The Cicely Dress - Free Sewing Pattern (2024)

Prom season is upon us. and who doesn’t want to feel like a queen twirling the night away? With the help of Mood’s newest pattern The Cicely Dress and our newest tulles and plisses, you can make your frothy dress fantasies a reality. Not only can you wear this dress to prom, it’s also great for co*cktail parties or even weddings. Who’s ready to conquer this new pattern and create an amazing look?!

1. Print, tape, and cut out your pattern pieces out of your base and overlay fabric..
2. Cut or mark notches, trace darts and sew darts.
3. Start pinning your overlay pieces over your lower bodice. Stay stitch around the pieces for stability.

4. Pin and sew your lower bodice together. We suggest sewing the lining first and do a pre-fitting to make sure it fits perfectly.

5. Once the lower bodice is sewn, press your seams away from the center front of the bodice. Once pressed, stitch the seam allowance down about ¼’’ away from the seam. By doing this, you will be making a channel for the boning to go through.

6. Pin the overlay to the upper bodice pieces, and stay stitch like you did for the lower bodice.
7. Pin and stitch the upper bodice side seam and shoulder seams. Do the same with the lining pieces.
8. Using a French seam, fold the sleeve with wrong sides together and stitch. Once sewn, baste at the top edge between the notches.

9. Fold the raw edge of the sleeve up at ½’’ and stitch, leaving an opening for the elastic.

10. Pin sleeves to the upper bodice at the side seam, then gather them into the armscye.

11. Pin your lining to your upper bodice, matching shoulder seam and notches. Sew down the front, leaving an opening between the dots on the front bodice. Note: The bodice isn’t connected yet.

12. For the armscye, pin right sides together and stitch. Note: this is a tricky way to do the lining. The fastest way would be to fold under the lining and slip stitch shut.

13. Clip around the armscye and press.

14. Gather the upper bodice (piece A) and fold it over the medal ring and pin. Distribute the gathers to your liking and hand sew down keeping the lining free. Once you are finished with one side, repeat on the other side.

15. Fold the lining over the raw edge and slip stitch shut.

16. Trim boning to the right size per channel, leaving ½’’ seam allowance on the top and the bottom. Once all the boning is in each channel, using a pressing cloth, press boning down flat. Note: Make sure the ends of your boning are curved and not square, otherwise it will poke through the fabric.
17. Pin the upper bodice to the lower bodice starting at the seams of piece D, leaving the center front open. Work your way outward matching side seams. Once pinned, stitch slowly just in case you didn’t push the boning all the way down. Tip: Push the boning down a little extra for easy sewing.

18. Press the bodice seam and understitch. Before you understitch, make sure you caught the overlay in the seam.
19. Set your bodice aside and prepare for the skirt.
20. Using a French seam, pin three of the half skirts together at side seams. Tip: to make sure you know what side is the actual side, place a pin or two along the seam.

21. Pin the back skirt together the same way as you did the front. This time, each side will get one half circle, then the center back pieces. So I wouldn’t confuse which back pieces are what, I added pins on where the side seam is and where the pockets will go.

22. Pin your overlay skirt along the side seam, then pin your pocket to the front skirt and stitch. Do the same on the other side of your front skirt.

23. Do the exact same process for the back as you did the front.
24. Pin the side seam and pocket, and stitch closed. When sewing, make sure you get all of the layers.

25. Once the side seams are sewn, stitch the center back skirt to the point where the zipper will end. Do the same for the lining.
26. Sew the skirt lining, the same way as you did your base/overlay skirt, minus the pocket. Once sewn, do a single basting stitch at the top, as you might need to gather it later. For the lining, you can eliminate three skirts on the fold and just use two plus your back pieces, in order to cut down on bulk.
27. Now that the skirt is sewn, pin pockets going towards the front of the skirt, then sew two rows of basting stitches. Once based and gathered, pin lower bodice to the skirt, matching side seams and leaving the lining free. Adjust gathers where needed and stitch.

28. With wrong sides together, pin skirt lining to the main skirt. If needed, gather the lining to fit the skirt. Stitch along the previous stitch line.

29. Pin upper lining to waistline, folding raw edge under ½’’. Slip stitch shut.

30. Sew in your zipper.
31. Do a rolled hem for the base fabric and lining.
32. You’re all done! It’s now time to strut your stuff on the dance floor.

Sam HApril 7, 2022 at 12:02 pm

Excellent, worked perfectly, thanks so much!! 🙂

Reply

Hi Taylor! We’re sorry for the delay in responding to your question! We get dozens of comments and questions each day, and so many questions get buried and, unfortunately, unanswered. We are now focusing user support on patterns 2 years and newer. We hope this will prevent questions on our more current patterns from going unanswered, such as yours. Although this is late, we wanted to respond in case anyone else has the same question:

Although the skirt appears to be a quarter circle panel, keep in mind that O needs to be cut on the fold, which will make it a half circle. P, which is not cut on the fold, needs to be cut mirrored. So, for EACH layer, there are 5 half circle skirts (O) and 2 quarter circle skirts (P).