A hooded sweater dress

The trend for hooded dresses has been growing for the last couple of years. This season the move is definitely more elegant with hooded dresses appearing on the red carpet and as evening wear.

A couple of years ago I made a hooded sweatshirt dress that you can read about here. But on a recent trip to Goldhawk Road London, I found a finer, brushed, wool-mix jersey and I thought I would try a cross between the sporty and the elegant.

I used The Two Contemporary Sweatshirts pattern with the following alterations:

First I narrowed the shape for the sleeves to suit the finer jersey - I traced off the size 12 bringing in the width as shown so the cuff measures 30cm. As the dress would be finished with 1cm hems and cuffs I shortened the sleeve to the line on the pattern for shortening.

I cut both front and back on the fold to omit the centre front seam - extending both by 30cm and as with the sleeves, I narrowed the body to a finished width of 60cm as shown above.

I cut out the hood as is and also drew two pocket shapes large enough for my hands.

When making up the dress, I stitched the front, sleeves and back together as instructed, then used a zigzag stitch over the seam. I stitched the sleeve and side seams as one.

Then taking the two hood pieces, I stitched the back seam and overstitched with a zigzag as before.

I switched my jersey needle for a 4mm twin needle to finish the neckline, hem and cuffs, also the edge of the hood.

I took the two pocket pieces and turned the opening edge over and finished this with the twin needle.

I placed the pocket pieces on the dress front with the opening edge at the side seam. I then twin-stitched the pockets around the curved edge to secure to the front of the dress.

I placed the hood inside the neckline and following the previous line of stitching around the neck, I attached the hood to the dress.

The finished garment has a sporty daytime feel without looking like active wear.

This style required 30cm more fabric than stated on the pattern.