i’ve been lurking the ceylon pattern for months now… finally gave in a couple weeks ago and bought a copy. i initially planned on making it up in some navy polka dot voile or lawn, but searching has turned to be fruitless so i settled on blue pin dot shirting fabric from fabric.com (you just wait… my first choice will suddenly be fruitful and multiply. gah.). i’ve already made a bit of progress on the dress so i thought i would share with y’all!
first off, i will point out that i didn’t bother to make a muslin and just started cutting directly into the fabric. i like to live dangerously sometimes.
second, in light of my former colette pattern complaints about buying waaaay too much fabric, i bought 3 yards of the shirting instead of the suggested 3 7/8 yards. i have about 1/4 yard left over after cutting, i consider this a success! yay!
third, i went ahead and made things extra complicated by deciding to pipe the major seams. well, i still haven’t decided exactly what seams i’m going to pipe… just that there is piping invovled. oh, and i made my own piping, again. 6 yards of cording and what feels like a thousand bias strips later (and, lolz, cut too many bias strips hahah), realize it probably would have been in my best interest to make a non-piped dress first to get a ~feel~ for the pattern, but whoops, too late!!
yay piping!
here is the pattern & shirting fabric in question. you can see where i have drawn directly on the booklet where i planned to pipe.
here’s a better picture. i’m still undecided with what seams to go with. i have already piped both midriff seams (top & bottom) and will definitely pipe the sleeve edges. the facing has been sewn on at this point, so i won’t be piping along the buttons or the V. what about the shoulder seams – yay or nay? i like the idea of outlining them so they aren’t lost in the busy-ness of the fabric (it’s my favorite detail, those shoulder seams!) but i wonder if it’ll look clashy without the rest of the neckline being piped? decisions, decisions.
ANYWAY, here’s what i’ve got at this point:
close-up of the piping. this has been a very detailed, almost tedious process, to say the least – making the bias strips, then basting in the piping (and running out of white thread! wtf! who runs out of white thread!?), then sewing the piping to the seam lines, then sewing the pieces together, then finishing the edges (i’m just serging this guy), then pressing, then very carefully stitching in the ditch. over and over! so yeah, tedious, but i’ve been a bit stressed this week and having something to concentrate on has really been helpful.
and it looks so nice, if i do say so myself!
remember when i said i made too many bias strips? i opted to use some of them to bind the edges of the facing. once again – tedious, kind of unnecessary – but i think it looks really polished.
and on a completely different note, i bought the fabric for my western shirt:
it’s all 100% cotton broadcloth shirting. the darker khaki will be the main fabric of the shirt, the lighter ivory for the yoke & cuffs, and the red is going to be piping! i bought some medium & dark brown embroidery floss for the guitars on the yoke 🙂 i’ll probably embroider the arrowheads in red.
pretty excited!
LLADYBIRD 
Oh, it’s going to be so cute! I have the ceylon pattern, but I always have to do so much work with a colette dress to adjust for my small bust that I’ve been avoiding it. Maybe yours will inspire me!
see, that’s what i love so much about the colette patterns – no bust adjustments for me! i think you should make it anyway 🙂 i loove this dress and there aren’t enough finished examples on the internet for me to look at haha!