Little Red Dress

In 2023, I knitted myself a striped cotton dress for summer, an idea of mine that had been in the works for several years. This year I scratched another longish-term knitting goal off my list: knitting myself a dress for winter.

Perhaps five or six years ago, I happened to come across a cute worsted knitted dress pattern and decided I wanted to make it, but somehow I was never able to find the right yarn for it. As several years passed, I began to consider whether I wanted to make that particular dress after all. It was one of those designs that looked very cute in its designer's sample shots, and not so good on the Ravelry members who had made it. And I don't really like wearing worsted weight knits. I found I still wanted a knitted dress for winter, but was that one really my best option? Once I asked myself that question, the obvious next step was to search the Ravelry database for knitted dresses in DK to see what other options I had. It didn't take long before I settled on the one you see above, which is the Little Red Dress, designed by Cathy Carron. It has good texture, a nice body skimming shape, cowl necks really suit me, and it was a design that looked really good on pretty much every Ravelry member who had made it, a sure sign of a winner.   

I still had trouble finding yarn for this project. I thought about how I would wear this dress, and soon concluded it was something I would want to wear with dark brown tights, my dark brown leather riding boots, and probably also a dark brown belt. (Most of the Ravelry members who had made the dress styled theirs with belts, and the dress looked better belted than not.) So I needed a colour that would work with dark brown. The "knitted wool dress" sat on my project list for a few more years while I looked for just the right DK. Plum would have been my first colour choice for this project, but I couldn't find yarn in the shade I wanted. I didn't want a neutral colour as that would have looked too drab, and I wasn't sure I wanted to wear a whole dress in some of the other colours I like, such as turquoise, spring green, or orange. In the end, I just bought 1500 grams of red yarn, or more specifically, Sandnes Garn Alpakka in Red. I like red, it suits me, and a classic red is definitely a wearable, practical choice, but I even with the dress a done deal, I can't help wishing I'd been able to get the plum yarn I wanted.    

A not great photo of the completed dress, made in size 39.25. I don't have anyone to take photos of me and therefore couldn't model it myself, so I had to put it on my dress form, on which the dress looks as though it were designed to fit a Lego person. I assure you it does not look that way on me, as I have legs. (Not to mention arms, and a head, and quite a lot of other things.)  

I modified the pattern by extending the moss stitch panels. I'm very well-endowed, and while on the model the moss stitch detailing ends below the bustline, on me it would have ended mid-bust or even above that. Lengthening the moss stitch panels enough to fall below my bustline would have meant ending them a few inches above my waistline, which I thought would look awkward, so I just went the distance and had the bodice detailing end at the waist. The dress would also have been too short on me, so I lengthened it to 41" in length, which reaches to just above my knees. My modifications don't seem to have detracted from the overall style, and I was pleased with the results. 

After I'd taken the requisite detail and full-length shots of this dress, I spent some time playing with the various belts from my closet to see how they'd look. I like the medium brown belt the best, as the other two look a little Santa Claus-y, but again, I intend to wear this dress with brown tights and riding boots, or maybe my brown high-heeled lace ups, and the dark brown belt would look best with those. Therefore I'll probably go with one of the dark brown belts, and if anyone yells "HO HO HO" at me when I'm wearing the ensemble... try to bear in mind that there are a few ways in which they might have meant it.