A Modest Princess

This Halter dress is not only lacking sleeves to make it modest, but it’s also too short so I decided to turn it into a skirt. The back of the dress was smocked which turned into a very supportive waistband. I simply reconstructed the front top to make a flat waistband and a super comfy skirt.

First I removed the strap that was simply looped through the center – this made a great matching headband. Then using my seam ripper I deconstructed the top.

I completely removed the bust section.

I then drew a straight line to create a rectangle for the waistband, I used both layers of the bust in order to keep the waistband double layered as the original dress front was. I sewed along this straight line and then trimmed the excess.

I then sewed this rectangle onto the rest of the dress. You can see here how the smocked back of the dress, complete with tag was left unchanged.

Finally I sewed up the sides, folded down the top and pinned in place. The chevron pattern didn’t match up but as I almost always wear long shirts over the top of skirts this will never actually be seen.

I then hand sewed the inside to create an invisible seam on the inside and a super comfy thick waistband skirt.