Finished Rose Applique Dress

It's done! The Joan Holloway-inspired dress I blogged about last week is now complete, thanks to an old tablecloth and a little crafty thinking. (A big thanks to those who gave me applique tips in the comments; I took note for next time!) It seems pretty appropriate to post on Valentine's Day, doesn't it?

The pattern is this one that I draped last year, and am still perfecting the fit on. (I wear my green polka dot version all the time, and get so many nice compliments on it.) And yes, it's more of the pinky-red merino I made that little suit out of. And I still have some left! I must have bought out the entire stock of that stuff. What can I say? It's my color.

It has a centered, lapped zipper, just like Joan's would have. (I also have a classy Joan-esque chignon, thanks to the multi-talented Fleur!)

It's lined in bright red silk Habutai, and the midriff section is interfaced to keep it smooth. 

An applique close-up:

It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say I've gotten a little applique-happy. There's a vintage lobster tablecloth coming my way in the mail. (Lobsters!) And then all the products I have to look into: stabilizers, interfacings, threads . . .  Watch out, world!

I Sewed a Sweater!

Here's a finished garment that I totally didn't blog about, can you believe it? I picked up some great Nanette Lepore ribbed sweater knit at the Haberman Fabrics booth at ASE (hey, it's available online!). I'd never sewn this kind of knit before, but I just did a little research and it was surprisingly easy. It helped that this particular knit is very stable--it doesn't stretch a ton and it didn't fray too much as I was working with it.

The pattern was the challenging part. I knew exactly what I wanted: a sort of "sweater girl" look with cute short sleeves. So I did something I've never done before: I draped the pattern, in the garment fabric! I draped the front and back separately, marking the seam lines with chalk. Then I basted them together on the seamlines to fit it. Once I was happy with the fit, I serged the seams. I borrowed the sleeve pattern from a knit dress pattern I have on hand, and measured carefully to be sure that it would fit properly (knit sleeves have no ease, so it had to be a precise fit).

I learned from my research that it's very important to stabilize any horizontal seams, so I basted some Stay Tape into the shoulder seam before serging it.

The neck binding worked really well in the fabric, since it's a rib. I just cut a piece of fabric a little smaller than the sweater neck and twice the width I wanted the binding. I serged the short ends together, folded it in half wrong sides together, and basted the raw edges together. Then it just gets serged into the neckline. Easy! The last step is to top stitch to get the binding to lay flat. The pro way to do this is to use a twin needle, and stitch with the neckline seam in the middle of the two needles. I just used a zigzag, though, because I was too lazy to set up my twin needle.

I did the hem on the bottom and the sleeves by turning it up and zigzagging. I tested this method first, and it worked well since the stitches really disappear in this knit.

I'm happy I now have a paper pattern for this, because I feel like I could use one in every color of the rainbow. Probably in a softer fabric--the ribbed wool is a little itchy to wear so close-fitting. It will be interesting to see how different types of knits work for this.

So there you have it. Isn't it so cool that you can sew a sweater?

Guest Post: Draping a Knit Cowl Dress, Part Two

Hey everyone! Remember this post on draping your own knit cowl dress? Well, our knits expert Alyson is back for a second installment. Enjoy! Also, check out the flier for Alyson's trunk show this weekend in Portland (see flier below). --Gertie

Hello folks, so sorry for the delay on the follow up from the first installment of this draping a knit dress. My life got away from me for a minute there! Got hitched, bought a house, adopted a 3rd dog (adopting senior dogs is the best thing ever), and have been traveling. Don't fret though; I've finished writing up the entire thing now. As Bob Ross would say - I've encountered a few happy accidents with this dress, and I'm finally pleased with how it turned out.

Inspiration: Norman Hartnell Cocktail Dress

There was such a wealth of gorgeous garments in the Golden Age of Couture show at the Frist that I'm quite overwhelmed by the thought of writing a post on my impressions of the exhibit as a whole. Instead, I thought I would highlight my favorites in individual posts. And what better way to start than this gorgeous early 50s dress, designed by Norman Hartnell and worn by Princess Margaret?

I would call this dress deceptively simple. It looks at first like a perfectly lovely LBD . . . but then its genius sneaks up on you. You notice the scalloped hem, which I believe our docent said was made by inserting godets into ten gores. When the skirt is spread out, it resembles a flower with lots of petals. Then you notice the lovely bodice shaping. The darts are unconventional; they form a chevron beneath the bust. And then there's the lovely, but subtle, pleating above the bust, where the straps begin.

In fact, by the time you've taken in all the lovely construction details, I would say the least dazzling thing about this dress is the sequin and diamante-encrusted straps.

My teacher Sharon and I were drooling over the exhibit catalog this morning, and I couldn't stop talking about this particular dress. She noticed, and suggested we go about recreating the pattern in our draping lessons. Yes, please! So that's what we'll be working on, starting next week. Don't you think a plum-colored wool satin would be just the thing? Stay tuned! (And stand by for more posts on the garments in the exhibit. I have a lot I want to show you!)

Guest Post: Draping a Knit Cowl Dress with Alyson Clair

This is the start of a fascinating new series with our favorite knits expert and all around awesome lady Alyson Clair. Check back soon for the rest of the series. And hey! Go look at Alyson's lovely new Fall/Winter line. It's fab.—Gertie

Greetings again from Portland, Oregon. I hope all of you are getting to enjoy summer time. The weather here has been more than a bit funky, and I really hope Mother Nature will provide me with a few more lovely days that are warm enough to go swimming. As soon as it's over 75 degrees I'm a total river rat, I even keep a towel and floatie toys in the back of my station wagon. I'm the first one in the water and the last one out. Since the weather has not been so nice to Oregon, I have spent a bit more time working that I usually do.

So a little bit ago Gertie had a post about cowls. This got me all excited because I LOVE cowls, and I have one in my Spring / Summer 2011 line plan. (Sidebar: yes, I am working that far ahead to be ready for market. Sometimes it's a bit hard doing that, since all I want to do is make cozy sweaters and dresses for fall.) But back to the important thing at hand—pretty cowls! I am going to walk you through the process—sketch to finished garment—with draping a lined knit dress with a cowl.

Inspiration: the Shelf Bust

Image via Etsy

There's pretty much nothing I love more in a dress than a fancy, sculptural bust line. The shelf bust, written about briefly on the Vintage Fashion Guild, is a somewhat vague term that applies to a design that's built up in a way that makes the bust appear to be on a shelf. (And what a lovely way to display things!) This usually involves clever seaming in conjunction with pleats, petals, ruching, or shirring.

Image via Etsy

The Vintage Fashion Guild post differentiates strongly between an empire line and a shelf bust, suggesting that the two cannot exist simultaneously. Indeed, the most shelf-like dresses I've seen tend to look like the bust is "set-in" to a curve that goes from the underarm and dips down to the middle or the bottom of the bust line. So, I guess the yellow dress I'm making isn't technically a shelf bust, but it has a similar feel with the petal-like pleats.

Image via Etsy

Image via Etsy

 Ceil Chapman was a master of the shelf bust:

Image via Etsy

Designs like these are the reason I wanted to learn draping; I simply cannot resist the beautiful, architectural folds of these bust lines. I'm so looking forward to advancing my skills so I can try some of these!

Image via Etsy

Image via Etsy

It's worth noting that the shelf bust is a "lot of look," as they say. And some designs certainly build the bust up to rather, um,  dramatic proportions:

Image via Etsy

Image via Etsy

If you're trying to minimize your bust line, perhaps the above designs aren't the way to go. Which is not to say that busty gals shouldn't try this. I give you Elizabeth Taylor:

Her tightly fitted shelf bust creates a beautiful line here and keeps the fluffiness to a minimum. (Of course, she could have worn a trash bag and looked amazing.)

I've found some patterns that incorporate a shelf bust, but they're hard to come by. Here are a couple:

This one was given to me by a very generous reader; I can't wait to make it!

What do you think? Would you wear this silhouette?

Building a Better Muslin

Here's my muslin of the yellow dress I'm working on, and I'm thrilled with it! I decided to make a muslin of the bodice only, since the skirt will be a circle skirt that I've draped and sewn before. It will just hang from the bodice, so the fit isn't as tricky.

It needs a couple tiny tweaks, but it's way closer than I expected it to be with a complicated design like this. Better still, I love it and I couldn't stop grinning at myself in the mirror when I first tried it on! I think what really contributed to my success with this muslin was following Susan Khalje's advice step-by-step in the book Bridal Couture. There were a lot of extra steps, but it was sooo worth it.

The muslin was cut with 1" seam allowances. I started out by thread-tracing each of the stitching lines on my machine. Here's the upper bust piece, with the thread tracings in a dark thread.

Here's the under bust piece.

After basting all the pieces together, it's important that you basically make your muslin have all of the "engineering" that your finished dress will have: twill tape, bra cups, boning, and a waist stay.

The twill tape is SO important. With a dress like this, it helps cup the fabric to the bust. On your muslin, you just pin it to the outside of your bodice, like so.

I put the bra cups in with a big catch stitch. I could have just tacked them loosely in, but I wanted to practice the catch stitch since that's what I'll use on the actual dress, stitching them just to the underlining. I figured out the placement of the cups by getting topless, holding each cup up to my bust and then holding the bodice up on top of them and pinning them in place. These cups are great; they're from SIL Thread and they're very thin, but molded. Love them.

The waist stay (a length of grosgrain the exact length of your waist measurement) is pinned to the outside of the muslin for fitting purposes, with the bottom of the grosgrain ending right at the waist seamline.

I basted rigeline boning on the side seams only. I will probably use spiral steel boning on the final dress, but it was nice to use rigeline on the muslin since you can sew right through it. (If you're looking for information on sewing a boned bodice, it doesn't get any better than the bustier article in this back issue of Threads magazine.)

I hand-basted in a dress-length zipper to the back (it had to be long so that I could get in and out of it).

And then it was time to try on!

The tweaks that I'm definitely going to make are: 1) taking out a pinch of fullness at the top of the bodice, 2) taking out about 1/4" of ease on each side seam, and 3) adding another set of bones to the back bodice to prevent sagging. I'll position them right under the back darts, and they'll be sewn to the underlining only so they're invisible from the outside. It might also need a swayback adjustment, but I'm going to see if the boning takes care of the problem first.

Quite a process, huh? When I saw all the steps that Susan Khalje recommends in her book, I was a little incredulous, I admit. But they really made ALL the difference in this muslin. I'll definitely be following her advice through the construction process as well!

The 'Cry Me a River' Dress

So, I'm not totally feeling this dress. I made it so I could have another chance with this self-draped pattern, and I am happy with the adjustments I made: namely, lowering the empire line just a tad under the bust. But, I'm just kind of "eh" about it. First, I don't love the fabric. It's that $2/yard Vera Wang navy faille from Fabric.com. It has the body of a tarp. I wish I'd just given it away, but for some reason I felt compelled to make the best of it. (Remind me in the future to not make any projects with fabric I'm just so-so about; life's too short!)

Secondly, it photographs terribly. The trim is two little white grosgrain bows (that idea was inspired by a 60s pattern design), not that you'd be able to see that from any of the photos I took.

Here's the back.

So, we'll see. I'm going to wear it to work and see if it grows on me. I'm also going to work on the styling of it. I love it with my lime green pumps, but the hair needs a do-over. This little bun is about all I could handle post-yoga in yesterday's heat. Plus, jewels! I need some baubles.

Gosh, I sound like such a sad-sack, don't I? To accentuate the positive, it's a nice neutral dress and the piping came out great. In other good news, I'm working on the muslin of the yellow dress and it's looking awesome so far. Onward!

Sixteen Yards of Yellow Fabric

Yep, that's what this is! I've been prepping for my next draped design, which is basically a knock-off of a current Anthro design (blogged here).

The inspiration! (Which, in turn, is very 50s-inspired itself.)

I began draping the dress on my own (without the help of my teacher Sharon). I got through the front bodice and hit a major wall. In fact, I was ready to throw my muslin at said wall! Luckily, Sharon came over the next day and sorted me out. It turned out that I was quite close; I just needed some help tweaking it. I didn't document the entire draping process this time (since I had no idea what I was doing), but here's a little peek at start of the bust draping:

The straight grain is the fold running diagonally across the bust. I'm kind of amazed I figured that out on my own! You can also see in the picture above how the fabric is trying to form itself into a dart below the bust apex. Sharon always says you should let the fabric tell you what it wants to do. Cool, huh?

Here's what that pattern piece ended up looking like, in the muslin prep stage:

Interesting, isn't it?

I made a decision to really work on my couture dressmaking skills with this project. I'm going all out, with the help of the book Bridal Couture by Susan Khalje. It's sadly out of print, but you can buy a CD version here.

As for all that yellow fabric? The body of the dress will be a beautiful cotton/viscose faille. The whole thing will be underlined in silk organza - I choose a very bright yellow to make the fashion fabric appear even more vibrant. And then a buttery yellow cotton batiste for the lining. The funny thing is that the fabric ended up costing about $160 - and the Anthro dress costs $158! Anyway, I know I don't need to explain to you all why you can't really compare the costs of the two - apples and oranges and all that.

I've also been gathering notions: horsehair for the hem, grosgrain for the waist stay, boning, bra cups, interfacing, and a zipper. (Whew!)

I'm finishing up another dress made from my last draped pattern, and then I'll be ready to go into full muslin mode on this yellow concoction. I already feel like this will be a very special dress, and I have high hopes of wearing it to the Golden Age of Couture exhibit in Nashville at the end of August. A special exhibit calls for a special dress, right?

I heavily documented the draping and design stage on my last project, but I feel like this one is going to be all about the construction. So I'm looking forward to really getting my inner sewing nerd on and sharing lots of technique pictures with you. More to come!

Draping a Dress, Part Six: Show Off Your Design!

Gosh, it's been so fun sharing the process of this dress with you that I almost don't want it to end! That's okay, there will be many more draping projects to come. So here it is, the finished dress. I made it up in a polka dot cotton faille from B&J. (Side note: did you know that faille is pronounced like nail "file"? I'd been pronouncing it FAIL, somewhat appropriately. You know, because I was FAILING at pronouncing it? Anyway!)

The empire line might be a smidge too high.

The back was certainly the hardest part to fit, but it came out fine, I think.

This picture shows the actual color of the fabric best, but it turned my skin a bit orange. Cameras are funny things, aren't they?

Unsolicited hair commentary: I've been playing around with this up-do. It's a slight bouffant in the front (helped with a bump-it) and a French twist in the back. I like it with my bangs down, like above, but they annoy me pretty quickly and I shove them behind my ear.

But back to sewing! I did a back lapped zipper for the first time, and I don't think I'll ever do a back centered zipper again. This went in so nicely. I hand-picked it, as you know I love to do.

I lined the bodice in cotton batiste. I ended up pick-stitching the lining around the zipper as well on a whim, and it worked really nicely!

The lining creates a sort of underlap for the zipper.

My draping teacher Sharon is coming over on Saturday and she's going to evaluate the fit of this for me. I told her to be brutal with me, but I don't think she has it in her. She (wisely) says that fitting is the only way to learn how to fit and that every garment I work on gets me closer to being an expert fitter. Isn't that inspirational? Sharon's the best.

I'm excited to use this pattern again - I'm thinking I'll pair the bodice with a circle skirt next.

So that wraps up this little draping series! Want to relive the fun? Here are links to the previous five parts.

Part One: Inspiration
Part Two: Getting Drapey With It
Part Three: Making a Muslin
Part Four: The Second Muslin
Part Five: Planning the Construction

Thanks for reading along!