Let’s Make a Dress for Special Occasion

This tutorial goes with my Special Occasion Dresses pattern guide. There are four different dress designs present in the guide, and I picked the Mock-up Wrap Dress (lower right corner in the pic) for this sew-along as it’s probably the trickiest one to sew. Whatever special occasion you’re looking to attend you’ll be able to create a special occasion dress to suit.

There are a few different ways to make this dress and I’m going to show you how to make a sleeveless version with layers of satin and chiffon. If you want to have sleeves, you could make, for example, flutter sleeves as in the picture. This style works also as a full-length dress.

This dress has an overlapped front and a flounce attached to the skirt. But as the name suggests, it’s not a real wrap dress, so you can’t actually open the front. There’s a zipper at the back instead.

But if you’d prefer to make a real wrap dress, that can be done, too, with a few modifications. Check out this tutorial to see how to create one.

I made a toile of the bodice before cutting the final fabric to check the fit and the neckline (to see if it gapes).

The Materials

You’ll want to choose flowy and drapey fabrics for this dress. You can either make it only in one layer + lining. Or two layers + lining, which is what I did.

Special occasion dress calls for special occasion fabrics.

I picked satin and chiffon. There were lots of lovely colors, but I was drawn to this one. The chiffon is more aquamarine/cerulean than the satin, but the end result works nonetheless.

This chiffon is not too transparent, but if you pick one that is, you could play with the shades more. In my case the satin just provides some extra shine.

Then there’s a white lining and a 60cm long invisible zipper.

The Dress Bodice

The dress bodice consists of two pieces which are prepared separately and then overlapped at the waist.

The back piece has no gathers, so I just united the chiffon and satin layers by sewing near the edge all around the piece.

The satin layer of the front piece doesn’t have gathers either, so you only need to close the dart. Whereas the chiffon layer needs to be gathered at the waistline.

Then you pin the chiffon piece carefully on top of the satin piece, matching the edges, and stitch all around to unite the layers.

You might want to leave the waistline open, though, as it’s easier to arrange the gathers later that way.

Especially if you’ve chosen to cut the chiffon piece on the bias! It will easily stretch and you might need to remove some excess length at the waistline anyways. However, I cut it on the straight grain so I didn’t have this problem. The drapes are not as soft, but I didn’t feel like making so many adjustments. 😀

After you’ve united the layers, you can sew the shoulder seams.

Then prepare the bodice lining, too.

Attaching the Lining

Now you can attach the lining to the main bodice around the neckline, right sides together.

This kind of neckline will likely stretch, so you must stay-tape it. Take the original neckline measurement from your pattern piece. I actually used a strip of the chiffon selvage as a stay tape!

Pin the stay tape to the seam allowance of the neckline. You might already notice how it has stretched. So to distribute the excess length, you can divide it into 2-3 sections. You can see in the picture above how my neckline is longer than the “stay tape”.

Then trim off about half of the seam allowance and understitch the neckline so that the seam allowance ends up towards the lining.

Next, sew the armholes in the same way. You don’t need to add stay tape unless you think there’s a risk of the armholes stretching. If they are gaping, you can add a slightly shorter stay tape to reduce that.

Once the armholes are done, too, you can sew the side seams. It’s easy to stitch the side seams of both the main bodice and the lining in one go.

If you’re making this dress with sleeves, you’d close the side seams before attaching the sleeves, then attach the sleeves to the main bodice first, and finally attach the lining at the armhole.

Finishing touches

Now you have both sides of the bodice sewn and it’s time to adjust the gathers.

Pin the two sides together at the waist, right side on top, matching the c-front notches. Then place the bodice on a dress form or a person (which could be you), and begin arranging the gathers.

Pin the folds in place the way you like. You might even want to turn the waistline gathers into pleats instead. As mentioned earlier, in the case of bias cut, you might need to remove some excess length at this point, too.

When you’re pleased with the result, add a few invisible hand stitches here and there to keep the folds in place. Basically, you attach the chiffon to the satin layer. The tiny stitches should remain inside the folds.

I attempted to take a picture, but even my camera wasn’t sure what I was trying to capture here! 😀 So I guess I did a good job..

Finally, you may stitch the two sides together at the waist.

Try the bodice on and pin the neckline: you need to hand-stitch it at the center so that it won’t open.

The Skirt

The skirt has 3 layers as well: chiffon, satin, and lining. I prepared each layer separately.

The chiffon layer also has an extra overlap layer at the front.

I sewed French seams for the chiffon skirt and normal seams for the other two. Hem the chiffon skirt first.

Narrow Rolled Hem

Chiffon kind of requires you to make a narrow rolled hem. Here’s how:

Instead of just pressing the hem normally, you first sew a row of stitches near the hemline. This will serve as a guideline for the first hemline fold. It’s easier to fold along the stitches!

If you feel like 0.5cm is too near the edge to press the fold, you can also sew further up and then just trim off excess width after you’ve pressed it.

I think it’s easier to make the second fold while stitching the hemline instead of pressing with the iron first. Try to keep it as narrow as possible.

Pin the chiffon and satin skirts together at the waist to check the skirt lengths before hemming the satin skirt; you don’t want the satin layer to show at the hemline.

The Overlap and the Flounce

The overlap is stitched to the skirt’s side seam and has a flounce attached to its other edge. I prepared this piece before attaching the overlap to the rest of the skirt.

This is a regular spiral flounce. The seam allowance is already built in the pattern.

I decided to hem the flounce with a serger, as it makes rolled hems, too. This can be quite nerve wracking, as the stitches easily slip off the edge. So I treated the flounce edge with Fray check first.

Another option of course is to cut the flounce twice and unite the two at the hemline to get a finished edge.

Then I sewed the flounce to the edge of the skirt overlap, right sides together. I needed to clip the flounce seam allowance at a few points.

However now we’ve got this ugly seam showing and need to hide it.

I cut a strip of chiffon (2.5cm wide) and sewed it at the previous seam allowance as shown here, and then folded it twice on top of the said seam allowance to cover it.

You can also baste before sewing, if you think pins are not going to do the trick.

Uniting the Bodice and the Skirt

I had gathers both for the chiffon and satin skirt, so I gathered the waistlines of these skirts to match the bodice and then united them at the waist to make it easier to join the skirt to the bodice.

However, I’d probably have preferred to keep the satin layer smooth to avoid extra bulk.

Anyways.

You won’t be able to keep the lining separate around the center front, but after the overlapped area, clip the seam allowance of the bodice lining at the waistline as shown here. This allows you to sew the back section with the lining separately.

Then attach the skirt lining by sewing it to the previous waistline seam allowance around the overlapped area, and the rest of it as usual.

The Dress Zipper

Now the dress is only missing a zipper! I sewed the main layer with my invisible zipper foot. There was basting involved to match the two sides.

Then I changed to the regular zipper foot to sew the lining to the zipper.

I also made a matching sash/belt for my new dress, using the full width of the fabrics.

The Finished Special Occasion Dress

Now you’ll probably want to see the result! 🙂

First, a few details.

Then the dress on the dressform.

And finally me with my new special occasion dress, ready for special occasions! Wondering if there will be any… Even curled my hair, just in case!