Avocado-Dyed Silk Slip (Measure Fabric)

I currently have a few full slips: this bias-cut blush slip made from a vintage pattern, a very short nude poly lace slip (sounds a lot sexier than it is honestly), and a black polyester slip that came with a Ted Baker dress. None of these are exactly the perfect slip, though, and making one would be easy: all I needed for the pretty and practical slip of my dreams is about a yard and a half of nude silk and my lengthened Ogden Cami pattern. So here I am! Of course, I decided to complicate it slightly…

Measure Fabric has a nice selection of silks and few of them are PFD White aka \”prepared for dying.\” They also have the required dyes so you can create any color of silk your heart desires. For my Ultimate Silk Slip, however, I wanted a pale warm pink, and I knew that one way to achieve that color was through avocado dyeing! I mean, just look at the gorgeous colors avocados create! (Plus, it was a great excuse to eat a bunch of avocado.) I think part of the magic is that you don\’t quite know what color it will be, but basically every color I\’ve seen online has been in the range of just pretty to absolutely perfect so I wasn\’t too concerned with the exact shade–and although my silk turned out more peachy than millennial pink it\’s actually the just about the exact right shade for my skin tone!
(…which is why I look naked in all these photos haha)

There are a million tutorials for both avocado dyeing and lengthening the Ogden Cami into dress-length out there, so I wont retread that ground in depth here, but basically:

1. To make the Ogden slip dress length, I added about 10\” at the bottom.
2. I dyed the fabric before I cut and sewed my pattern since I wasn\’t sure if the dyeing process would affect the size/texture/drape of the fabric.
3. Avocado dyeing is super super easy and basically everything I have is now crying out for a little dip in an avocado dye bath.

As for the sewing, I made up my usual size and did teeny little french seams at the side to make this project a bit more durable and topstitched down the facing since I want this to be pretty wash and wear. My french seams aren\’t quite perfect so I have a bit of seam sticking out out at the sides–I always have this problem! I don\’t think I am aggressive enough trimming my seams. I added little bows to the front straps so I can easily tell front from back.

I had a lot of fun doing my first natural dyeing project and I\’m looking forward to experimenting more… I\’m so so into this–are you?

xoxo,