Seren Dress

Well, what a gorgeous pattern the Seren dress is by Tilly and the Buttons – talk about a dreamy dress! It’s the epitome of summer with a button down front, optional neckline flounce or tie front bodice and options for either a knee or midi length skirt. It’s simply stunning and I loved it straightaway!

I had a friends wedding coming up and decided (a little too last minute!) that I wanted to make a Seren for it. The fabric options are another ball game altogether as different fabrics give the dress such a different look and feel! Tilly suggests light to medium weight woven fabrics such as cotton lawn, chambray, seersucker, linen, viscose or crepe and if you’re making the flounce version make sure to pick a drapey fabric. I feel that a bold, plain colour  would really dress it up and shows off all the gorgeous features whereas a patterned fabric gives the dress a slightly more of a ‘day dress’ feel.

The midi-length, flounce version was the one that took my fancy so I traced off a size 2 as this is almost my measurements exactly and made a wearable toile of the bodice as suggested, as this is really the only bit that needs to fit correctly. After making this I found it ever so slightly tight around my waist, but it wasn’t enough to move a whole size up, so I thought I would just use a smaller seam allowance on the actual dress in this area, this way it would still be close fitting. The other alteration I made was to take up the straps an extra 1.5cm as they were a little long on my short bodice.

The instructions are as ever, super clear and easy to follow, I found the step where you have to attach the inner waistband to the outer waistband whilst it’s attached to the bodice a little tricky but as long as you follow it very carefully and do exactly as it says – you can do it! The pattern actually is fairly uncomplicated despite looking like a tricky dress and doesn’t take very long to sew together. What took me the longest time was getting the bodice to fit after it came up quite baggy and doing the buttonholes!

To continue reading my review head over to my blog here:

Sweet Seren by Tilly and the Buttons

Happy sewing!

Holly x