Hooked on Needles: One Katie's Hand Embroidered Irish Step Dancing Dress

Recently I've been talking about the hand embroidery I had done on a few Irish Step Dancing dresses and I showed you some of the designs. Here are the designs from another dress I did for a lovely young dancer named Katie L. This was her fifth year dress which was newly made since she had outgrown her first velvet dress, thus requiring all the embroidery from the two previous years to be done again. Being a fifth year dancer, she had earned the privilege of wearing the brat, or scarf, and also the belt and her initials on the right sleeve, plus two more small designs on the front of the skirt. All this in addition to the original third year designs and the fourth year small designs. Quite a lot of embroidery to be done all at once! And this dress was one of two that I made and embroidered that year!

This is the chain stitch embroidery design that Katie L. chose for her brat. The fabric was a silky satiny type of polyester which draped nicely across the back when pinned at the shoulder and opposite hip. The shape of it was square, but it was folded into a triangle to be worn. The embroidery was put on the exposed corner so it could be seen from the back. Lovely design and very nice color choices.

This is Katie L.'s belt design. I stitched it before sewing up the belt so that I would not have to stitch through two layers of velvet. As you can see, this design is Much Simpler than the belts I did for Brooke and Bridget!

This is one of the small designs on the front of the dress. I just love the simple lines and curves, and I think you just can't go wrong with rich purples and greens.

This is the other small design on the front of the dress. It is the same one I did on Bridget's dress, only in a different color combination.

Katie L.'s initials, done in split stitch using regular DMC embroidery floss.

And this is Katie L.'s completed dress. I love the knot design at the hem with the rainbow colors used throughout the dress all brought together. She did a nice job choosing her designs, placement and colors.

The other dress I did that same year was for another Katie and it turned out to be my absolute favorite dress of all. That one can be seen by clicking HERE!

Happy Stitching!