I have been very pleased with the previous version of this pattern that I made. Having found a charming Flower Fairies print © Estate of Cicely Mary Baker on a Duck Egg Blue background somewhere fairly near the top of my fabric stash, I thought that the print would be ideal for a nightdress. Titania is queen of the fairies and in Shakespeare’s “Midsummer Nights Dream” spends some time asleep I thought it an appropriate name for this garment.

I had 2 ¼ yards of fabric that was 56 inches wide and that was plenty to be able to extend the tunic to nightdress length. I made view B, the one with 9 tucks across the front but with the short sleeves from View D. This time I cut a straight XL (20-22) with no extra at the side seams. The print is multi-directional so when placing the pattern pieces I laid the front at one end of the length of fabric with the hem pointing towards the middle and the back at the other end of the fabric, again with the hem pointing towards the middle. I measured the distance between the two pieces which was 16”, and therefore lengthened each piece by 8”. To avoid an unnecessary seam at centre back, the pattern piece was placed on the fold having first removed the seam allowance. The short sleeve was placed on the cross grain in the spare fabric. The bias binding for the neck was cut in 2 pieces and joined together at centre front and centre back.

This was a very straightforward sew. The shoulder, sleeve and side seams are flat fell so there are no raw edges inside the nightdress. The sleeves were inserted and overlocked. The hem is a narrow double fold and top stitched. I remembered to change the order for the bias binding on the neckline. This time I stitched to the INSIDE before trimming the seam allowances and then bringing the binding to the OUTSIDE before top-stitching.

There is still plenty of room in the garment so next time I may cut one size smaller. The sleeves could also do with being narrower at the hem but that is a small detail that I shall attend to next time.