A Grasp of the Fundamentals: Part 1

So the idea of the Fundamentals dress is to make a shaped garment without the use of darts - only design lines. Nakamichi gives you a diagram for the pattern block you need to draft to start off with. This really isn't hard with your measurements, a long ruler and a good understanding of maths. Lots of people I know who sew do hate this part but for me it's the easy bit and a chance to very gently exercise my maths muscles - something that I do weirdly miss having dropped it as soon as I reached 6th Form!

Once your pattern is drafted it's time for you to cut out the fabric for your toile...

Apologies for my appalling photography here

 I hand dyed my fabric for my dress so I had some calico which turned out appallingly that I used for my toile but any plain, cheap fabric will do. I was also very conventional and cut my front piece out on the fold and the back as two - but the lack of detailed instructions means that you're freee to do whatever the hell you want xD

Next step is to whip it up into a dress:

 Here is my toile in all it's inelegant (apparently it's inelegant not unelegant! Who knew? Not the English student...), roughly sewn together glory - you can even see the horrible patchy dying job there. Anyway it doesn't really matter TOO much, although it is best to get it right at this stage so you're not fixing things when it does matter :)

Then...DESIGN LINES. This is when you get to decide where your panels go so thinketh carefully about placement - it may be awkward to have a panel right in the middle of your body or finishing halfway over a boob for example. Make sure you mark the end of your darts and the waistline though as the further away your lines are from these areas the harder it is to manipulate the fabric into the correct shape.

I did a quick sketch beforehand so I knew what I was aiming for - I also decided that I wanted to add flares so hence there are flares in the picture (more on that later). I drew my design lines onto my dress and after that...cut the entire dress up. Nakamichi has some good instructions on the theory behind this part - including adding in the flares. I remember having to take several deep breaths before every step after this one, it's not impossible but it is trickier and requires more experience than your average skirt pattern.

 The idea is to get them lying flat, don't worry about separating the front from the back or anything like that as that's part of the magic of a dartless dress!

Next up: Shaping the toile