FO: Great Gatsby Dress

I finished my Great Gatsby Dress! It was a super fast knit (I think I finished it in about a a week), and I’m utterly thrilled with the finished object.

Also, I got about a foot of hair chopped off. It’s delightfully short and I donated about 10 inches to locks of love. Anyway, back to the knitting.

(The bottom’s not uneven, I just don’t stand straight and that bulge is the dress underneath, which is empire waisted)

Pattern: Great Gatsby Dress, from the Summer 2009 Interweave Knits
Yarn: Recycled Linen/Cotton blend, navajo plied and dyed with Dylon Dye
Needle: Mostly US 5/3.75 cause I couldn’t find my 6/4mm KP tips
Mods: Um, a lot. My gauge was like, waaay off (cause you know I don’t swatch), so I did as many repeats of the Fern Lace pattern to get the right width and then modified from there. Also, I left off the picot bind off and just did garter edges.

Like I said, I am so utterly delighted with this dress. I’d been searching for the right yarn in thrift shops for a while, knowing I’d have to recycle a large sweater to make the project affordable. It took some doing, but I finally found a lace-weight linen/cotton blend that was large enough. I frogged it, tripling the yarn as I wound it, and dyed it with about 3/4 a packet of Dylan dye. The dye job came out to the color wanted (dark grey) with some variation (but not enough to be obnoxious).

The pattern itself was pretty easy to follow for the most part, and I really like the effect picking up the skirt stitches on the wrong side has. The bodice was a little confusing, but that’s mostly because my stitch counts were way off. I just mirrored the armholes like the back, which I followed more closely to the pattern, and worked the neckline the way I’d make any scoop necked sweater. The effect: SUPER CUTE.

The only issue I have with the dress is that it’s a wee bit short, which means I have to wear something underneath it (I quite like it over this white dress, which is how I had planned to wear it). I could probably get away with just an underskirt as the top part is pretty opaque (though the stitching is pretty loose, so who knows). I was worried the bodice was going to be do tight, but I did some extra bust inscreases on the side, and it fits quite well.

Next on the knitting agenda is a reknit of my Leah vest. I frogged the longer version cause the shaping didn’t sit right and I plan to remake the shorter version so I can finish drafting the pattern and hopefully get it into testing this week. Cheers!