Muumuu Dresses with Designer Details!

 I started sewing muumuu dresses for myself, when I lived in Yucca Valley, California, where it is VERY HOT! This was the 1980's, and the McCall's 1986 copyright pattern, #2537 that I love best, not only became my go to pattern for tops, but for dresses, including my wedding dress!

Sleeves can be cooler for summer, with the added designer detail, of an insert of lace, down the center of the sleeve! I had to gather the top of the lace, for the sleeves, for the best look, but I LOVE it! The turquoise, black and pink dresses all have black flat lace inserts (it was actually a stretch lace, which got too old, so couldn't be used as stretch lace, so I decided to use it as sleeve inserts! I rolled the hem at the bottom of the sleeves, including the lace.)

Experiment with different shades of thread, for your embroidery, always interface the fabric, before sewing the embroidery, for best results. You can use stabilizers, as well, but I used just standard iron on interfacing for my yokes, sewed the embroidery, then sewed the facing to the inside of the yokes.

Take advantage of your serger, rolled hems, even a standard overlock stitch, with a short stitch length and decorative thread, makes beautiful edges for satin trim, for sleeve cuffs, for pocket edging decorative details, which also prevents fraying! Take advantage of bias tape to create decorative accents on yokes and pockets, for a designer detail.

Muumuus can be worn loose and comfortable, or belted, for a more formal, fitted look. The pattern had in seam pockets, which my wedding dress does have (it is 100% cotton, with flat white lace), but I discovered that for everyday dresses, the pockets hang up on my hips, making them stick out more, so I switched to patch pockets, especially once I started carrying a cell phone.

The green and white dress has single needle embroidery sewn with my vintage Kenmore 96 before I sent it to my mom. I used the decorative Kenmore type C cams for the details on the yoke, and around the neckline. The pink and white dress, I sewed twin needle embroidery in 2 shades of green, on a white satin ribbon, used a paper backed basting tape as a stabilizer during embroidery, then removed the paper, and sewed the ribbon to the edge of the lace on the dress yoke.  

While my wedding dress was quite decorative, with lots of flat lace, at the neck, the deep cuffs on the puffed sleeves, and each layer of ruffle, my regular muumuus tended to be more plain. As I have gained more sewing skills, I have begun to add more detail to my home sewn muumuu dresses, contrasting colors, lace, ribbon, bias tape in decorative shapes, lace inserts in the center of the sleeves, embroidery on the yokes, rolled edges and hems on sleeves, and pockets, copying designer detail techniques, to make my home sewn dresses more professional looking.

Here is the original pattern- 1986 McCall's pattern #2537

The photos of me wearing my hair long, but up in a Gibson girl bun, and my wedding dress, are from this last year, before I cut my hair short again. 

Yes, these are really my wedding dress, and since it is a muumuu, I've been able to wear it for over 33 years (not frequently, of course), even when I was pregnant, and when I gained weight, over the years, due to the steroids I had to take, to help keep tumor growth, and swelling from brain surgery, and spinal tumor surgeries! The photo dated 10/28/2005 photo of me in my wedding dress, shows the cuffs.

The Daisy Kingdom fabric had a very large print, but you can get creative about how you place the yoke pattern pieces, to frame the print designs you prefer, before cutting out the yoke. Make sure you do a similar treatment with the front yoke, and the back yoke. 

This is a long sleeved muumuu I made out of Daisy Kingdom 100% cotton, and wore until it was see through! I actually made 2 Daisy Kingdom fabric dresses from this fabric, the other one had bell sleeves. I wore that one out first!

ANOTHER turquoise muumu dress! Can you tell I LOVE this color? I literally wear them until they have holes, patch them, and wear them more. When they get see through, I do finally force myself to give them up, but it is HARD, LOL!

I love the print on this muumuu, but this is one of the few muumuu dresses which I actually gave away, after only a few times wearing it. This rayon fabric really should have had a lightweight interfacing ironed to the back of the ENTIRE DRESS, before sewing it together. This super lightweight rayon wrinkled so badly, it just didn't have enough body, for the kind of heavy wear I put on these dresses.

These photos are the ONLY wedding photos we have! We blew the motor of our car, on our way home, so it was a very rough day, in 1987, we spent the next 3 days rebuilding the motor, and every penny we owned. No wedding reception, we helped my parents move, 3 days after the wedding, so we were very grateful to get these photos. Notice my muumuu has a wide belt, which is the width of the lace. It has clear crystal buttons, so I can wear the dress belted, or unbelted. Notice I am wearing my wedding dress, when I am holding my daughter, in her green dress. I am pregnant with my son in this photo, so muumuu dresses are definitely handy for various weight levels!

The pink and white muumuu  I am wearing in the rocking chair, is when I was pregnant with my daughter, Jamie, our first child. It was winter, in Idaho, and my dress had been made for southern California, so I wore a white homemade cotton blouse underneath it, with a high ruffled neck, to stay warmer!

The embroidered insert that I used as an applique on this yoke, was a discarded second, from one of the Lincolnton, North Carolina lace and fabric manufacturing factories, as it was shutting down. My hubby bought 8 HUGE contractor size bags of lace, and other factory "scraps" at a "garage sale". It took me 2 years to roll all of the lace, and organize it, so I could find what I wanted, and sew with it. 

The satin stitch around the edges of the insert, had been cut, so the embroidery was coming off. I used a similar satin stitch, on one of the vintage sewing machines that I had fixed up, to applique it to the yoke, using the same color of thread, that it had been edged with, in the factory. I have one more piece this same size, that I want to use on a white yoke, on a brown crinkled cotton or rayon muumuu. I love the way the blue stems of the embroidery, match the color of my dress.

Zigzagging (or serging) over 1/8", 3/8", or 1/4" elastic, is a quick way to a professional elasticized cuff, waistband, or shirred effect! Use a satin stitch presser foot with the tunnel wider than the elastic you are using, and zigzag over the elastic, as you sew it to the location you wish it to gather. I mark it with chalk, before sewing, so I have an easy to follow stitching line. I used this technique on the dark blue crinkled rayon dress, with the white yoke with the embroidery detail. The brown fabric is a ruffle for another dress, I used it as an example to help show a tutorial on this style of gathering with a zigzag sewing machine and elastic.

Notice the blue sleeve has a rolled hem sewn with wooly nylon, on a serger. You can also get this effect with a zigzag sewing machine, if you zigzag over the edge. It helps if you have a special "overlock" presser foot, with either a pin, or a flat metal piece, which helps the zigzag stitches stay a uniform width, while sewing along the edge of the fabric, using a short satin stitch (very short stitch length, zigzag width the size you want). You can zigzag over an elastic cord if desired, or over thread or cotton string, to help add body to the rolled hem, but I did not bother with that when I rolled this sleeve hem, on my serger.

You will notice that even in the most expensive stores, rolled hems, flatlocked edges, and stitching details are some of the most common details, instead of the old styles of folded hems, even on women's dresses and blouses. I used this around pockets, as well!

Plain muumuus can be beautiful, too, but because I like to wear them in public, as well, I started making the muumuus more decorative. This cream colored muumuu is totally plain, just with a 3/4 length sleeve. I eventually wore the neckline out, fraying the fabric, due to wearing a cell phone in a case, over the lip of the yoke. It is not good for the dress neckline, so I started adding patch pockets for my cell phone.

The top photo of the cream dress, wearing earrings and a necklace, makes a plain muumuu look VERY DRESSY!

The same cream muumuu, over 10 years later, shown below, when I had grown my hair out, and obviously, gained weight, lol! 

I have experimented with various weights and types of fabrics, with my muumuu dresses, because I wear them year round. The pale blue and white muumuu, with a white yoke, trimmed with navy blue flat lace, is actually sewn out of old white sheets, and men's shirting, so it stays a little warmer, in cold weather. Heavier, or thicker fabrics do not shirr or gather as well, so you may want to sew tucks, or pleats, instead of gathers, depending on the fabrics you choose, when sewing muumuus.  I sewed a large kangaroo pouch pocket, out of a scrap of blue and white floral tapestry fabric, on the front. I didn't want to cut up the beautiful floral design centered in the scrap of fabric, which is why I decided to make the kangaroo pocket on the front, like on a wrap dress I had when I was in 4th grade, lol!

I mitered the lace corners, by sewing it backed with strips of paper, then sewed it to the yoke.

These dresses have been worn both for daywear, and for sleeping, especially when I am recovering from surgeries, so they are faded, but you can see the variations from plain, like the baby blue, and cream dresses, to the green with embroidery and lace, the blue and white with the bias tape decorated yoke, the turquoise and black, used to be just turquoise, but as the seams wore out, I added a trim of black fabric, to make it last longer. It looked like a designer detail, especially around the neck, down the sides, the black patch pocket, and  at the ends of the sleeves. The black dress was made with the turquoise ruffles, but I didn't like the elastic, so I took it out, and left them as a decorative turquoise band. You can tell black and turquoise are two of my favorite colors.

Designing the bias tape trim and yoke, by pinning them on in different patterns, and taking photos, to help me decide how I wanted it to look. Notice how faded the dress is, after many wearings, and washings, in the photo above! LOL!

I usually do inspiration sessions, when I am not sure if I want to change a design I have come up with, before it is sewn. I pin the trims in the different designs I considered, and decide which ones I like the best, by taking photos of them, and comparing the photos, before sewing them into the final design. You can see this in the photos for the light pink and white dress, as well.