dinner dress progress
Jun. 23rd, 2017 11:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mandie_rwI celebrated the end of summer session by doing nothing but sewing today. Or, well, sewing-related things, anyway. Mostly worked on the dinner dress, but I also unpicked everything that needed to be unpicked to hopefully fix the awful fit of the beige cotton print dress bodice. Took the collar off, took the sleeves off, took out some boning, and took out the side seams. Yay, that's going to be fun...later.
But, decent dress progress was made. I:
- scaled up a bodice pattern from Fashions of the Gilded Age. I was going to just buy the TV pattern, but I'm feeling miserly at the moment, and I have those books, so, might as well use them, right?
I prefer the square neck, but I like the cut of the lower edge of the round-neck bodice better, and as that'll be much easier to adjust on a mockup, I scaled up the round-neck one. Quite satisfying, actually...like a grownup connect-the-dots. ;) I didn't add seam allowances or cut out a mockup, just scaled up the pieces and cut them out of paper for now. And I used a green marker, so, no, you can't really see details in the pics. Oh well.
- I finished pleating up/ tacking down the ivory silk flounce on the skirt, and pressed the pleats.
I ended up making ONE pleat out of the different silk, which looks pretty funny...good thing it's in the back.
- Cut out and sewed the striped skirt together. My original idea was to do either scalloped or vandyked cutouts at the hem of the striped skirt, about mid-calf-length (hence the pleated flounce, which would then peek out from underneath), but when I put the striped skirt together and pinned it on top of the base skirt, I didn't like that idea any more. The stripes are very wide, but the skirt is very gored, so I think no matter the width of the cutouts, they'd end up looking funky with the stripes.
(And yes, the stripes got juuuuust a little bit uneven at the side-front seam. Ooops. Not resewing.)
And I discovered just how cheerfully this fabric frays. The ivory stripes are taffeta, which frays a manageable amount, but the black stripes are satin, and they shed more thanmiss_philomena 's black fluffy cat Jasper does! Note to self: do not cut out bodice pieces and then leave them sitting around for any length of time; they'll probably just disintegrate.
EVOOOOOL. #satinissatan
- Got the striped skirt basted on top of the cotton one, and sewed the waistband down. Stared at the skirt on the dummy for a while, pondering a better hem treatment for the striped layer than cutouts, and I finally hit upon the idea of pinching it up into swags. (It is drapery fabric, after all...)
It's just very roughly pinned right now, but I think it'll work. Much more satisfactory than cutouts!
I don't think I'll have time to sew tomorrow (work, then Philly Orchestra concert in the evening), but I should have a good chunk of time free on Sunday. Maybe I'll try to get a mockup for this bodice fitted? We'll see.
But, decent dress progress was made. I:
- scaled up a bodice pattern from Fashions of the Gilded Age. I was going to just buy the TV pattern, but I'm feeling miserly at the moment, and I have those books, so, might as well use them, right?
I prefer the square neck, but I like the cut of the lower edge of the round-neck bodice better, and as that'll be much easier to adjust on a mockup, I scaled up the round-neck one. Quite satisfying, actually...like a grownup connect-the-dots. ;) I didn't add seam allowances or cut out a mockup, just scaled up the pieces and cut them out of paper for now. And I used a green marker, so, no, you can't really see details in the pics. Oh well.
- I finished pleating up/ tacking down the ivory silk flounce on the skirt, and pressed the pleats.
I ended up making ONE pleat out of the different silk, which looks pretty funny...good thing it's in the back.
- Cut out and sewed the striped skirt together. My original idea was to do either scalloped or vandyked cutouts at the hem of the striped skirt, about mid-calf-length (hence the pleated flounce, which would then peek out from underneath), but when I put the striped skirt together and pinned it on top of the base skirt, I didn't like that idea any more. The stripes are very wide, but the skirt is very gored, so I think no matter the width of the cutouts, they'd end up looking funky with the stripes.
(And yes, the stripes got juuuuust a little bit uneven at the side-front seam. Ooops. Not resewing.)
And I discovered just how cheerfully this fabric frays. The ivory stripes are taffeta, which frays a manageable amount, but the black stripes are satin, and they shed more than
miss_philomena 's black fluffy cat Jasper does! Note to self: do not cut out bodice pieces and then leave them sitting around for any length of time; they'll probably just disintegrate. EVOOOOOL. #satinissatan
- Got the striped skirt basted on top of the cotton one, and sewed the waistband down. Stared at the skirt on the dummy for a while, pondering a better hem treatment for the striped layer than cutouts, and I finally hit upon the idea of pinching it up into swags. (It is drapery fabric, after all...)
It's just very roughly pinned right now, but I think it'll work. Much more satisfactory than cutouts!
I don't think I'll have time to sew tomorrow (work, then Philly Orchestra concert in the evening), but I should have a good chunk of time free on Sunday. Maybe I'll try to get a mockup for this bodice fitted? We'll see.
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