This dress pattern is made after I received a request from a reader on Tiana’s Closet. She asked me (a few times) for an empire waist dress, with V neckline and short sleeves. After a long time of procrastination, I finally finished designing this Yvonne empire waist dress.
At first I was quite reluctant to make an empire waist dress. To me, this style is often made for pregnant women – higher waistline and plenty room at the skirt to accumulate the baby bum. But when I tried with many styles, I realized that this style can also be elegant and flattering if the skirt is cut the right way.
The Yvonne dress has all bust darts turned into gathering at the empire waist line, and the skirt is fairly fitted at the waist and flared down the hemline. This helps to draw attention to the bust and covers the (possibly) not very slim waist of the wearer.
Let’s have a look at the 3D simulation of the Yvonne dress. I was quite happy with it, so I played around with the prints and color. You can explore your own way of choosing a suitable color for this dress.
How do you think about this dress? If you are interested, download and print the pattern and start the project.
The pattern is made using layered PDF, please check for your desired size before printing so you won’t waste your paper. If you still do not know how to print a layered PDF, please check for the instruction here.
You can print this using your home printer and A4/Letter paper. I calculated the printing area so that you will be able to use either type of paper to print the pattern out perfectly. Always print the first page first and check with the test square if you are printing at the right scale before you print out the whole pattern.
Some PC may print smaller than actual size even when you choose 100% scale – I don’t know why this problem exist, but my HP laptop cannot print true to size. I have to scale up to 103% to get the right size. You may need to check with your PC to see if it prints true to size, if not, scale up a bit.
Cutting instruction:
After taping down all the pages following the instruction, the overall layout of the pattern pieces is like this:
