The Drafters Grid Dress

That wonderful moment when you find a project that reignites a much loved hobby that has gone stale! It happened to me (yay) whilst I was on holiday. The project in question is the absolutely amazing Drafters Grid Dress by Robert’s Wood patterns.

This pattern is basically a patchwork dress. You make the entire dress up using lots of tiny pattern pieces which ever so cleverly build the pattern of the fabric, and the shape of the dress as you go.

My version was made from a stash of tiny pieces of linen left over from previous projects. I’m absolutely over the moon that I managed to get a whole dress out of scraps that would have otherwise potentially ended up in landfill.

This pattern is the most expensive that I’ve ever purchased at £34 for a PDF, but based on the fact I’ve made a dress with zero fabric costs, it’s already more than paid for itself. I honestly think its worth every penny as it must have taken so much time and work for the designer to create this pattern.

I didn’t take that many progress photos as I was sharing the process by video over on my Instagram (check out my reels if you want to view). To give you an idea of how it works, below are a couple of photos of a sleeve. So you basically cut out the tiny pattern pieces from scraps of fabric then patchwork them together by sewing each piece in a row, then joining the rows together to form the garment element (bodice front, 2 x bodice back, skirt front, skirt back and 2 x sleeves).

I was careful to cut the pattern pieces on grain as much as possible to ensure that the fabric “flows” well when pieced together. It was also essential to label all of the pattern pieces to ensure that I didn’t get lost or confused, especially where packing away for the night. I often took a photo of the pieces laid out pre-stitching so that I had this to refer back to. It took a little loner to write out all of the labels, but it will be quicker next time as I now have them ready to reuse.

The instructions are very clear regarding the “patchwork” process. In fact the instruction book is nearly 90 pages long! However it does assume a certain level of sewing experience e.g. it doesn’t explain step by step how to insert the zip.

It also doesn’t mention anything about stay-stitching. I decided to stay stitch the necklines and skirt waist once I’d pieced these together to avoid them stretching out of shape after all the hard work.

Let’s talk sizing. This pattern has quite a bit of ease and is not form fitting. When you purchase you get 2 sizes. I got size 6-8 and 10-12 in my purchase. I made up the size 6-8. If I’m honest, during construction I thought it was going to come up too large, but I absolutely love the fit. It is loose (and very comfortable) but the shape means it’s still feminine. I love that it has volume without bulk.

My body measurements (for reference) are 33” bust, 27” waist and 36” hip. I am 5ft 3” tall. I made the mini version (simply because that’s all I had enough fabric for) and it is very mini. I did a little twirl video for Instagram and it’s a good job I played it back before posting as it showed a little cheek :)!! I would wear it with little shorts I think or tights in the winter. I do love the look of the mini length and will definitely make it again, but I will add another row if I have enough fabric on the next version to lengthen it to something that I could wear at work.

The pattern comes with the option to add an elasticated waist and sleeve cuff. I omitted these and I’m glad that I did. I love the loose fit shape and also have the option to wear it with a belt as shown above. I decided that I like the wide sleeve cuff so saved myself the faff of adding elastic (well I had none in my stash anyway). I finished the sleeves and skirt hem with bias binding.

Be prepared for lots of pressing and seam alignment! What makes this pattern amazing is that you are making your own fabric as you sew. For this to be effective you need to get your patchwork seams to line up as much as possible.

To help with this I ensured that the seams were aligned when placing the strips right side together ready to sew. I then used wonderclips over the aligned seams to keep them in place until just before they reached the needle. One other thing to watch out for is that your seams lay flat and don’t get twisted in the construction (as this would case bulk). I just used my fingers to feel that the seams were laying flat as I sewed.

I finished the seams by using the overlocker. I’m normally a french seam fan but it would be too much work and possibly be too bulky with so many french seams. It may work if you are using really light weight fabric but it would be a lot of effort.

When overlocking I was super careful that I didn’t accidentally cut into the fabric (how devastating would that be)! On the picture below you can see just how many seams there are. I thought that it may be a little uncomfortable to wear with so many seams, but it truly isn’t (probably thanks to the loose fit and fabric of choice).

I absolutely love how this dress turned out, but more importantly, I LOVED the process of sewing it. It’s reignited my love of sewing and for that I’m truly thankful. I’m already planning v2 but I think that I’ll purchase fabric this time as I now have very little scrap stash left. That said I do have some things that I hardly wear that I could cut up!

Thanks for reading and I’ll be back soon to share v2!