MN2105 DOVE Archives — Page 2 of 4 — megan nielsen design diary

Five Ways to Transfer Pattern Markings to Fabric

04.08.2017 by Meg // 13 Comments

5 ways to transfer pattern markings to fabric // tutorial on Megan Nielsen Design Diary

Transferring your pattern markings onto the fabric itself is an important step that will set you up to sew more easily in later stages of your garment construction. Since we are about to begin the Flint pants sewalong, i thought it would be good to cover this before we start!

I’ve heard from a couple of people that they find transferring pattern markings quite stressful – but honestly, it doesn’t have to be! Today I’ve got three super easy ways for you to transfer your pattern markings from pattern to fabric that will take the stress and headache out of the whole process!

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Inspiration and Variation ideas for the Dove blouse

10.11.2016 by Meg // Leave a Comment

ONE // TWO // THREE // FOUR // FIVE // SIX

Well my dears, the Dove blouse sewalong has officially come to a close! I hope you enjoyed the tutorials, and that they helped you tackle some of the new techniques in this sewing pattern. Now that we’ve covered all the technical aspects of making the Dove blouse, i thought i’d share a few ideas and inspirations for creating your own unique and stylish Dove blouse, as well as how to style it in your day to day life.

There is a lot of room for cool styling with this pattern. I love pairing this blouse untucked with a pair of skinny jeans or a slim skirt, and letting the curved hem and sleeves own all the attention. It creates an instantly put together outfit.

But that doesn’t mean that tucking isn’t a great idea. There is enough length in this blouse to make it easy to tuck in to a skirt or pants, or wear layered under a dress.

Personally i like to keep the volume to a minimum in whatever garment is accompanying Dove, to really let the cuffs take centre stage.

I have had so much fun collecting all these inspiration images for Dove on Pinterest! You guys know i love taking a pattern and altering it to make something new. One of the things i’ve been really excited about with Dove is playing with variations.

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Dove is all about statement sleeves, and there is a lot of room for creating something super unique. I love the idea of changing up the cuffs for a pleated or gathered cuff! This could be as simple as cutting a rectangle of fabric and gathering it, then attaching to the sleeve instead of the included cuff pattern piece. Tapering it in at the wrist would be kind of amazing too. High on my list is adding some trim to the cuff hem, like fringe/tassels or even pom poms to play off more current trends. Another idea i’d like to try is a split cuff!

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This pattern works really well extended to a dress length as well, and if you’d like to try that yourself check out this tutorial.

The Dove blouse is intended to be sewn with light to medium weight shirting fabrics. I have personally sewn this blouse in anything from cotton voile to silk crepe to linen. It works well with all of them, but obviously has a slightly different look depending on how much drape the fabric has. If you choose a stiffer fabric like linen your blouse will have more structure, but choose a fabric with more drape such as crepe de chine will result in a flowy blouse.

Personally i tend to gravitate towards solids for this pattern, because i enjoy highlighting the style lines, but it looks just as gorgeous in prints. I’m a bit of a sucker for Liberty of London prints, and i think they are particularly well suited to this pattern due to the fabric weight and delicate designs.

I’ve seen this pattern made in large scale florals, all the way through to geometric grids, and i love how effective they all look.

ONE // TWO // THREE // FOUR // FIVE

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little roundup of whats inspiring my Dove makes at the moment! Don’t forget to check out the below posts if you need a little help sewing your blouse:

Dove Dress Hack!

10.08.2016 by Sarah Beth // 6 Comments

I’ve always wished I lived in the late 60’s for the fashion. I love a more bohemian look and have been loving some of the new trends that have a more modern spin on the 60’s style. I’ve been eyeing bell sleeves for awhile now and was contemplating adding them to a pattern because I wanted them so badly, so you can imagine my excitement when Megan told me about her newest pattern, the Dove Blouse. I thought a dress with bell sleeves would be so much fun, so I decided to do a little hack to extend the Dove pattern into a simple A-line dress, while still maintaining that beautiful curved hem that makes the Dove so special.

This is a fairly simple tutorial, but in order for the dress to fit you properly it’ll be important you get a few measurements along the way. Resist the urge to just follow the angle of the side seam to a longer length. That might work for some, but if you are more of a pear shape like me, that will not work. To create a dress from the Dove pattern you will need to adjust the front and back pieces, as well as create new bottom hem facings, if you choose the facing option as opposed to a rolled hem. Once you create your new pattern pieces, the garment will be sewn up just like Megan describes in the pattern instructions. So, let’s get started!

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Three ways to sew a hem facing // A Dove blouse tutorial

10.04.2016 by Meg // 1 Comment

I have so much love for special hems! I think hems often get overlooked when it comes to adding design features, but i think an interesting hem can take a blouse to the next level – especially if you’re the kind of girl who likes to wear your tops untucked.

Due to the extreme curve of the Dove blouse hemline i decided to make this a faced hem, with included hemline facing pieces, and i think it adds a lovely amount of weight and structure to the blouse. Today i’m going to show you how to sew a beautiful hem facing, and three different ways to finish the internal raw edges so that it’s beautiful on the inside an the outside!

Of course if you prefer you may sew a very narrow rolled hem instead, using this tutorial.

Ready to sew a gorgeous hem facing?

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How to hem flared sleeves // A Dove blouse tutorial

10.02.2016 by Meg // Leave a Comment

How to hem flared and bell sleeve cuffs! Thorough tutorial by Megan Nielsen Patterns shown on the Dove Blouse sewing pattern

Hemming a curve is one of those things that can seem quite scary, but as with most things in sewing, if you take it slow and follow the steps you can conquer it and end up with a really clean beautiful result.

The Dove blouse sewing pattern comes with two sleeve cuffs, one is gently flared (above) and one is a full bell sleeve, but the method for hemming them is exactly the same. In essence we will be doing a narrow rolled hem. I’ll be showing you how to do this by machine without any special presser feet, but please note that you can use a rolled hem foot for this, or hand sew your hems. If you’d like to try either of your methods check out this tutorial.

It’s also worth noting that as these cuffs include bias sections we recommended that you let the sleeves hang for at least 24 hours before hemming. This will allow the bias sections to stretch out, and once all stretching out has occurred you may even out the cuff hemline before sewing. Having said that, an uneven sleeve cuff isn’t quite as noticeable as an uneven skirt hem, and in one of my earlier samples i was too lazy to even out the sleeves before hemming and i honestly think it looks just fine.

Ok lets get sleeve hemming:

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Five Ways to Transfer Pattern Markings to Fabric

Inspiration and Variation ideas for the Dove blouse

Dove Dress Hack!

Three ways to sew a hem facing // A Dove blouse tutorial

How to hem flared sleeves // A Dove blouse tutorial

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