still not settled on a name for this one… I am liking the Firecracker Dress.

What do you think, Yuki?  No comment.  She’s just enjoying the sunshine.

Details:  Dress – Sew Serendipity (Marilyn) || Fabric – fabric.com (clickable link on fabric photo) || Shoes- Doc Martens || Shirt – No Boundaries || Tights – Vera Wang

*Linking up with:  Craftastic Monday, Creative Mondays, Do Tell Tuesday, Tuesday’s With a Twist & Passion for Fashion.