Isn’t it exciting when you find out you have a special event to go to… all the outfit planning, pintrest trawling, pattern review research and fabric swatches. Well, I managed to pick up a couple of tickets to the Dressmakers Ball from the lovely Beth on IG AK Madscouser back in January so plenty of time for planning and trawling..right? Hmmm being a bit/lot of a procrastinator (aren’t most of us) all of the “fun” stuff, was basically ad-hoc and crammed in here n there, with the actual derision making, taking place on a Sunday morning, two weeks prior to the event! This said planning, spurred on, after a mini stress out on my behalf by my friend Kitt (also going) when I still hadn’t chosen a pattern the day before.
My fail safe back up plan was going to be the fabulous V9253 but isn’t it more fun to have a new challenge and a make something new? Darn yes it is. However, it soon became apparent, flicking through boxes of patterns in the stash, that early aspirational sewing of evening wear took place way back in my sewing journey and clearly prior to hormonal ravaging of ones body. My choice of pattern rapidly diminished due to 1) ordering new would eat into the already limited time frame 2) was ridiculously too small for grading, 3) would leave me resemble a sausage bursting its skin or 4) flash far to much flesh that nobody needs to see these days.!
Left on the table with a glimmer of hope was the Butterick Retro design 4919. Half way through making this design, I realised it was very much based on the Walk Away Dress #B4790 that became every popular after series
Choosing fabric was fine- well it should be owning a fabric shop! i am lucky that the shopping process, also considered with ordering new Spring time stocks and therefore had a few potential candidates to step up to the mark. Unusually I plumped for a delicious black satin Faille, not a colour I generally favour but this was to underlay a beautiful multi-coloured Ice Chiffon from John Kaldor. The black Faille gave the colourful confetti pieces on the chiffon a little bit of pop.
Monday morn and pattern in hand, I headed off to the shop feeling like Dr. Frankenstein heading to his lab to create his monster; here I have more room and resources to hand. Pattern was traced off, was proceeded by the grading-up process of two sizes- If any body is interested in this process, leave me a comment as I’m happy to do a more in-depth post to save the waffle here. Approx 1.25″ FBA was inserted to keep the bodice line level. Finally a Calico toile was born – we were off.
Back bodice – Dart moves due to grading 
FBA on non darted bodice
Monday Evening – So version #1 displayed a fair few signs for a variety of tweaks and adjustments…we have to start somewhere! A lot of sewists say how difficult they find fitting themselves. Personally, I find it more exhausting and chilly, as I normally end up sewing in bra and knickers, as said toile is on n off, up n down more than a fiddlers elbow! Please note – I was now back home! Could you imagine this taking place at the shop! passes by would think they’d been transported to the red-light district of Amsterdam, if i were to be sewing in undies in shop window! ?
back bodice pinned out 
gape at the front V pinched out
The original bodice front had no waist dart, and although the back bodice ties were used to wrap and cross over in the front, I felt the excess fabric under the bust would ruckle and create too much fullness in the boob area – and they certainly don’t need any further emphasis. So using some good ol’ dart manipulation, the gapes from the front V and arm-scythe were closed up, and transferred into a waist dart . Hopefully the picture on the left shows what I’m on about.
- The back bodice section had a wedge taken out right across shortening the areas in shoulder blade – i did experiment with a narrow back alteration but this exposed the bra straps so reverted to the horizontal out take, and reshaping the curve of the arm hole.
Fitting and working in calico is such fun, my rebellious side comes out; sewing out ugly gapes, slashing and sewing in additional pieces of fabric and if not right, rip them out with your bare hands ooooo! After an evening of Neanderthal sewing I was left with a battle scarred bodice that was starting to take (on my) shape, a real satisfying feeling .
I felt it would be easier to draft a skirt pattern from scratch, having the final waist measurements of the bodice and using my favourite circle skirt calculator from Patty Browerr of the Sungbug This is such a brilliant calculator giving you every measurement you’ll need. Occasionally a full circle skirt can be a little bulky around the belly area, as the folds of fabric fall, having two layers of fabric I wasn’t 100% sure they would lay together smooth enough. Thinking I may need to enter on to a weight training programme to drag the 11 metres of fabric around with me all evening, I thought I could shave a little off by constructing a 3/4 skirt for the black Faille and then give the Ice chiffon all the glory of a full circle. A peplum was mocked up using the measurement, just to check each component would fit
Procrastinating yet again or just putting off the inevitable need to cut fabric, it was decided that I should create #V3 of the bodice, with all the tweaks added and test the skirt pattern in full for length; so a full calico mock was made ! ( at least i could wear this if I did finally run out of time! and believe me it was close)
Big girly pants were on and the cut was going to take place – One week before D-day – pics were popping up all over IG with progress been made or even final makes of those who would be attending
I cut the skirts of first, knowing these would need to be sewn up first and given a couple of days to hang – although i did contemplate not hanging them so they could not drop and just wear for the night! but my own conscience and the over whelming consensus of social media was that YES they must hang! – The moral, if you don’t want to hear the answer, don’t ask the question 🙂
One major plus about toile work, it enables you to get to know your pattern and its construction, giving you more confidence when you get to pretty fabric time – I’d got this sorted – The plan:
- get the skirts sewn on the Sunday, set to hang.
- Make bodice Sunday/Monday,
- re-cut skirt hems Tuesday, and attach
- Hem on Wednesday…..
No siree,, bodice making on Sunday and messing on Monday left me falling out of love with it. It was Okay, but just that and not perfect, Bin fodder it was; with a new bodice having to be cut out and made on Tuesday – although i do have a job to do and a family to run around after ….oh sleep was going to be over rated that week – by Friday i had visions of both me and Kitt snoozing in the corner like e pair of door mice too tired to party ( yes, Kitt too was having issues with her dress) A bit of moral support and a sewing lock in on the Tuesday evening got us back on track. and feeling more positive towards completion.
Wednesday tea time Kitt popped over to the shop to pin the hem of my skirts, yeah no worries it was clear that the satin Faille had dropped a good 6″ in places so a few pins here and there would be fine, get the skirts onto the table, place pattern on top, re-cut! ……you’d think!
Nope -, i stopped after class on the Wednesday got skirts separated, and placed on cutting table, there was no difference! they were laid flat and the hems measured completely even! scratchy head moment- I could see where the strategic pins were, but this was far too random and no way could any cutting be risked just to slice off, what looked to be correct.
Plan B – up at 5.30 Thursday morn, attach skirts back to bodice securely this time, to any finishing i could, hemming of back ties, sewing in the zipper finally etc, etc- I would ask my lovely Thursday morning ladies for help. Bless them, two who were able to scrabble around on the floor stayed for 1 1/2 hrs meticulously measuring the underskirt from waist to floor, and pinned ever inch. then repeated for the over lay !
Friday and the mammoth hemming task began- round and round and round I went ; a waist stay was planned but soon went out of the window as the time ticked by 3.45pm and i could do no more. It was as finished as it could be and i needed to be home. a glass of vino to calm the nerves and the pampering coiffuring began…well slap and dash.
I leave you with some of the pics from the evening, Yes i did feel good in it and was topped my the affirmation from my 14year old who quote ” wow mom that is really pretty and you look lovely” as any mom’s out there may vouch to get approval from a teenager is priceless ❤
A big thank you has to go to Sarah and Freya and their team for organising a truly amazing event, to bring sew much fun and sew much talent together all in one room is rather mind blowing but it worked. It’s obviously impossible to get to chat to everyone in an evening but those i did were all gorgeous, as were their dresses. Next time I’m looking out for a dress with a tiny hem!
