Why Hello, Handsome!

Readers, I am totally geeking out over how awesome I think this bound buttonhole looks. I used a new method, and this was my FIRST TRY at it. I learned the technique in a new book I bought called The Sewing Bible (which by the way, is proving to be a totally worthwhile purchase), and it's very similar to this fabulous welt pocket technique. You face the buttonhole with a patch of silk organza and then position the "lips" behind it and attach them with a couple fancy moves. It's so completely rad that I'm going to make a video this weekend to show you the method in action.

You might notice that this fabric is the purple doubleknit I chose for my background dress. Which means YES, the Background Dress of Doom is underway! It's kind of a funny story. May I share?
So remember how I mentioned I was on muslin number three for this project and just couldn't get the fit right? Well, this is going to sound horribly careless, but I finally decided to just cut the original pattern with a bit of an extra seam allowance and hope for the best. I did a basted fitting. And guess what? THE FREAKING DRESS FIT PERFECTLY WITH NO ALTERATIONS.

All I can really do at this point is laugh at myself and hopefully learn from the situation. Basically, a few things were at play.

1. The pattern I had was a size 34" and I was convinced there was no way it would fit. I started adding a lot to the side seams without really checking. Bad Gertie.
   
2. I also reshaped the skirt without making it up as the pattern called for first. I was hoping for a curvier look, so I used the silhouette of my Jenny skirt pattern - my tried and true pencil skirt - to get a new look. I seriously distorted the pattern this way without even realizing it, as the skirt is meant to be a bit more voluminous in the front than in back, and I completely threw off the balance. And the more tweaking I did, the worse I made it. I'll say it again: Bad Gertie!
   
3. Lastly, I made my muslin in well, muslin, but I'm using a doubleknit for the dress. Doubleknits can stand in for wovens as they're a very stable knit, BUT: this particular doubleknit has a fair amount of two way horizontal stretch, allowing the fit of this dress to be more formfitting rather than tailored. So I had more wiggle room in the pattern than I thought.
   

So there you have it! Lesson (hopefully) learned. The very hard way.

Here's an in-process shot of the collar interfacing. VoNBBS calls for muslin interfacing to be basted to the actual dress collar, and then bound buttonholes are made at the neckline, after which the facing (with no interfacing) is applied to the collar.

Below is the side zipper in progress. (Look how different the purple looks in each of these photos! It's such a tricky color to capture.) VoNBBS and other vintage patterns often use a strip of fabric as a placket at the front side of the lapped zipper, creating a sort of facing. Let me know if you're interested in learning more about this method - I took all sorts of photos for a potential tutorial.

And thus the Background Dress of Doom marches on in its heretofore troubled journey towards fruition. May it be smooth sailing from now on!