A-line dress - Japanese pattern book

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This dress started off as a thickly woven fabric floor mat made by Ikea and it was bought second hand from a thrift store. I liked the thickness and weave of the fabric and decided it would be pretty educational to try and work with it. I traced out my size from the japanese pattern book and in the end foiund there is something not quite right about the sleeve cut. I added a pocket to one side of the dress and used a black poly/cotton to reduce bulk. In hindsight I should have drafted a nicer pocket as it gapes a little and you can see the black fabric.

 I also used the black poly/cotton for the neckline facing and herringbone stitched it in place. This wasn't the best way to do it, but I found just sewing it to the seam allowances wasn't stopping the poly/cotton facing from rolling to the outside. This was my first project that I sewed with my new-to-me Singer industrial sewing machine and I found that the bite was too strong for this thick fabric and you can see the stripes distort around the neckline where I sewed the facing to the dress.