Titanic exhibit dress: Planning stage!
Sep. 21st, 2012 11:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mandie_rwSince on FB, we've been discussing going to the Titanic exhibit at the Franklin Institute(now determined for the end of January), I couldn't resist making plans for my outfit. Even if I still have a lot of work to do on the undergarments first, SIGH.
I did have vague plans to use the ecru striped wool for a day teens dress if I needed one, but now that wool's earmarked for a Pennsbury mantua and petticoat, if I ever get around to it (mostly because it's the only piece I have enough of to make a matching petticoat & mantua), so - new plan!
After lots of poking around and trying to decide whether I want to shell out for a pattern (as usual, I don't!), I remembered there are some patterns on the La Couturiere Parisienne site. She has a nice selection of patterns from 1913, and I waffled between the silk jacket pattern and the dress pattern directly below it - but finally decided to go with the dress. (Though I do have some lightweight blue wool that would be nice for a spring suit! Someday...)
The most complicated thing about this dress, I think (besides, you know, getting it to fit. And the collar. I hate collars) will be the ridiculously complicated closure that 90% of dresses seem to have had, but I spent a couple of evenings puzzling it out, and think I've got it figured! Don't ask me to explain it, but...
And of course, now I've picked the dress, what fabric should I use??? All-important, you know! Okay, Stash, what've you got?
Not too difficult to choose, really - bright cranberry-red mid-weight wool suiting would be lovely for a winter dress. And eye-catching. Gotta be eye-catching in dull January weather, right? Like a gaggle of women in hundred-year-out-of-date clothes wandering around the Franklin Institute won't be eye-catching enough.
So, the wool for the dress...but I didn't have anything for the sash and collar. Really! I didn't want to use black (more of a contrast than I wanted), and the only other red fabric in the Stash was scraps of cherry red-shot-with-black dupioni, which looked icky and I don't think there was enough of it anyway.
Fabricguru.com to the rescue! Their drapery silk is usually a fairly smooth weave, and not a bad price, especially if you don't need much. So I bought some burgundy silk and hoped it would coordinate okay.
Not bad! The color's not quite true; the wool washes out the silk when I take them together, but oh well. Gives you some idea, anyway!
There's also going to be a patently ridiculous crushed velvet coat, but I haven't gotten that fabric in the mail yet...
Got the dress pattern, got the fabric, got the shoes - now all I need is a hat!
I might start up on the teens stuff again after I finish the Ren Faire outfit, since 1/ I now have an event to sew for, and 2/ fabric.com is stupid yet again and ran out of the linen I ordered for 18thc linings before getting to my order, so I don't think I'll do the curtain dress next after all!
I did have vague plans to use the ecru striped wool for a day teens dress if I needed one, but now that wool's earmarked for a Pennsbury mantua and petticoat, if I ever get around to it (mostly because it's the only piece I have enough of to make a matching petticoat & mantua), so - new plan!
After lots of poking around and trying to decide whether I want to shell out for a pattern (as usual, I don't!), I remembered there are some patterns on the La Couturiere Parisienne site. She has a nice selection of patterns from 1913, and I waffled between the silk jacket pattern and the dress pattern directly below it - but finally decided to go with the dress. (Though I do have some lightweight blue wool that would be nice for a spring suit! Someday...)
The most complicated thing about this dress, I think (besides, you know, getting it to fit. And the collar. I hate collars) will be the ridiculously complicated closure that 90% of dresses seem to have had, but I spent a couple of evenings puzzling it out, and think I've got it figured! Don't ask me to explain it, but...
And of course, now I've picked the dress, what fabric should I use??? All-important, you know! Okay, Stash, what've you got?
Not too difficult to choose, really - bright cranberry-red mid-weight wool suiting would be lovely for a winter dress. And eye-catching. Gotta be eye-catching in dull January weather, right? Like a gaggle of women in hundred-year-out-of-date clothes wandering around the Franklin Institute won't be eye-catching enough.
So, the wool for the dress...but I didn't have anything for the sash and collar. Really! I didn't want to use black (more of a contrast than I wanted), and the only other red fabric in the Stash was scraps of cherry red-shot-with-black dupioni, which looked icky and I don't think there was enough of it anyway.
Fabricguru.com to the rescue! Their drapery silk is usually a fairly smooth weave, and not a bad price, especially if you don't need much. So I bought some burgundy silk and hoped it would coordinate okay.
Not bad! The color's not quite true; the wool washes out the silk when I take them together, but oh well. Gives you some idea, anyway!
There's also going to be a patently ridiculous crushed velvet coat, but I haven't gotten that fabric in the mail yet...
Got the dress pattern, got the fabric, got the shoes - now all I need is a hat!
I might start up on the teens stuff again after I finish the Ren Faire outfit, since 1/ I now have an event to sew for, and 2/ fabric.com is stupid yet again and ran out of the linen I ordered for 18thc linings before getting to my order, so I don't think I'll do the curtain dress next after all!
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Date: 2012-09-22 11:32 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-09-23 02:55 am (UTC)