Here are some much better photos of my Avina needlecord pinafore (my teenage daughter takes all the photos of me and she is brilliant but sometimes needs some persuasion to take them for me). I think these photos show off this unusual fabric much better, in natural light.

The fabric

This is a print on demand Minerva Exclusive ombre design in the Black Cherry colourway, printed on stretch woven cotton needlecord. As with all the ombre designs the colour changes run from selvedge to selvedge, and the fabric is wide at 150cm, so if you want to see the colour change width ways on your garment you have to cut them out of different parts of the fabric and put them together. This being a needlecord, I wanted the ridges to run vertically, and this pinafore pattern made up of stripes of fabric was perfect for this. I was able to cut pieces out of the colours across the ombre. I chose to make a symmetrical arrangement of the colours, repeated in the back.

When I cut the pieces out I had the fabric folded double so that I could mirror the colours on either side of the centre. However I completely forgot that needlecord has a slight nap so some of my pieces have the nap running up and some down. I don’t think it matters too much as the nap is so fine, but I would pay attention to this next time.

One thing to watch out for with POD fabric is the wide selvedges. I cut one piece too close to the edge and had to recut it because it had too much of the selvedge showing (fortunately I had enough of the right coloured part of the fabric).

The needlecord washed well - no shrinking. But it did fray, leaving bits of cotton in the rest of my laundry! It frayed more with sewing so it is a good idea to finish all the edges well.

The fabric has a small amount of stretch but is nevertheless stable and I sewed it with a normal foot and a universal needle. I used a slightly longer length stitch because the fabric was thick. I was able to unpick without too much trouble. I found that if you over iron or over handle it the nap can get damaged however. In my case I tried to sew the bodice using the burrito method - a really bad idea to try and pull the dress through a narrow strap and I pulled it a bit too hard. I was able to carefully iron out the creases (on the reverse side) And it has mostly recovered. It’s worth noting that a feature of this needlecord is the visibility of the white fabric between the ridges when close up, and at the seams. I personally think this makes it unique, and it doesn’t take away from the overall look of the colour of the garment, but that might be a matter of taste.

The pattern

I used the Avina Pinafore pattern from FibreMood magazine 36. It should be a straightforward pattern but I had the same problem I have experienced previously with their instructions for sewing a facing onto a bodice. The pattern looks like it should use the burrito method but the description and illustrations don’t show that. So it’s a bit unclear how they expect the bodice to be sewn. This time as the burrito method just wasn’t going to work with thick needlecord, I decided to finish the armholes with binding made from the same fabric. This worked surprisingly well (I wondered if it might be too thick but it was fine). I managed to work out how to finish the facing and side seams and side zip with the bias tape there too and I think it looks ok.

The pattern is for quite a short dress but I wanted it longer. So I didn’t shorten the pattern for my height (I usually take off 5cm for FibreMood) and instead even added another 9cm). As usual I wasn’t paying enough attention when cutting out my pieces from the fabric and somehow managed to cut two of the strips of fabric shorter than all the others. I didn’t have enough of the right colour fabric to recut them, so just added an additional piece to the ends. Those two stripes are at the back and it’s not visible from the outside (you can see the joining seam in my inside-out photo in my previous post).

These issues aside I did like this pattern. The dress is a nice shape and it fits well.

Overall I really like how this has turned out. The pinafore feels thick and warm and I am looking forward to wearing it with a jumper and tights and boots in the winter.

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