Cris Wood Sews Envelope dress in block print fabric

Since we don't have a printer, I had decided for my next few makes to be things I already had printed and cut out. But then I kept seeing this dress, the cris wood sews envelope dress, everywhere, and when I found out it's an instruction, not a pattern I decided to jump in. 

It's zero waste, made from a series of rectangles that use the whole width of the fabric, so there isn't a whole lot of sewing involved. The way it works is that the edges the fabric become the top and bottom of the dress.

It just needs 1.5 metres of fabric, so it's great for those random pieces we seem to all acquire from god knows where. Early on in my sewing career I would buy this length without a plan. Not this pieces though, I got this from a job lot of stuff from Thimble and Threads. It looks like a block printed fabric, quite a loose cotton. The selvedge says made in Pakistan. It's perfect for this as you do need something drapey.

There's not much to say about the construction, it's all pretty straightforward although I did make some small changes:

* I calculated that I needed ever so slightly more than the standard size because of my hips (1.6 yards rather than 1.5 yard) and then decided to just use all of the fabric I had, which was I think slightly over 1.5 metres

* I added bartacks in all the places where the seam splits into a hole, as I could already see them start to split apart slightly

* my bottom edge didn't quite line up, so I added a side slit at the bottom and am calling it  a hi lo hem

I'm not sure I would call the resulting thing a dress as such, maybe more a kaftan. This is the perfect pattern for our times, takes no time and little fabric and head space to sew, ideal for lounging. I love it!