McCalls 6559 Maxi Dress

I have shied away from Maxi dresses for a while simply because I felt all that fabric on a 6ft frame was a bit too….well…Amish Sue.
But this gorgeous striped fabric with a huge repeat needed a pattern to show it off! So a maxi it is! I have some full length pics that I will post later. (Here I’m toasting to Pattern Review with their signature drink on Canada Day before heading off to our neighbours party).

Here are the full length front and back photos:

Super simple dress, I made the plain view with the racer back, but I took a couple of extra steps to make it special. First, I carefully matched the stripes by basting with silk thread:

side seams hand basted with silk thread

Here you can see the matching stripes

Then, instead of adding neckbands, I bound the neckband & arms with the black stripes. I cut them about 1 1/4″ shorter than the opening. You have to adjust the length of the binding according to the weight and stretch of your fabric, try starting with about 90% of the opening, baste it if you’re not sure – otherwise it will flop if it’s not tight enough, or pull if it’s too tight.

Here are the basic steps for this technique:

1. Join binding strip & in half lengthwise. Serge to wrong side of fabric (it will be folded and topstitched to the right side. If you get it wrong, as I did with one it doesn’t make that much difference!)

2. Press seam towards binding, wrap binding around seam to the right side of the garment.

3. Topstitch in place using a straight stitch

4. Admire your clean finish inside & out!