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Text of the page (random words):
zed the whole dress to be able to be worn without a corset for the sake of australian summer i got the outfit to the point where the hem was pinned no buttons yet and no sleeves but i had handsewn in the collar which i may add was no mean feat trying to get it pinned to lie flat on the bodice with it on me gladys is in need of repair so not really good for that sort of thing was not something i wish to ever repeat but i did get there all the internal seams were finished in a hand felled method or french for the long skirt seam there is only one and there it sat from memory i had issues working out what sleeves i wanted then there was trying to get a sleeve to fit into the hole left by the drop sleeved style of the pagoda bodice and finally the event ended up on a day i could not attend the reason why escapes me as it was a date i had organised so all i can think is that a family event came up then i sent gladys for repairs that never happened and took 9mths but that is a whole other story so the dress came down was packed away and passed over for more needed or exciting projects this month we have an event on open themed and i wanted to make the renaissance dress for it but the green dress made its way back up and into sorting as we move my stash from under the house into storage for mould reasons i took another look at it and thought it deserved to be finished especially after the battle that was the yoke collar piece however the basic colonial style wasn t exciting me first step was to put sleeves in and rather than spend weeks wrestling with patterning i decided to put the pagoda sleeves on i wondered if it would fit over a hoop as that was also on my to do list this month and a new plan was born raise the hem make a pleated petticoat to go underneath and fit over a hoop i added some stash cotton lace and ribbon to the sleeve ends to finish them nicely and balance the white portions also yay some stash use i did not have the required amount of fabric for the petticoat so i hit up spotlight for the first of about a million visits this month cotton cost was high given the amount used in a hoop petticoat plus the cotton needed for the pleats would make one very heavy petticoat given my other petticoat is already out of a too heavy linen the idea of having both on my hips was not appealing in order to save money and in line with the is it pretty mentality i bought some 2 m poly cotton poplin and a couple of meters of white quilting cotton same quality as the green fabric as it turns out 2m was very ambitious as i worked out the pleat depth etc and returned the next day for another 2m i would need 12m total to make the 4m hem of pleats setting the pleats i tried the vinigar methods and other than giving me a craving for chips it did not seem to help me much but giving them a good steam and basting has held them so far the dress hem ended up being lower than anticipated so i have kept a basting stitch above this hem to hold the pleats better when hemming the dress my original plan was to have about 10 inches of pleats showing however that did not look balanced at all so after consultations with friends it was decided to just about halve that in the end its 6 inches from green to floor in hoop this is mostly eyeballed but i also used a 6 paper template to run under the green and make sure it was at least in the ball park yes this was to much pleats one of the best secrets about this dress is the with the side closure i can line up a whole bunch of openings to be able to access my bernie pocket rather than carrying a bag i am very happy with the result and glad i took the time to reimagine and finish this project keen eyes may have noticed a bonnet appear in the final photos i have considered a separate post but as the bonnet was made in one night i don t think i have enough to say to fill out a whole post the basis was made from some fleeting tips made by angela clayton and it is constructed with buckram and wire frame padded with some quilted wadding and covered in left over cotton from the pleats and uses up a length of ribbon i had in my stash from gods know when i love the gather effect on the back though i have been told it looks a little bit handmaids tale so i may need to add more adornments before i wear it again posted by angelic cow at 10 33 pm no comments sunday march 28 2021 because its the 20 s why not a 20 s dress the historical picnic society event for march is bring a friend i made it so it is my fault but i do tend to call the first event of the year bring a friend every year as such i asked who wanted to be my friend my niece tayla very quickly volunteered i asked her what she wanted suggested i could do a quasi medieval dress regency or 1950 s all of which i could pretty easily throw together in the time i had she countered that she could do 1940 s or 1920 s having been binge watching closet historian i immediately thought ahhhh the 1 hour dress and plans for a 1920 s began should be simple but for those who have read my previous posts nothing is ever easy when i get involved the one hour dress is an easy draft for full explanation here is where i got my instructions basically take bust measurement plus ease make rectangle half this wide and as long as you want the dress add some arms and expand at hips to make an i shape i however thought ohh the hanky hem that would be great yeah ballsed that one up when my side triangles were like tiny little spikes instead of long billowing hanky hems after two days of attempts to fix and trying to reimagine how to add panels to create not only what i wanted but something that was even wearable i decided it was just not pretty i wanted my niece to have a nice dress not some frankensteined messed up rag yes the first attempt was indeed this bad i bit the bullet hit up spotlight again visit 50 this month i am sure and discovered to my delight a 40 of apparel fabric sale this meant that i didn t have to buy the cheap winston or plain satin and suddenly could afford the beautiful satin rayon so pretty so slinky so arsie to sew i will never again taint my sanity with its luster to accent i found an almost perfect colour match lace armed with these purchases i returned home to complete my 1hr dress personal side note i did this dress in its entirety including all planning patterning draping and adornments in one afternoon from about 10am to 4pm with an hour or so of breaks to pick up my son and the repeated interruption of a baby and a 5 year old post school do i think it is possible to make a 1hr dress in an actual hour yes i do but it would need to be made out of cotton easy to sew fabric have no extra trims or finishes i may one day challenge myself to do so this one however with lace inserts and neckline belt and bow in slippery fabric was not going to behave in such a manner as to make a 1hr finish possible i am actually really happy with the finished result i don t think some of the inserts or collar are professionally finished but i also don t think tayla will care she isn t going to be wearing this to her wedding posted by angelic cow at 4 01 pm no comments tuesday march 23 2021 finishing the unfinished blanket dress so this is the first in a series i will be calling finishing the unfinished to qualify as a ufo the item has to never have been completed to the point of wearable in future i will take photos of how close they were but for this one i will just have to be descriptive i call this project the blanket dress date started circa 2011 2013 date finished 22 march 2021 so with the window of a full decade this dress was left languishing because i was just generally unhappy with how it was going it got put aside and not picked up again until now the thing i remember not liking the wonky front neckline it was left with all seams done except the zipper side including the lining inserted in the same state but the lining was missing a ruffle not part of the original pattern though then again neither was the lining the pattern was vintage vogue 2267 currently i believe out of print i well we including ange were going through a big 50 s phase buying up all the vintage reprint patterns we could get our hands on its not the most exciting vintage pattern but i do like the faux princess line i say faux because it does have side bust darts so its not entirely princess and the softer 50 s silhouette rather than the super full skirt more often found on these reprints the fabric i bought to make a victorian bustle gown with and yes i still have umpteen meters of it i think it cost a couple bucks a meter in cabramatta and was a few years owned by the time i made this dress the thought was that it would be a warm winter look because the fabric is a very loose weave and very thick fabric i like warm the loose weave however also made it terrible to cut and sew hence the weird front neck angle yes it can not be unseen it was dragged around 2 moves and eventually the cut and overlocked poplin pieces to create the ruffle were misplaced the bulk of the dress was located again when my friend and i were organising my sewing stuff and she suggested it was so close to done that i should take a look at it it required at that stage zip and side seam ruffle and hem time to complete if i have worked on it non stop probably one afternoon will i use it unlikely 2011 was not just 10 years but also 2 children ago and alas i even tried a corset to get into this for photos and the universe is not favouring me on this one so gladys got spiffied up to show off the finished product i am proud of how i got my zip in it is pretty invisible and should be given that it was hand basted then hand sewn then machine sewn in just to keep the fabric from shifting the ruffled under petticoat lining is great for holding the dress in a nice shape without being too over poofed and it styles well with the shirt here however that neck still bugs me senseless i could given the masses of this fabric left try again in a bigger size with the experience i think i could generally have this dress finished in a week including taking time to fit the pattern to me would need resize and fba and all finishes the hem for example was measured from the waste and hand basted before being hand stitched down it is a very uncomplicated pattern i am unlikely to do so however at least not with this fabric i do think i would like a similar style for my wardrobe but i don t have the patience to try lining up these stripes so we will see if i do find a fabric to inspire me i actually think this would look really good with a matching coat the pattern does have a matching bolero but that isn t as winter friendly now its done i need to decide what to do with it do i hold onto it in the hopes that i can get small enough or do i send it to a new home posted by angelic cow at 5 21 pm no comments sunday march 21 2021 1940 s crepe de chine dress final it sounded so simple right a commercially available multi sized reprint of a 1940 s pattern i have made tones of 1940 s dress most of them requiring resizing from something crazy like 30 bust a week tops right enter crepe de chine i bought the crepe de chine polyester from pitt trading in a remnant bundle 3m for 5 who can say no especially when one is already paying postage for other fabric it was a soft dove grey colour and reminiscent of a dress worn by the mother in the queens gambit i had the pattern already in mind and crepe de chine is one of the suggested fabrics tick and tick i actually didn t even need all of the 3m which was fantastic i started strong trying to do all the things bar a mock up because how do you make a mock up for something that literally cost 5 in materials when the material is like water so it isn t like calico is going to show you anything having made many patterns from the big 4 companies i already knew that the vast majority fit fine if i make a size 16 front and a size 14 back i just cut and go but i did baste my curves and corners follow the pattern instructions for a little bit anyway and i piped pockets and collar i lined up all my notches you know all the things you should do but i rarely do as photo below yes i always trace my patterns so prior to major construction all my pieces looked fantastic pockets attached ready to go the first issue a narrow bias cut strip sewn into a tube turned out and cut into 6 equal peices to form button loops once sewn i could not get that thing to turn for love nor money no worries take the second one cause i cut it on the fold and sew the tube by turning in both sides to the middle then folding down the middle and sewing down the upper edge except crepe de chine slides more than even satin its like as slippery as a bathroom floor after a 5 year olds shower so even ironed the strip was too narrow to keep even no matter how many pins it had ok lets just try and use the best bits again the slippery nature of the crepe meant i couldn t sew them in the right shape and before full meltdown tantrum could ensue i made the decision that i would create thread loops for the buttons and quietly congratulated myself for such a smart idea but was it smart indeed it was not as one can not work out how big the loop must be for the buttons when one has not chosen the buttons more on that later the button loops were sewn further down the process so we will come back to that my next issue why did i decide to come back from almost a year off sewing and make a dress with a round yoke that calls for not one but two 90 degree turns to create the front seam oh that s right because i am a masochist this is i think the pinpoint of where things really started going south for this project and i started giving up on it i could not get those turns in maybe in a cotton but not in crepe de chine they ended up slightly rounded and not entirely symmetrical but i could not even anymore at this point i sewed up my side seams and pinked as was my chosen method of finishing and cut through a seam because that s something i do never mind it s low so that can be an issue for future hef when she works out the hem i tried it on and pulled together the opening where the zip would go and oh god it looked yuk like gab on every single lump and post pregnancy bump possible gross it just didn t fit and at this point i stopped caring and my brain wandered further and further to the future projects and my sewing time spent on bernie as february closed i realised i had to get this done even if i called it an almost wearable mock up i just had to do it there could be no more adding to the ufo s and my self imposed february 28 deadline had come and gone i pulled it back out hung it up and assessed it needed zip hem button loops buttons and a good iron so in an effort to finish i created the button loops first yes before i had chosen buttons and yes that is as stupid as it sounds next was zip i hand basted then hand sewed and then machine sewed this in overkill perhaps but i wan...