I recently completed this dress using Charm Patterns Liz dress for the bodice combined with the three-quarter circle skirt from their Lamour dress. The wonderful thing about Charm Patterns is the extended size range, which includes multiple cup size options from A-H! Normally, with each new pattern I sew, I have to first spend time tracing and grading and adjusting, then cutting and sewing multiple test muslins to check the fit - all work which cuts into the time available for sewing actual garments. The time investment required for each new pattern can be significant.

So you can imagine my delight to have all this work taken care of for me! I picked out my size based on the fitting chart and it fit almost perfectly straight out of the packet, with only minor adjustments. I cannot begin to explain how revolutionary this is, and how much time and effort it saved me. In fact there’s no way I would have even begun to tackle this particular pattern - with its complex three-piece cup construction - if I had needed to undertake the full bust adjustment myself. So I’m eternally grateful to Gertie and the Charm Patterns team for doing that intensive development work (and believe me, I know how much dedication and how many rounds of pattern revisions it took!) so that I can now have this fabulous dress in my life.

I will note that although most of the dress comes together quite quickly (including those multi-piece cups), the pattern is rated intermediate-advanced due to some tricky aspects. As with all patterns by Gertie it come with a detailed instruction leaflet with tips including the gentle recommendation “be patient, and don’t start this step when you’re tired”.