Willow Fabric Recommendations

Today’s post is all about recommended fabrics for the Willow Tank & Dress. First I’ll walk you through the fabrics we used for our samples, followed by a chart showing a few commonly used fabrics and their composition & weight. I hope this gives you an idea of how a similar fabric could work. 

For the tank version of the Willow we used a lightweight linen. This fabric is lightweight enough that it’s a bit sheer and for that reason it’s a better choice for the dress than the top. Despite the oz weight of the fabric being quite light at 3.83 oz, the structure of the linen keeps it solidly in the soft drape category, rather than fluid. You can see how the top hangs nicely on Tiffany but does still retain the shape of the top a bit.

Contrast the previous fabric with the fabric we used for the dress version of the Willow. This is a cotton / linen blend weighing in at 5.6 oz and you can see how much more structure it has than the lighter weight top. The cotton & linen blend presses beautifully which helps to make the pleat really stand out. The fabric is also completely opaque so no need to worry about that!

Here we’ve pulled a few fabric examples with their composition and weight to show you how different fabrics compare to each other in regards to drape. Starting with the first category, fluid, you can see that there are weights ranging from 2.8 - 5.1 oz, yet the rayon challis is much more drapey than the fabrics in the soft category which all weigh less per yard. This has to do with the properties of the fibers used as well as the finishing and weave of the yarns that are woven into the fabric. Another contrast would be the two silks. Both the silk crepe de chine and silk noil are composed of 100% silk yet have quite different drapes.

The easiest way to start recognizing how certain fabrics drape is to pay attention to the fabrics you order for your projects, their fiber composition, and their weights. You could even start a swatch book to reference when fabric shopping, especially online.

I hope this information will help you make a more informed decision on your own fabric choices. If you have any questions you can let us know in the comments below!