Short answer
Yes, moderately. Not because the stitching is difficult, but because velvet imposes rules that remove most of a dressmaker's usual shortcuts — and each rule costs either fabric or time.
Nap
Velvet has a pile that lies in one direction. Run your hand up it and it looks darker; run it down and it looks lighter. Every piece must therefore be cut facing the same way, or panels of the same dress will read as different colours. That removes the cutter's ability to rotate pieces to nest them efficiently, and typically adds about 15% to the yardage.
Traditionally, pile runs upward for a richer, deeper colour. Downward reads lighter and more silvery. Both are correct — but pick one and tell your maker, because it must be consistent.
Pressing
An iron on the face of velvet crushes the pile permanently. Seams have to be pressed from the back over a needle board or a folded towel, which is slower and more careful work than pressing any flat fabric.
Shifting
Two layers of velvet slide against each other while being sewn, so seams walk out of alignment. It needs a walking foot, generous basting or both — again, time rather than difficulty.
Marking
Pins and unpicked stitches leave holes. Mistakes are less recoverable than in almost any other fabric, which is the real reason makers charge more for it.
When it is worth it
For autumn and winter formalwear, velvet has a depth of colour and a weight of drape nothing else achieves, and it is extraordinarily flattering in photographs. Choose a simple silhouette — a column or a gentle A-line — and let the fabric do the work. Elaborate detail is wasted on velvet anyway, because the pile swallows it.