Today I’m sharing my version of the Fibre Mood Vikki Dress.

AKA adventures in colour block land.

AKA the giant marshmallow dress…

But, don’t worry, I don’t think of that as being a bad thing!

Colour block dreams

When I lay in bed at night thinking about sewing, I have been fantasising about a colour-blocked maxi dress for a while. What finally pushed me over the edge to make it a reality was a sale on linen at Stragier (damn you weekly marketing email), which made it look suddenly more attractive to order the 4 metres this pattern requires.

Now, I will start at the outset by saying that linen is not one of the recommended fabrics for this pattern. It recommends lighter and more fluid fabrics, with viscose seemingly being its main target.

Not only have I gone for linen, but my linen is actually quite solidly mid-weight. So the fabric I chose has definitely made my Fibre Mood Vikki come out much more “poufy” than if I had made it as recommended.

Let’s say it’s more “structural”.

I decided to take my chances with this because I decided that achieving the colour block effect I wanted was, on the whole, more important to me than achieving the intended drape and fludity.

The thing is, when I decide I want to try to colour block something (especially if I want to work with more than two colours), it can be very difficult to find both the colours and fabric type that you need.

Here, as I was obsessed with the idea of neutral though to pink and linen often comes in a lovely array of colours, I decided to take the risk and see what would happen when you venture outside the realms of the recommended fabric!

My Fibre Mood Vikki Dress

My Fibre Mood Vikki Dress is a size 16.

The main modification is that the version you see here has been significantly shortened from the pattern as designed.

To start with, my dress was already an inch shorter than as designed due to a lack of fabric. Then I found the middle tier to look way to long, so I cut it down by two inches. I also slightly increased my pleats and sewed a wider hem than as designed.

All in all, my best guess is that this version is 4.5-5 inches shorter than the pattern off the printer!

Sewing the Fibre Mood Vikki Dress

Sewing the pleated skirt was a bit tedious but, overall, not too bad. AFter all, it is only seven pleats in total.

My only issues with the pleats were caused by my own inaccuracy 🙂

To the contrary, for the sewing of the bodice (which is fully lined), I couldn’t make heads or tails of how the instructions were suggested that I attach the bodice and its lining (although the instructions refer to it as a facing) cleanly.

I ended up watching this video and tutorial by Melly Sews on sewing a lined sleeveless bodice using the burrito method as a refresher and then went with the burrito method to create my bodice.

My only other modification was that the pattern calls for interfacing your entire bodice lining pieces. While this may make sense if you are using a very light and drapey fabric, as intended, it seemed overkill in my midweight linen and I was afraid it would make the dress too rigid and stiffling.

So I skipped the interfacing and just used a small strip of interfacing tape around the neckline.

So, all in all, that is basically the story of my Fibre Mood Vikki Dress.

Is it a bit much?

Quite possibly.

At 4 full metres of midweight linen is it so darn heavy that I could never bring it on vacation lest my baggage allowance be instantly blown out?

Well, yes…

But despite this, this Fibre Mood Vikki Dress makes me feel a bit like a walking swirly human marshmallow cloud.

And, really, who could say no to dressing like patisserie….