Learn Italian: Il vestito che sto cucendo con il cotone è molto elegante. - The dress that I am sewing with the cotton is very elegant.

Sto cucendo is the present continuous tense, built with the verb stare (to stay/be) and the gerund form of a verb (ending in -ando or -endo). We use it to emphasize that an action is happening right at this very moment. While the regular present tense cucio can also translate to "I am sewing", sto cucendo strongly highlights that you are in the middle of doing it right now.

Is che the only word used to link sentences like "that" or "which"?

In most everyday situations, yes! Here, che connects the two parts of the sentence and means "that" (the dress that I am sewing). In Italian, che is the go-to relative pronoun for linking phrases, meaning "who", "whom", "which", or "that", whether you are talking about a person, an animal, or an object.

Why does the sentence say con il cotone (with the cotton) instead of using di for the material?

If you just want to describe what a piece of clothing is made of, you would use di, as in un vestito di cotone (a cotton dress). However, because this sentence describes the active process of sewing, con il cotone focuses on the cotton as the physical material or thread the person is using right now to put the dress together.

I've seen vestito translated as "suit" before. How do we know it means "dress" here?