Sunday, January 16, 2011

My 60's dress is done!

Good morning!  I hope everyone had a good Saturday night.  Did anyone watch the Packers/Falcons game?  I knew GB was going to win, but 48-21?  Crazy!

I finished my silk print 60's dress yesterday.  I think it turned out a little Mad Men-esque.  I hesitate to say that because it's so overused, and half the time I wonder if the person even watches the show.  You'll see a dress on eBay and the seller is like "It's SO Joan" and it's like, a brown and white plaid dress and I'll think "when did Joan ever wear brown?  Or PLAID?" 

But I know my Mad Men, and Joan wore a dress with a similar neckline, sleeves, and print on Season 4.

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Having completely finished the bodice yesterday, I started on the skirt.  I think that's my new method, get the bodice done first and if I like it, then cut the skirt.  That way, if it's not turning out the way I wanted, I still have fabric left to make something else.

The pattern piece for the skirt looked really long.  I measured it - 29".  I checked the hem on my favorite dress and it was only 23"!  So I had to do some shortening for sure.  This pattern (most do) has printed lines where you should lengthen and shorten.  I shortened the pattern piece to 24.5".

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I thought about underlining the whole skirt because it's a pretty slim-fitting skirt, and I worried that if I just left it unlined, the seams would be stressed when I sat.  But then I wondered if that would make the hem look sloppy, so I just did through the hips. 

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The best part is, that made the darts really easy to mark.  There were four on the back and six on the front, so I'll take all the help I can get.

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And the good side:

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I edge-finished the back vent.  I still cannot sew in a straight line.

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Attaching the skirt to the bodice was fine, no issues there.  I didn't even stop and take a picture, whoops.  But the darts in the bodice matched up great with the ones on the skirt, and I trimmed the waistline seam and finished it with bias tape.

I hemmed it by hand. I don't think I will ever use the machine again. This looks so much better and it's worth the extra time.

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Finally, I did the zipper.  I had two in my drawer that would have worked.  They were both the right length, but one was dark teal and the other was dark blue.

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I ended up going with the teal, because it was closed at both ends and specifically for side-zip dresses.

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I sewed it on by hand with prick stitches. Also never using the machine for a zipper again. This somehow takes me the same time as doing it by machine, but looks a thousand times better. I'm getting better at making my stitches more even, too. I can see a big improvement from my first hand-sewn zipper.

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It's totally done and ready to wear!  It's weird that it took me three days.  There was a lot of hand finishing to do, and a grand total of 16 darts.  I normally zip through a dress on a weeknight after work, so it was nice to be able to enjoy the process and take my time.

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I'm going to wear it to work tomorrow, so hopefully I will remember to take a picture of it on.  I feel like I never post pictures of me actually wearing the clothes I make.  I swear I do!  I've worn my own creations every day for the last two weeks. 

Today I'm going to work on fixing up a vintage dress I found at the antique store. It's in pretty bad shape, so I'm going to see if can make it pretty again.  Have a great Sunday!

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