Pattern Review: Cashmerette Turner Dress

Good morning to all of my friends here at CSC! In the interest of full disclosure I would like to let you know that I was a tester for this Cashmerette Turner Dress pattern. I received this pattern for free for testing purposes. As always my opinions are my own. I do not have a blog and made no promises to give this a positive review nor did I promise to review it at all. So with that out of the way I would like to show you how I made this Cashmerette Turner Dress my own. This is the pattern I used to make my mother of the groom dress, so you all have seen the dress before. It has been very hard to keep quiet about this pattern as I have found another “shout it from the rooftop pattern”! I am now 64 and have my share of problems with fitting my ageing figure. I have a rather stooped forward and very broad back and a foreword angled neck. Sigh, my shoulders are rotated forward also. At least I know which way is foreword!My measurements for your comparison:Bust 44″. Waist 40″ ish. Hips. 47 1/2″. I wear a 40D bra.

In the old days I was a definite pear shape and still carry my weight in my hips and thighs. However I also have an apple belly. So I have no idea what shape I am now. I often have to lengthen the bodice on patterns as I am long-waisted. I consider my arms to be on the chunky side.

I made my muslin dress out of a fairly soft rayon knit. In retrospect it was a bit too lightweight for this dress. I made the 18EF for this dress. Technically I would fit into the 18CD sizing but at my age I like a little less negative ease at the bustline. I did not have enough fabric for the sleeves so I made it sleeveless. I did raise the armhole about 1/2″ to make sure I wouldn’t have any bra showage. The top of this dress is lined so in order to have the armhole finished well I used a technique that I learned from the Colette website. It worked very well and I got a nicely finished armhole. I like to understitch the lining to make it roll under.

I was certainly pretty happy with how the dress fit and love to style it as if I was much younger with my cool boots. I haven’t twirled in years! Looking at the dress in the picture I wish I had made it about 1-2″ shorter. I also found that with wearing the dress that it was a bit short waisted for me. I found the V neckline to be perfect. As a comparison I found the V neck on the Concord T-shirt a bit wide and deep for me. If you are interested the Jean jacket is the Stylearc Stacie Jean Jacket. I think I made it 3 years ago – I love that jacket.

On to the big reveal. The Mother of the Groom dress

The actual wedding day. Welcoming my new son in law to the family.

The alterations to this dress are as follows. I lengthened the bodice by 1″. And shortened the skirt by 2″. Again, even though I did have enough fabric for this dress I chose to make it sleeveless. Also, this fabric was a lightweight sweater knit that I just loved with a border print. In order to use the print to its advantage I had to use the fabric on the cross grain. There was not as much stretch on the crossgrain as was recommended by the pattern, so I added a bit of fit insurance to the side seams – added about 1 size to the 18EF along the sideseams only. The border print was only on one side of the fabric. So, when I cut out the bodice I used the border right side up, placing the off white background at the top of the dress. When I cut out the skirt I played around quite a while deciding what I should do. The deciding factor was the very curved hem of the pattern – I couldn’t get the pattern to fit the straight border. It looked much more pleasing to my eye when I put the majority of the border at the waistline seam. The vines then dangle down at the bottom of the skirt. This is probably my favorite dress make in a very long time! Here’s my summary of the pattern: Sizing: Size inclusive and the extra cup sizing gives this a 5/5 for me. Ease of sewing: very easy t shirt dress and a very easy sew. It is a lined bodice which takes it up a notch for me. 5/5 again. Instructions: Great instructions as per usual in Cashmerette patterns. Since this is NOT a pattern that includes a sleeveless option Jenny gets a pass that I had to look elsewhere for the tutorial! 5/5 for me here Final fit: 5/5 This give a final rating of 5/5. This is a perfect pattern for me. Love the skirt, bodice and everything about this pattern. The V neckline is perfect! I plan to make another dress for this winter with sleeves. I have a lovely rayon ponte knit that I plan to make for Christmas. Again it is not quite stretchy enough but will do the same as I did for the wedding day dress. Did I mention that I LOVE this pattern.

️️

️️

️️

️️

️️.A 5 star dress pattern!