Vintage Dress Duo
This is a bit of a long post, ladies and gents. Grab a cup of tea and get your reading glasses on.
So recently I decided to use this fabric from my stash that I have had for a couple of years. Back before we bought our house, one of my coworkers had stopped by a yard sale and spotted a Mood Fabric bag and inside was a few cuts of fabric, one of which being this black and white open weave fabric.
Moo... could you not...
Moo, just...
((sigh))
She bought the bag for me and I decided that now was the time to make something out of it. I have been trying to do more with vintage patterns recently, although I have slipped into the modern world a little. Anywho, this was 1.5 yards and I did some looking around to decide on what I was going to make with it. I decided upon a vintage sheath/Jiffy dress because they're usually made to be constructed with a small amount of fabric.
Ta-da! This pattern was cool because it had options for neckline variations and cuffs.
She had pictured a blazer but I kept seeing a dress when I looked at it. I did some research on black and white sheath dresses and got some inspiration, but overall I only added some black bias piping to the neckline and ends of the sleeves. Some of the dresses I saw had some cool detailing at the neck, but I decided to let the fabric be the decoration.
Le front...
... and the back. Unfortunately the pattern doesn't quite line up at the zipper area, but I don't care. I mainly wanted the body itself to have as little adjustments and pattern pieces overall because I didn't want to mess up the design of the fabric with lots of seams and such. This pattern had a front dart and back dart and that's pretty much it. So it really didn't disrupt the design much.
I added some piping bias tape to the neckline and ends of the sleeves for a clean finish.
I thought it turned out pretty good! It was kind of a bitch to cut because the fabric frayed very easily, being an open weave design. I had originally decided on a black lining for it because again, open weave, but I actually had this deep blue that I thought gave it a little touch of something. I don't know if anyone can even notice it if I didn't point it out, but I know its there. Anywho, I laid the blue down first on my cutting mat and then I laid the open weave on top and pinned them together. Then I carefully cut out the two layers together and then sewed a basting stitch all around the edges.
Then I sewed both layers together as one for the darts and I serged the inside seams in blue to go with the underlining fabric. I toyed around with the idea of lining it also, but its kind of substantial and heavy already and I pictured wearing this in the summer months, so I opted for no lining and just went with the underlining. I'm sure adding a lining fabric wouldn't have made that much of a difference, but whatever. It still shifted around a bit when I was sewing because it is a very unstructured fabric, so I had to make sure to check it very often, especially when sewing the darts. I took my time and made sure it was all in place. Overall I am very happy with it!
Before I made this dress, I knew I wanted to make a muslin because I didn't want to fuck up the black and white fabric and sometimes those vintage patterns fit a little wonky. This one said that it was for a bust of 31.5 and mine is a 36, so I wanted to make sure it would fit. However, when laying out the paper pattern, I measured at the bust area and it seemed like it would fit like a glove, but just to be on the safe side I cut it a little generously. Here is my 'muslin'.
I actually had put the zipper in and then I was watching Gertie's free Lamour Dress class on youtube and saw how to insert a lapped zipper, so I went back and took the zipper completely out and did a lapped zipper instead. I really like how it turned out. I also thoroughly enjoyed the Lamour class that Gertie released for free to help folks who are stuck at home during the whole corona virus madness. Unfortunately I cannot #stayhomeandsew all day because fortunately I work from home and still am able to work when a lot of people have been sent home. I wish I could just sew all day, but I am also very glad I already worked from home before this mess.
Back to the muslin. The problem was my hips, as always. haha. This bitch was very tight at the hips, so I actually undid the back seam a little at the bottom to give myself some room. It helped, but also I did not have a lot of this fabric to begin with, so it ended up kinda short.
I think I will wear it more like a tunic with maybe some leggings under it or something. That way I don't have to worry about how short it is. I just adored this fabric and I have been stashing it away because it was so stunning and I didn't want to cut it. haha. It has everything I love in a fabric; birds, flowers, the color blue. I really like it a lot. I ended up finishing the armholes and neckline with a piece of blue bias tape that I turned to the inside and stitched down. From this muslin I also learned that the neckline is too high for my normal liking, so the black and white one had a trim on the neckline as I was sewing it up. I hate things that are too close on my neck. Not a turtleneck fan, here. haha. Anywho, I made a paid of pleather leggings and I will post about them soon, but I might wear them with this tunic. Might be an interesting look...
So recently I decided to use this fabric from my stash that I have had for a couple of years. Back before we bought our house, one of my coworkers had stopped by a yard sale and spotted a Mood Fabric bag and inside was a few cuts of fabric, one of which being this black and white open weave fabric.
Moo... could you not...
Moo, just...
((sigh))
She bought the bag for me and I decided that now was the time to make something out of it. I have been trying to do more with vintage patterns recently, although I have slipped into the modern world a little. Anywho, this was 1.5 yards and I did some looking around to decide on what I was going to make with it. I decided upon a vintage sheath/Jiffy dress because they're usually made to be constructed with a small amount of fabric.
Ta-da! This pattern was cool because it had options for neckline variations and cuffs.
She had pictured a blazer but I kept seeing a dress when I looked at it. I did some research on black and white sheath dresses and got some inspiration, but overall I only added some black bias piping to the neckline and ends of the sleeves. Some of the dresses I saw had some cool detailing at the neck, but I decided to let the fabric be the decoration.
Le front...
... and the back. Unfortunately the pattern doesn't quite line up at the zipper area, but I don't care. I mainly wanted the body itself to have as little adjustments and pattern pieces overall because I didn't want to mess up the design of the fabric with lots of seams and such. This pattern had a front dart and back dart and that's pretty much it. So it really didn't disrupt the design much.
I added some piping bias tape to the neckline and ends of the sleeves for a clean finish.
I thought it turned out pretty good! It was kind of a bitch to cut because the fabric frayed very easily, being an open weave design. I had originally decided on a black lining for it because again, open weave, but I actually had this deep blue that I thought gave it a little touch of something. I don't know if anyone can even notice it if I didn't point it out, but I know its there. Anywho, I laid the blue down first on my cutting mat and then I laid the open weave on top and pinned them together. Then I carefully cut out the two layers together and then sewed a basting stitch all around the edges.
Then I sewed both layers together as one for the darts and I serged the inside seams in blue to go with the underlining fabric. I toyed around with the idea of lining it also, but its kind of substantial and heavy already and I pictured wearing this in the summer months, so I opted for no lining and just went with the underlining. I'm sure adding a lining fabric wouldn't have made that much of a difference, but whatever. It still shifted around a bit when I was sewing because it is a very unstructured fabric, so I had to make sure to check it very often, especially when sewing the darts. I took my time and made sure it was all in place. Overall I am very happy with it!
Before I made this dress, I knew I wanted to make a muslin because I didn't want to fuck up the black and white fabric and sometimes those vintage patterns fit a little wonky. This one said that it was for a bust of 31.5 and mine is a 36, so I wanted to make sure it would fit. However, when laying out the paper pattern, I measured at the bust area and it seemed like it would fit like a glove, but just to be on the safe side I cut it a little generously. Here is my 'muslin'.
I actually had put the zipper in and then I was watching Gertie's free Lamour Dress class on youtube and saw how to insert a lapped zipper, so I went back and took the zipper completely out and did a lapped zipper instead. I really like how it turned out. I also thoroughly enjoyed the Lamour class that Gertie released for free to help folks who are stuck at home during the whole corona virus madness. Unfortunately I cannot #stayhomeandsew all day because fortunately I work from home and still am able to work when a lot of people have been sent home. I wish I could just sew all day, but I am also very glad I already worked from home before this mess.
Back to the muslin. The problem was my hips, as always. haha. This bitch was very tight at the hips, so I actually undid the back seam a little at the bottom to give myself some room. It helped, but also I did not have a lot of this fabric to begin with, so it ended up kinda short.
I think I will wear it more like a tunic with maybe some leggings under it or something. That way I don't have to worry about how short it is. I just adored this fabric and I have been stashing it away because it was so stunning and I didn't want to cut it. haha. It has everything I love in a fabric; birds, flowers, the color blue. I really like it a lot. I ended up finishing the armholes and neckline with a piece of blue bias tape that I turned to the inside and stitched down. From this muslin I also learned that the neckline is too high for my normal liking, so the black and white one had a trim on the neckline as I was sewing it up. I hate things that are too close on my neck. Not a turtleneck fan, here. haha. Anywho, I made a paid of pleather leggings and I will post about them soon, but I might wear them with this tunic. Might be an interesting look...
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