Here’s a little tip to get you started designing and making your own dresses using our Building Block Dress book.
When I’m designing a new pattern I start by doing a lot of drawing and sketching, and I rarely use my first sketch as the final design. It really helps to put a lot of ideas down on paper initially, and then refine them as you go along. You might like a particular pocket from one sketch, but maybe works better with a different neckline and skirt than the one you initially drew. Perhaps you want to focus your design on one element, like curves. Curved princess seams, a scalloped hem, and rounded pocket shapes. You can play with your ideas until you find one that you like best.
Over the years, I’ve filled crazy numbers of sketchbooks with my designs, and I thought it might be helpful for you to have a format where you can design and draw and refine your ideas as well, before you turn to the worksheet in the book to start working out the details of your final design.
So we’ve put together a design sheet to help you. You can download it in both a horizontal format and a vertical format. Print as many copies as you want.
Maybe your children and husband want to be designers, too! Everyone can get in on the action this way, and you can use the dotted lines of the dress outline to help you with your drawing and designs.