I am about to embark on a project for a friend which has me making a 1970s double breasted blazer a la Don Cherry. The colour palette requested is based on the Cleveland Browns uniforms – orange and brown. Yup. Let that sink in for a second…
SOOOO…I decided I wanted to make something for myself before I threw myself into the Don Cherry project.
I picked up this pattern (Simplicity 8125) on eBay about three months ago and was having a bit of a difficult time finding fabric. I don’t know about you, but sometimes you just need to find the RIGHT fabric for a project. This one needed two fabrics! It was a lot more difficult than I thought it was going to be, but I digress.
According to the envelope this Simplicity pattern is from 1969. It is for a mod style REVERSIBLE! dress. How cute is that? Two dresses for the price of one!

It took me a couple of months and a trip across the border to find two fabrics I liked. Confession here – it is a rare day that I don’t wear black – so I KNEW one side was going to have a black background. I was stumped on the second side. Most people would say – why not white and magenta? Good question. I have what people politely call alabaster skin tone. It is pale to the extreme and blue undertones which means I cannot wear white without looking like I’m dead. True story.
Here is what I was finally able to find:

Not too shabby right?
This dress was a breeze to sew up. The only alteration I had to make was to shorten the dress about 3 inches. The joys of being so short. It took me less time to sew up this dress then it did to cut it out.
Here are the results:


This dress is much cuter on a real person – my Judy doesn’t do it justice, but it’s been raining most of the weekend and I couldn’t bring myself to fake a cheery shoot! Maybe when the weather gets better I’ll post another picture. Fingers crossed that summer comes to Vancouver, BC!
-girliefrank-
Absolutely brilliant! I love the colours you chose! The dress looks fantastic!
Thanks Debi!
Great idea to make a reversible dress so you can suit your mood.