Zips and Linings

Finally my red dress is coming together.  Due to the material being very slippery there is a marked difference in the length of the bodice front and the lining front.  Unfortunately I did not realise this until after I had stitched the lining down on the inside.  The result was not overly pleasing.  Today I unpicked the stitching holding the lining down and the waistline seam and adjusted the fit.  Although rather time consuming I am much happier with it now.  I also stitched the press studs on the yoke and hand stitched the zip in.  Pictures below.

Zip pinned to dress from wrong side

The zip stitched in from the right side, the gathers are meant to be there!

The lining stitched over the zip tape on the wrong side.

Press studs on left yoke.

 I have been debating for a while which earrings to wear with this dress and I think I have settled for the earrings below, which I have borrowed from my Mother.

Tomorrow I will be tackling the hem on the dress.  I will also be working and going out to dinner so I may not get to post.  I will not post pictures of the finished dress until Thursday, as I will then be wearing and someone might remember to take some photos!

I noted with interest that Winston Churchill's birthday is today, along with Mark Twain and Jonathan Swift, what is it about authors birthdays and today???

Second-hand Retro Dresses

Yesterday I mentioned that I had acquired two genuine vintage dresses from work.  Bright and early this morning I washed them and hung them out to dry as the weather was delightfully warm.  My red dress has not gone well today so I am not going  to show pictures of it, instead I will show pictures of these dresses.  My favourite of the two dresses is the blue one and I think it may fit me, however I do not think the green one will, unless I put on a lot of weight!

The green one is made from a very nasty feeling knit of some kind.  It is a princess seam and I really like the neckline.

From the front

Waist detail

Neck detail

The second is a beautiful full skirted dress with a muslin skirt lining.  It has a particularly delightful shoulder detail and a lovely belt attached.  This dress needs lots of work on it though and most of the seams are fraying.  I think it may fit me as it is too small for our smallest mannequin.

Front of dress

Shoulder detail

Belt buckle.  Belt buckles at back.

Front of the belt.

Metal toothed zip.  The dress zips up the back.

The observant among you may have noted the second, apron-wearing, mannequin in the background.  This apron is a project in progress and is one of the five (!) I have made for Christmas.

Hopefully I will be more in the mood to post about my red dress again tomorrow, so stay tuned!

Skirting The Issue!

As predicted today was extremely hectic and I spent most of it at work and then walked the dog when  I got home.  Today was dedicated to assembly and attaching the skirt and skirt lining to the dress.  Pictures follow.

The corner on the skirt front seam, refer to envelope picture for a better idea!

Pinning the skirt and skirt lining together for basting.

The assemble skirt with lining basted inside.

Here the skirt is sewn to the outer bodice.  

Once the zip is in (next step) the inner bodice will be sewn over the waistline seam.  I am really hoping to have this thing finished tomorrow.

In other news I picked up two vintage handmade dresses from work today, both in my size (I hope).  More to follow!

A Day of Sleeves

I think I can honestly say that it took me as long to complete the sleeves and their eventual attachment to the bodice as it took to assemble the bodice.  The fact that I worked all afternoon and overslept probably did not help my perception.

With this dress, the capped sleeves are self lined, so you effectively cut four sleeves (prepares one for making a dog dress, I suppose), only two of them act as a lining to the other two.  The sleeves are eased and seamed together at the bottom.  You stitch the outer sleeve to the armhole in the dress, easing in fullness, then slipstitch the lining sleeve over the seam on the inside, if that makes any sense.  My sleeves were not all that cooperative but I am fairly pleased with the result.  Photographs of the procedure follow:

Completed sleeve, before attaching to bodice.

The sleeve lining pinned over the sleeve seam on the inside.

The bodice completed with sleeves attached.

Close up of yoke and overlap on left hand side of bodice.

Hopefully I will have the skirt attached by this time tomorrow, however I do not like my chances as I have been called into work early to cover for someone who is sick.

Today is November the 26th and it is apparently Tina Turner's birthday, my absolute favourite song of hers is 'Simply the Best'.

I also love the dress she is wearing in the picture above!

A New Dress!

"Just what she needs....", I hear you grumble to yourself.  I cannot blame you really, I very rarely (about, ahem, twice a year) wear the dresses I make, dresses are just not practical.  I also think that some part of my brain tells me that if I wish to be seen as 'good' as any man, I must dress like one.  However, it does not seem to work!

Anyhow, back to the topic of the new dress, I actually am making this with a particular occasion in mind.  I intend to wear it to an awards ceremony in a week.  There was a large number of potential dress patterns to choose from but for various reasons I managed to narrow it down to this one only: Butterick B5281, picture below:

I am making view B with the capped sleeves and I will not be putting shoulder pads in mine.  After a trip to Spotlight I settled on some lovely red self patterned drapey jacquard.  The lining is a red lawn to give the dress some body.

Today I managed (in between making a batch of grapefruit pickle with some mouldy grapefruits and taking the dog for a walk) to cut the dress out and assemble the bodice, except for the sleeves.  The dress is fully lined which gives a lovely neckline without the frustration of a facing that keeps jumping to the right side.  Below are some random pictures from the construction.

Tucks stitched into the right hand shoulder.

The assembled bodice without the lining.

The assembled bodice with lining, I am happy with it!

Close up of neckline.

I am using my Singer 306 to sew this dress.  So far it is behaving nicely and making a very nice stitch.  I decided to use the straight stitch throat-plate in a fit of inspiration and it seems to be really helping.

On another note, it was the 23rd (!) anniversary of Freddie Mercury's passing yesterday, I was going to listen to my Queen CD but my CD player has finally given up the ghost so that plan went out of the window.

More updates to follow!