I had been plodding away on this dress for the past few months, so when I received an invitation to a high tea for a pre-wedding event, I got my butt into gear and finished it off. I present you Weigels 2063!

It was so much fun dressing up for the event! I’ve recently gotten into victory rolls. This was my third go. I think if I grow my hair a little longer they would be easier, but I’m finding them fairly simple and a great way to get into the vintage vibe.

It is a lovely vintage pattern, Weigel’s 2063. I would have loved to put the collar on the dress, but sadly there wasn’t enough fabric. Keeping with the vintage theme, I used an old bed sheet I bought from an op shop and had to unpick the hems on the sheet to fit all the pattern pieces in! The skirt is made up from 5 panels. That translates to one long hem to stitch! The panels are heavily gathered and the front section is also pleated in towards the centre.

The Weigel’s pattern company has quite an interesting history. I had not heard of it before coming across this pattern. If you’d like to read the history of this Australian company, check out the Madame Weigels website here.

The fit straight out of the packet was pretty good on my muslin. When it came to my ‘good’ version though, it was sitting a little funny under the bust. My sewing bae, Sarah, kindly fixed it with some fancy ‘y’ darts. Thank you Sarah! You can just make them out in the picture above. The original pattern had one huge dart, which would work perfectly with a bullet bra…something at this stage I have no desire for.

The sleeve length was a little longer than I was after, so I folded them under quite a bit and then folded them up to give them a little cuff. I decided to secure it with some hand stitching and I think it’s a sweet little detail. It would probably look nice around the skirt hem too, but ain’t no one got time for that!

As always, I added pockets. That’s one of the perks of sewing your own wardrobe… You can add details that RTW is often missing. Very handy for secretly carrying around my phone and lipstick.

Given there is so much fabric in the skirt, I decided to add a waist stay. Ideally, I would have liked to finish it off with a large hook like they have on bikini tops so that it would be adjustable, but I couldn’t find one the size I wanted. Instead, I settled for some neat hooks and eyes. In retrospect, I should be a little looser, but it’s not uncomfortable to wear. I followed this tutorial to add the waist stay. The waist stay also stops the side seams from sagging if the pockets are well loaded.

I’m slowly falling into a vintage rabbit hole and I’m really loving wearing a more vintage silhouette, though it does take a bit of getting used to. And I am definitely not used to being stopped in the street by strangers when I’ve gone all out. I had several octogenarian men inviting me out to dance! Too cute!