Working with the Chado Ralph Rucci Fabric - Part 1

First for those who haven't been around long, you should know that if I had to name my top three designers they would be Michael Kors, Carolina Herrara and Ralph Rucci and not necessarily in that order.  So to be working with a piece of fabric that Ralph Rucci ordered for his use is not only inspiring but wonderous.  Bold adjectives I know but I'm a girl that likes fashion and fabric...so combine the two and I'm in heaven!

After searching through several of Rucci's collections, I found this dress in his Fall 2013 RTW collection that appears to use the black & purple double knit fabric:

I went through a few ideas before seeing this picture and finally decided to color block a dress, make a straight skirt and use the leftover fabric to cut out a simple jacket.  

I've cut the dress first using the pattern pieces from my Whitney Dress. It's perfect for color blocking and I feel it would use the fabric to it's best advantage.

I've been wanting to make another version of this dress and this fabric is perfect for it.  However, for this latest version I've added long sleeves.  I want to wear this dress alone and not cover up any of the design features.

The jacket was cut using a pattern I haven't sewn in several years which is now out of print. I was actually looking for another one when I touched this pattern.  I pulled the instruction sheet out of the folder and realized that I remembered how much I liked wearing this jacket and how easily it went together. It's unlined which is what I also want for the jacket in this grouping. I've made two versions of this Vogue pattern before, here and here.

The skirt pieces were cut using my TNT straight skirt pattern.  They were the easiest pieces to cut from the fabric because I wasn't adventurous with the cutting.  The skirt will be lined as will the dress.

I know this is an ambitious plan but I've managed to get all three garments out of the 4 3/4 yards using quite a bit of creative cutting!

Here is the pile of scraps that are left after all of the pieces were cut out...

So this is where I am now. Future posts will be about the construction of and decisions that need to be made for the garments.  I have a few ideas swirling around that need to be handled during the construction phase that will affect the look of the finished garments.  Boy doesn't that sound mysterious! *LOL*

...as always more later!