Bonn Dress – nice clear instructions

BONN DRESS by Itch to Stitch

I desperately wanted to make a dress with flounce sleeves and found myself buying this ItS pattern because it advertised clear instructions with words and pictures (pics are important to me).  Being a pear shape, a shirt dress with lots of ease was going to be a challenge and I think there is a lot of value in toiling in the pattern.  I did take me quite a while toiling to make the adjustments that I needed but I think that’s because my of my figure rather than the pattern.  I sewed most of the dress closed to compensate for how often I cross my legs and it still looks closed.

Things I loved about the pattern:

• Fabulous instructions that were detailed and included words and pics.  There has been a lot of effort put in here and it really shows.
• That there is a facebook group with an active membership for ItS patterns. I felt comforting knowing that help would be available if I really struggled.
• The different sleeve length options
• Cute looking collar.

Things I wished were different about the pattern / my make (please note a lot of these are more about me rather than the lovely pattern):

• The collar was a struggle because it was much bigger than the dress it was being applied to. I probably stretched it at some point so be careful with this.
• I found the labelling of the sleeve options confusing when comparing the pattern pieces to pictures of makes I found online.  This meant I made the 3/4 sleeve and tried to attach the flounce to it.  So many pics of this shirt / dress show the flounce lower on the arm than the pattern makes it.  A bit frustrating as I had to redraft the 3/4 sleeve to make it fit in the first place and then realised I had made the wrong sleeve for the flounce I wanted.
• There way a lot more room in the dress than I expected when toiling- it’s not a fitted style.  For my shape, when I made the size for my measurements, I was swimming in it.  I actually ended up making a 4 sizes smaller in the end and still needed some darts to get it fitted well to suit my pear body shape.  I don’t think others would need to do this.

Note, these aren’t criticisms of the pattern, just my observations of the pattern and how it related to my make and body shape.  I’m really thrilled with the result and would happily make it again.  I made the dress in a thin shirting and next time would make it in a more drapey fabric to appreciate the flounce more.

I would recommend the pattern 🙂