Accessorising with Dickey Collars by Designer Stitch

Nell, a Caucasian person, stands in front of a white wall facing the camera. They are wearing a grey knit sweater and a white peter pan dickey collar. One hand is holding their hair aside.

Hello friends!

Having finished McCall’s 8035, I was once again filled with the itch to stitch. However, as the next pattern I was interested in making was a vintage skirt pattern, it required lengths of fabric that I simply didn’t have to hand. And since I am trying not to over extend my budget, I instead looked at what sort of fabric I did have – which was a lot of leftovers from other makes, and thought hard about what I could whip up that would be practical and useful. I scoured Instagram for inspiration, and came across several posts for a rather vintage looking dickey collar as based on the Designer Stitch pattern. This pattern give quite a lot of bang for your buck, offering several different collar variations, and since I know for a fact that I’m not all that good at collars, buttonholes or button placement I thought this could be an opportunity to improve those skills.

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About Me

This image is in black and white, and shows the back of Nell, a Caucasian person. They are sitting on the edge of a jetty with their arms forming a love heart shape by pointing their hands down towards their head. They are wearing a striped shirt, a black beret, and black pants with suspender straps

Hello friends and visitors!

Before we get started, I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land on which I live, and pay my respects to Elders past, present and emerging. I extend this respect to any Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people who might be visiting this little blog of mine.

Hello, and welcome to Stitch Sessions!

I started this blog after deciding to close down – of all things, a food blog in which I had been testing and creating Gluten Free recipes for well over five or six years. I found that I still had the itch to write, to take photos, and share some kind of creative pursuit with others. I loved being able to write down titbits of information which might benefit others in their own creative adventures. But as I didn’t have a new special interest at the time I was scratching my head over what to do, and that was when I began to get interested in sewing. Little did I know how passionate I would become about it.

It was a shocking shift in hobbies to be sure. Most of all for me. I tend to be impatient with tasks that take a long time to do, I dislike redoing things, and I can get bored of doing the same task multiple times in a row. All of which are phrases I would use to describe sewing. However, it was the other aspects of sewing that hooked me. It was the chance to learn something new at a pace that suited me, it was the fact that there were a lot of Video tutorials which overcame my difficulties with understanding verbal instructions, and it was the chance to make something that I was imagining become a real, tangible thing I could touch and hold and use.

Over time, I also gained a strong interest in vintage fashion which had only grown with time. I made the discovery that the fit of certain patterns from the 40’s and 50’s was well-made for my figure, and I sought them out. However, I now also have a focus on vintage-inspired patterns, which tend to be more on the affordable side. I also source my fabric and notions secondhand where I can, or on clearance where I can’t. I love hunting for secondhand patterns, and I love learning more and more with each garment I make!

For reference:

My base measurements: Bust 36”, Waist 31”, Hips 46”.

The most common changes I make to garments: Full Bicep Adjustment, lengthening the crotch curve, scooping out the back crotch curve, shortening the waist by 1-2”.