Modest Nursing Dress Design (Free Pattern DIY)

We looked for a modest nursing dress design
so we could offer you a free pattern DIY.
Preparing for baby means mama needs new clothes, too!

 

We found a few nursing dress designs around the net that could be styled modestly.

You can find ready-made modest nursing dresses.

Our favorites were from latchedmama.com. They have good variety, and many cover quite well.

However, we wanted you to be able to take your personal dress pattern and re-design it into a nursing dress pattern.

So here’s our free pattern tutorial made as simple as we could make it!

 

Modest Nursing Dress Design – Our Favorite

What you’ll need:

1. A basic pull-over-the-head pattern for knit fabric. This basic pattern should be 3 main pieces, including the Front, Back and set-in Sleeve pattern pieces.
2. Pattern making paper, such as gift wrap, bulletin board roll, or our favorite, exam table paper roll. (Email us and ask for a roll. We keep it on hand to share. $15.00 including shipping.)
3. Yard stick, pencil, scissors, sewist’s tape measure.

 

How to Make Your Pattern:

1. There will be no changes to the back and sleeve pattern pieces, because you will work with the front piece only.
2. Start by tracing the complete front pattern piece just as it is onto the pattern making paper. You should have a dress made to this pattern, so you know that it fits you. Also, so you can use the finished dress for measuring.
3. You have re-created the exact pattern you started with. Now we begin to redesign the pattern into a nursing pattern. You will need to be wearing your dress made to this pattern to make adjustments and cuts. (On the pattern, not the dress!)
4. Look in the mirror, and decide where you want a seam to go across, preferably half way between the bust and waist, or maybe an inch or so above your natural waist. (Don’t worry if you don’t have a waist now, it will come back. Just guess at where it should be.)  Mark your dress where this seam should go.
5. Take the dress off, then with the sewist’s tape measure, measure the side seam from the sleeve to your mark. Transfer this mark to the new pattern piece you cut, without adding the seam allowance. You’ll find out why later. Draw a straight line from this mark to the center front, then cut along this line. You will now have a blouse top and a skirt pattern.
6. If your skirt has darts from the waist, go ahead and cut that width from the top of the skirt piece, tapering to the hip. Now your skirt pattern piece is finished. You can set it aside with the dress pattern back and sleeve.

 

 

 

Design the Blouse Top

1. Pin the blouse piece on the pattern paper and trace another blouse exactly like the one you pinned EXCEPT add 1 1/4″ on the waist line. This will make up the seam allowances for both the blouse and the skirt. Cut two of these blouse tops, marking the center fold line on both. Hold the Front pattern piece up to your body to see if the waist is about where you want it, then adjust if necessary.
2. On one blouse pattern piece mark the armhole just before the curve begins to go up on the armscye.
3. At the blouse waist, mark about 2″ from the side seam. Connect the two marks with a straight line. Cut along this line, which is actually a hem, because it won’t get sewn to the rest of the dress. This creates the opening for nursing on each side of the blouse front.
4. With the second blouse pattern piece: Draw a straight line across the blouse just below the neckline, then cut this line. This is now what we’ll call the blouse lining piece, which will show only beside the main blouse piece, on the sides under the arms.

 

 

 

Now your pattern is ready for cutting and sewing!  Here’s the sewing tutorial to make the dress.

 

Enjoy designing your own Modest Nursing Dress pattern!
Tell us how it turns out,
and be sure to email us with any questions.