Sewing An Embroidered Denim Dress | Sewing Tips, Tutorials, Projects and Events

Today on the blog I've made another New Look pattern - I have a big pile of them I pilfered from work a while back and have been working my way through them so I can justify snaffling another load! Plus I have a holiday coming up so I wanted to make some new bits to take with me, I can't get too carried away though - we're flying with Ryan Air (urgh!) and are sharing a suitcase between the four of us (double urgh!) so I will be severely limited. I might do a Joey from friends and just wear all my clothes at once on the flight so I can take everything I want to.

I chose this New Look 6095 pattern ages ago and decided I wanted to make it in our lovely soft chambray fabric. I have to admit the word 'easy' on the packet appealed to me again as a beginner and I also thought it would help to fill the gap in my wardrobe for day dresses when it's not quite that blistering heat that allows us to wear proper sundresses, but it's warm enough to get your pins out.

I got the fabric washed and cut out then started having doubts. I do this a lot. Over everything. Clothes, world politics, which chocolate bar to buy. I decided it was going to be a bit boring if I left it plain because the fabric was plain unlike the nice stripy stuff on the front of the packet. Then I had a light bulb moment. I'd read in quite a few places about the big embroidered denim trend this summer and thought I'd jump on the bandwagon...

Once you've found and chosen a suitable design the actual embroidery bit is really easy and there are some handy photos and a little video below to show you just how easy. As with many scenarios in life the tough bit is choosing. For a start there are hundreds of thousands of designs out there - who knew you could embroider a hamburger?! Then, once you've decided you want to embroider a hamburger you have to check it is the right size and shape to fit the relevant place on your garment. Ok so the hamburger never made it onto the short list, but you get the picture. I ended up choosing three different designs before we found one that would work with the neckline of the dress.

What is really cool about the way the computerised embroidery machines work is that you can alter the designs by twisting and turning them to make them sit at different angles. You can also chop bits off that you don't like so even though it took a few attempts to find the perfect design it was a lot of fun playing around with them.

Once I'd chosen the design we printed it out on paper and tried it on the actual garment to make sure it fitted well and looked right taking care to remember to accommodate seam allowances. We marked the vertical centre point and the horizontal centre point at each edge of the design with tailors chalk then used a ruler to join the points marked and create a cross in the middle.

Next we clipped some easy tear stabiliserinto a 360mm x 200mm embroidery hoop and marked the centre point on the stabiliser with tailors chalk using the centre point marks indicated on the hoop. We sprayed the stabiliser with spray adhesive and stuck the garment to the stabiliser lining up the centre points. The design was sent from the laptop to the machine via the cloud (I almost sound like I'm talking about here!) and the hoop was then slotted onto the machine. I watched in amazement as it completed it's computerised wizardry hammering out the design in about 20 minutes. The needle moves up and down in rapid succession and the design is created by the machine arm moving the hoop. Clever ay?!

I was absolutely thrilled with the end result and toddled off home to finish the dress, which came together easily. I had previously made a toille using some polycotton so I knew I was pretty happy with the fit. I did make a couple of adjustments - I took it in slightly under the arms and let it out slightly around my thighs. I soon realised I'd been a bit too harsh on my thighs and had made an adjustment that would have comfortably accommodated the thighs of a 49ers linebacker and made my silhouette resemble that of an umpa lumpa. Needless to say I scrapped this adjustment as unnecessary!

The instructions were nice and simple to follow and the only thing I did differently was to put the zip in first then apply the neckline facing, which allowed me to tuck in the top of the zip and finish it neatly whereas the pattern suggested applying the facing first then the zip.

I sewed a baby hem for the sleeves and the hemline by pressing a 5/8" seam up and then folding the raw edge in to meet the fold of the seam and top stitching it in place. I really like the way it turned out and think this finish is great for denim style garments.

Despite cutting an inch and a half off the length I still think it's a bit long for me so I do plan to take it up again and make it shorter at some point. If you look at the pattern packet it is supposed to sit just above the knee which mine does, but only after shortening it by an inch and a half. I'm 5' 6'' so whilst I'm not exactly expecting a call from the Harlem Globetrotters recruitment team I'm not a complete pip squeak either.

So there you have it, my denim (chambray) embroidered dress - super comfy and easy to make which means it will get a right bashing this summer!

Shopping list

For the dress

For the embroidery

Have fun sewing!

Lucy

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