I’ve got another Minerva Crafts make for you guys today!

And it’s a pattern hack of one of the latest Tilly and the Button patterns – the Seren dress!

The inspiration for this pattern hack came from the fact that I need more separates in my life. I’ve been making far too many dresses of late! (Ok, so that’s an overstatement cause you can never really have too many dresses, but you get what I mean!). But whilst I loved the design on the new Seren dress from Tilly and the Buttons, I knew I didn’t really want to make yet another dress.

So I decided to turn the Seren into a little summer top with a peplum and tied straps!

I’ve made mine in a large scale gingham polycotton. I love a gingham fabric. For some reason, I think it really works as a summer print!

Instructions for the pattern hack alterations:

I kept the bodice part of the dress exactly the same so make and fit it the same as you normally would do!

For the peplum, I trimmed the skirt to 10 inches long. I wanted a little more volume in the peplum so I added extra fabric for gathers.

The easiest way to do this is to add a few extra inches onto the CF/CB line of the pattern piece. I added 4 inches but you can do more or less or none at all at this stage. That’s completely up to you! You can just draw it out straight from the CF/CB line (in other words add on a rectangle onto this line) without having to worry about adding any curves. I then gathered the skirt with a long basting stitch and attached it to the waistband.

For the facing, you can either shorten the skirt facing piece that comes with the pattern. Or the easier option is to lengthen the bodice facing. In this case, I erred on the cautious side and overextended the facing. Remember you can always trim it later!

Instead of using the straps that came with the pattern I decided to go with a skinny strap which tied together.

These were made from four long strips of fabric (around 50cm long by 4cm wide) which I folded in half lengthways, then folded the long sides into the middle and top stitched.

I placed these in the middle of the strap notches on the bodice and sandwiched and sewed them in between the bodice and facing.

It’s a fun little top that skims over any your curves. A real winner!

One thing I just want to add before you start making your own the Seren is that I’d recommend making a muslin of the bodice. I still feel like I haven’t achieved a particularly good fit of the top and this is the second time I’ve made it (my first time was a tester version and not fit for public consumption…).

I don’t know why I found it such a struggle – it’s such a simple pattern, you’d think it would require very little adjustment! I’ve seen other people make it and had great luck with the fit of this dress but just to be on the safe side, I’d recommend a muslin!