Burda Style 02-2012-106 Fan Dance Coat, or how to de glamourize a pattern for household use

I am often amused by Burda Style magazine. I was particularly taken with the Asian Inspiration section in the February issue, especially the suggestion that "The elegant coat of silk satin print will accompany you to the theatre"
This is lovely, but personally, should I observe someone wearing such a garment to the theatre, I would strongly suspect that they wanted an early night, and felt that going out in their dressing gown would save them a few minutes at the end of the evening.

Having a certain reluctance to use silk satin for a first time pattern exploration, I trialled this pattern using some extremely loud and large print quilting cotton that a friend bought for me whilst she was in Japan. This should help to wake me up each morning.

It is rather windy today, so the photograph makes the garment look a little skewed.
I have used two colourways of the same print, not having sufficient of either, to make the dressing gown, but it is hard to see this combination of fabrics due to the stunning nature of the print.

Although this is a very simple pattern, at first glance not unlike the New Look pattern I have been using for the past 10 years or so for family dressing gowns, it has some very nice details.

The all in one front and collar is shaped with a long dart, which sits very nicely around the neck, and the sleeves have a very pleasant bell shape, which somehow escapes being too large and impractical for important tasks such as tea drinking.

The Burda directions are not too bad, except where they instruct you to baste the collar then sew from the right side. Instead of doing this, I clipped the inner dart to the seam line, then hand stitched the collar to the neck and shoulders.

Photograph of clipping at dart prior to hand stitching

I added flat piping to the collar/facing seam, and added a inner tie at waist level. My belt is wider than Burda's, and I tapered out the side and back seams below the waist, as I am not shaped in the least like a kimono. I probably did not need to do this, as the smallest size 36-38 has generous ease. I made a square shoulder adjustment, but no further fitting alterations.
I flat felled the centre back seam, and bound the other seams with bias binding, having just read the Colette sewing book and being inspired to make things nicely.

Do I need a pretty silk-satin dressing gown as well?