I wanted to knit it out of merino, as that’s the only animal fibre that I’m sure doesn’t irritate my skin. I knew I wanted to wear it with just a slip or camisole underneath.

It would have cost me more than $200 to buy enough Touch yarn to make the whole dress, so I made the upper torso and sleeves from it, and the rest is the Ashford Tekapo (which turned out to be surprisingly soft).

I had nearly finished it twice, and unravelled it twice, before realising that this silhouette would never work for me. so I changed it to an A-line tunic - which suits me so much more!

To do this, once past the bust I started increasing every 6 rounds and kept doing this until about crotch-level. At this point I did my increases further into the body i.e. instead of increasing at the sides, I increased about a third of the way in from either side, on both front and back.

I also modified the sleeves:

• I stopped the cable repeats after the second repeat
• I decreased every 4th rounds 4 times

The Tekapo is slightly thicker than the Touch so the dress is relatively heavy. This meant I had to strengthen the neckline with a chain of crochet. I did the same for the raglan lines.

I love how it’s turned out.