The Craft Room: Heart Back Dress (No Sew)

Happy Thursday Darlings!

It's DIY time again...

So the thing is - I had this lovely little ivory and plum dress from Modcloth that returned to me pretty badly stained in the back after I lent it out.  (It's ok, stuff happens).  Anyhow, as I only got several wears out of the dress myself and the stains covered a pretty large area and were stubborn as a moose and just wouldn't budge after numerous washes, treatments, and natural stain removal methods, my only hopes of salvaging the dress were to make a cute little cutout where the stained area was (not so bad, eh?).  Better yet, there's no sewing involved - so it's a pretty easy feat for anyone to take on :)

This is what I used to do just that:

First steps:

1.  Determine how large you want your heart to be and cut the shape out of your card-stock (I used a thick page from an old magazine)

2.  a.  Measure across the back of the dress and mark the center, and place your cut out heart accordingly.

     b.  Trace around the heart with your fabric pencil.

     c.  Cut that baby out.  (It's easiest to cut up the center and then around each of the sides.)

 Next steps:

3.  On the back of the dress, around the heart, place your HeatNBond and iron on.

4.  Place your bias tape directly over your HeatnBond and iron on.

 *** If you wish to leave the cutout open on your dress, you can stop right here.  I happened to have the perfect vintage floral material that matched the dress to a tee, so I decided to use that to fill in my heart and not leave my back exposed.  I'm quite a bosomy gal anyways, so an opened back is really not an option for me.  

Final steps:

5.  Turn the dress inside out and repeat step 3 with the HeatNBond around the heart on the inside of the dress.

6.  Iron on your material (measure it first to make sure you have enough to cover the cutout), then cut the excess around the edge of the heart.  (If you are super brave you can cut the heart shape out of the material first and then iron on, however I don't always trust my cutting skills, so I opted to do it the first way).  

Ta-Da - you are finished!  It's a million times cuter on - so I shall have to do a proper post with it once the weather warms.  My sad little hanger and less than flattering indoor lighting is just not doing this beauty any justice.  

That's all for now darlings!  Hope your holiday season of decorating, baking, shopping, wrapping, and party going is simply as sweet as a sugar plum!  

Talk soon!

Love Bunches,