Sewing the Cocowawa Plum Dress in African Wax Print Fabric from Dovetailed London

In this guest blog post, Cynthia has made the Plum Dress by Cocowawa in this beautiful green and orange African print fabric from Dovetailed London.  Cynthia was gifted this fabric in exchange for a blog post as part of the Dovetailed London Ambassador Program.  Want to read on, get a cup of your favourite drink and enjoy!

I can never go wrong or get enough of working with African print. It’s cotton and this lovely fabric from Dovetailed London is light and has good drape to it. I thought this would be suitable for making something like a dress or blouse or skirt that does not require structure. I did think when I held it up towards the light, it’s a little see through. If I was going to make a full skirt or dress with a full skirt I would consider putting a light lining. But this would be a personal choice and something worth considering.

The print itself does not require a lot of pattern matching which is great for a quick project like this one. With most African prints, the prints are placed in the direction of the grain. Usually I would consider placement of my pattern pieces but with this fabric it worked well and lay in the direction of the print. If not, I would consider what I am making and if I need the stretch or prefer the print to be against the grain.

The colours on the fabric give the autumnal feel as it’s bold and vibrant. It has a green base colour with yellow and orange designs. I had the option to use thread for any of the three colours, could have considered even a contrasting colour like gold or even could have got away with using black if this is the colour I had in my stash. Used black that was on my overlocker to finish off the seams. I took the orange colour and went to town with it, using orange thread and added orange buttons.

When I received this fabric I knew I wanted to make a dress as there are a few patterns I’ve had my eye on. The fabric was three yards which is usually enough to make a simple dress. A few of my dress choices were perfect for the three yards and just had to make a choice.

When your body changes postpartum, loose fitting smock dresses are definitely the best. The plum dress made the list specifically for this. Although I did consider a shirt dress for ease of breastfeeding and I am enjoying making anything with buttonholes since I’ve recently mastered this. The plum dress does have buttons at the back so I’m still on this streak and I do love pockets too. I still have not quite mastered gathering, I found this fabric was easy to work the gathers even though still not perfect.

The pattern also has only 5 pattern pieces which meant I could cut and make the dress quite quickly since I no longer have a lot of time on my hands anymore. The fabric is stable which allows for easy cutting into. In my case without pinning and just using weights and a rotary cutter. I managed to get the dress cut and finished over three nights, total of seven hours. I am definitely not a quick sewer and do not like to rush as I’m borderline perfectionist. Pleased with my final dress 👗

Happy Sewing!

Want to sew with African fabric? Shop here.

Looking for a range of sewing patterns designed specifically with African wax print fabric in mind, shop here. 

Want to buy ready-made in a selection of Dovetailed garments? Shop ready made here.

Want to make your own with a little help? Shop workshops here.