Saturday, December 24, 2016

Laughing Moon 114 1840s-1850s Victorian round dress

Pardon any typos etc.... It is Christmas Eve and I have been hitting the hard cider. Quite possibly one of the most sneak up on you drunks ever, aside from Long Island ice tea. Nothing goes better together than drinking and blogging. Because, fun.

I had arranged a costume meet up at Fort Nisqually for their annual Christmas celebration. What a great excuse to finally make Laughing Moon #114! December is a very busy month for most people so it was just myself and the Countess representing SITU. Father Christmas was making an appearance at the fort as well and I am happy to say he is a personal friend of mine too. So needless to say the Countess and I were on our best behavior. (yeah right)

The pattern:

Victorian dress 1840-1852. Several bodice and sleeve styles. Skirt is gauged. I made view A with mancherons (small upper sleeve) over the bell sleeve.

Fabric:

Plaid silk voile. I believe I bought this from Fabric Mart during one of their big sales. I don't think that silk voile existed in the 1840s-50s but I am not aiming for 100% historical accuracy. Silk voile is a really wonderful fabric to work with. It has a crisper drape than cotton voile and a lovely smooth hand.

Size & alterations:

I go back and forth on LM patterns with sizing. In a corset my bust is between 42-43 inches. I have found with their Victorian styles a size 20 is a nice fit from my apex upwards. Now in Regency stays my bust is a very perky 44 inches. So I use a size 22.

Once I made the muslin I decided to make the darts smaller to add a bit more ease room across my waist and fullest part of my bust. I removed 1.5 inches from the dropped shoulder seam. This is consistent on any dress pattern with a dropped shoulder. Where I kind of screwed up was the bodice length. I made it shorter than I wanted. I was aiming for the 840s longer bodice but became over zealous and it seems more 1850s. But that's ok. I really like this dress anyway. The neckline on my muslin was too tight so I removed 1/2 an inch. I also did this with my LM wrapper. All in all the alterations were minimal.

Construction:

No issues. None. Went together a charm. The neckline, armholes and waist have piping. I really, really love to make and apply piping. Hard to believe since I hate fiddly bits on projects. Piping looks so pretty, especially in a stripe or plaid. The skirt is gauged and hand stitched on. Not my favorite thing to do. However, this time it went much better and faster than my first gauged skirt. The sleeves fit beautifully too.

End notes:

Your sleeves are bias cut, don't let them stretch out. Watch your fit in the hip area. That is how my bodice wound up shorter than I wanted. The sides were hitting on my hips in the wrong spot and made the piping go wonky. I had to rip it all out and trim off the excess from the arc that curves over the hip. And in doing so trimmed too much from the front bodice. Always leave ease room for the skirt bulk, boning, petticoats.

The Fort Nisqually event was a lot of fun. I love it when the Countess goes on adventures with me because it's always a good time.

 Feeling very festive in my holiday dress!

 Some guy crashes my picture.

 Back view. Yep, drink in all that sexy.

 The lovely Countess in her festive plaid!

Bonnet selfie!

Me and Father Christmas! Plus my errant falling down bastard under sleeve. Oh well...

Have a wonderful holiday season! Even if it is not perfect (kind of like my under sleeve situation) enjoy it anyways!  There will be plenty more blogging and sewing in 2017!  


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