Wedding of the Year

This weekend two of my closest friends married each other. And I bawled my eyes out.

It was the perfect day and I’m so happy for them, even though I’m a teeny bit jealous of their amazing honeymoon plans.

For the occasion I wanted the perfect dress. When I saw the new Gertie pattern Butterick 6167 I thought it was just gorgeous. Sadly it hadn’t been released in the UK when I fell in love with it. BUT WAIT… Sewing Superhero Sonja from Ginger Makes got hold of a copy and posted it over for me!!! How sweet is that!?

I bought 2m of Liberty Carline poplin from an ebay seller called Fellabird Fabrics while I waited for the postman to come a knocking. This is a smaller version of carline, in a beautiful pink.

The dress features a gathered shelf bust detail, boning, spaghetti straps and a full skirt. The bodice is self lined and I used polyester lining for the skirt. Interestingly the dress is cut on the cross grain!

I thinned out the straps and took a whopping 6cm off the hem. Plus I added a huge hem ruffle (twice the width of the skirt) to the lining to act as a fake petticoat and boost the shape.

It’s a pretty good pattern if you’re interested in learning how to bone a bodice and sew a lapped zipper. I confess I didn’t really need to learn those things but I appreciate that they’re included.

The other joy of the wedding was that it was my honour to make the ties and pocket squares for the Groom, groomsmen and page boys.

Look at these handsome men! When I introduced Mark to my University friend Nicola I never thought it would turn out so well. Mark, Alex and Matt have been in my life for 15 years and I love that they’ve welcomed Jimi like they’ve known him that long as well. He made a very handsome usher.

I know the men look dashing but come on, are those not the cutest kids you’ve ever seen?

I made 7 men’s ties, 7 pocket squares and 2 “fake” ties that fastened with velcro. I drafted patterns from existing ties and googled “sew your own pocket square”. The fake ties were the hardest to wrap my brain around.

I’m half-tempted to make a pdf of the kid’s tie and make it available as a free download. It’s kind of the thing I’d have been happy to find when I was prepping to make these so maybe someone out there would find it useful?

So that was my Easter Saturday! Did you have a fun long weekend?