Hi, I’m Lily from Mode de Lis! Today I’m sharing a recent project using the Red Daisy fabric from the Strawberry Biscuit line! The fabrics in the Strawberry Biscuit line are so great for vintage dresses and this was the perfect choice for a new everyday dress- I love wearing vintage on a daily basis so new dresses are a constant necessity. 🙂
I wanted to try a different dress style than my normal, and since I was nannying over the summer I’ve found a definite need for busy prints to hide any stains or wrinkles, large pockets to hold odds and ends, and fuss-free styling. I decided to take a cue from the 1950s and make a wrap-style housedress! I also recently discovered that a local building used to be the headquarters for a housedress/apron factory in the 1920s-60s! I’ll have a post about the company on my blog within the next month or so, and it seemed only appropriate to model the dress in front of a factory where many similar garments were produced!
For my dress, I used a pattern from the 1950s that was already in my stash.
The dress closes by wrapping in the back and buttoning at the neckline….
Each half of the waistline has a tie attached so the under layer slips through a hole in the side seam….
…And comes around to the front….
…The over layer comes around to the front….
…Both ties cross at the center….
…Loop around back to the side they came from….
….And tie in the back! Voila!
These pockets that wrap all the way around the sides are soooo capacious! We joked that there’s no concern about fitting a phone in these… they’re certainly big enough for a tablet and almost big enough for your whole laptop!
To accent the tab details at the neck and pockets, I edged both with white piping and finished them off with vintage buttons. I absolutely love the quality of all the Penny Rose fabric I’ve purchased, and I’m sure this dress will last me for several years!
If anyone wore wrap dresses like this in the 40s or 50s (or remembers their mom or grandma wearing them!), I’d love to hear about it! They were such a practical housedress and a popular choice for chores around the house.
Oh, and in case you were skeptical about my rather *impractical* footwear, I wasn’t sure what to pair this with for photos so I took my cue from the pattern cover art- heels, a la June Cleaver! 😉