Mom is wringing her hands, convinced that I can't finish this dress for Saturday. I might not have all the finishing work done (although I'll have the interior skirt seams all hand-finished today, which is trivial but also means that when it comes to applying the pockets, attaching the skirt, and hemming, I won't have to stop and mess with the skirt seams) but it will be wearable, I'm convinced. I'm determined, darn it.
I'm not going to finish the purple print version. The fabric was fraying and the collar was just insanely, obstructively, big. I can tell already that I would end up not choosing to wear it, so there isn't any reason for me to spend the time to finish it or the closet space to store it. But it was a good muslin and I worked out a lot of fit issues, so it wasn't wasted.
The skirt was an issue. There wasn't really any shaping. Those really are straight lines:
Which means the skirt was basically conical. I didn't think this looked that weird but I was forgetting that there aren't any waist darts. The pattern illustration makes it look bell-shaped, but it's not. It fit me in the sense that I could get into it, but it wasn't comfortable and it didn't look that great. Y'all, some of us just need waist darts.
So I added 3/4" width to each side of the skirt back and created a dart, and I also curved the side seams over the hips and backside (I left the center front straight):
Not drawn to scale. Obviously.
I also tackled the collar. I still like that I added to the collar around the back of the neck, but the front collar was just huge. Ridiculously, impractically, unflatteringly, huge. Here it is after I pinned two inches of width off of the outside edge. Two inches, folks:
It was out to the shoulder points before! This looks much more like the illustration.
Note the allegedly bell-shaped skirt.
I might trim it back a little bit more and lower the points.
Also . . . little tiny swayback adjustment (shortening the middle of the bodice back). I don't think I'm actually swaybacked as this is not usually something I need to do, but I think that there are some general issues with the drafting of this pattern, and with its shape relative to my pear-shaped figure, and this seemed to be a thing that needed to happen.
Then . . . on to the good fabric!! This is Moda Purebred Bluegrass Foals--natural foals on coral-red. The foals are about three inches. It's adorable.
I cut the front on the fold. I ended up piecing the corners because the pattern piece was a bit wide, but whatever--that's a legit vintage sewing detail, anyway.
I'm not going to finish the purple print version. The fabric was fraying and the collar was just insanely, obstructively, big. I can tell already that I would end up not choosing to wear it, so there isn't any reason for me to spend the time to finish it or the closet space to store it. But it was a good muslin and I worked out a lot of fit issues, so it wasn't wasted.
The skirt was an issue. There wasn't really any shaping. Those really are straight lines:
Which means the skirt was basically conical. I didn't think this looked that weird but I was forgetting that there aren't any waist darts. The pattern illustration makes it look bell-shaped, but it's not. It fit me in the sense that I could get into it, but it wasn't comfortable and it didn't look that great. Y'all, some of us just need waist darts.
So I added 3/4" width to each side of the skirt back and created a dart, and I also curved the side seams over the hips and backside (I left the center front straight):
Not drawn to scale. Obviously.
I also tackled the collar. I still like that I added to the collar around the back of the neck, but the front collar was just huge. Ridiculously, impractically, unflatteringly, huge. Here it is after I pinned two inches of width off of the outside edge. Two inches, folks:
It was out to the shoulder points before! This looks much more like the illustration.
Note the allegedly bell-shaped skirt.
I might trim it back a little bit more and lower the points.
Also . . . little tiny swayback adjustment (shortening the middle of the bodice back). I don't think I'm actually swaybacked as this is not usually something I need to do, but I think that there are some general issues with the drafting of this pattern, and with its shape relative to my pear-shaped figure, and this seemed to be a thing that needed to happen.
Then . . . on to the good fabric!! This is Moda Purebred Bluegrass Foals--natural foals on coral-red. The foals are about three inches. It's adorable.
I cut the front on the fold. I ended up piecing the corners because the pattern piece was a bit wide, but whatever--that's a legit vintage sewing detail, anyway.
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