Truly Victorian natural form part 3 TV423 TV324 TV221

 Back to my Victorian natural form journey. This outfit was to be worn for the Victorian Festival fashion show but with all events cancelled it now hangs in my closet.

I used 3 different colors of silk taffeta. The main gown is Mandrake (deep eggplant), contrast is Mandragora (golden olive green) and a small accent of warm grey lavender. The first two fabrics were bought from Silk Baron and the accent fabric was from my stash.

I decided to push my skills a bit and added a back accent based on a gown at the MET, The Mrs. F.M. Carroll dress. It's lovely gown and the back of the bodice is very interesting and unusual.

TV423 Two Toned Bodice:

I already reviewed this lovely pattern so I'm just sharing some of my process on copying the back of Mrs. Carroll's dress. I would like to say I did some fancy math and sketched everything out in 100% perfect detail but.....Nope. After looking at the picture and counting how many bow shapes I was going to need I cut out the 2 back bodice pieces in muslin and started to sketch out the pieces on the back. I used iron away ink so if I made mistakes they would disappear. :-)

The interesting thing about the Carroll dress is if you zoom in you can see that some of the back bow shaped pieces aren't perfectly even. Nice to know that even such a beautiful gown has little discrepancies like that since my stuff is never perfect either.

Here is the back cut out in muslin. You can see I traced out shapes down the back. Once the shapes were traced out I laid a piece of tracing paper over the back and traced the bow shapes. I added 1/2 inch seam allowance to each bow shape. Once the pattern making part was done I cut the shapes out in fabric and lining. I also made the contrast piping. I made a practice bow and realized sewing them RST on top and bottom and trying to turn them RSOut was a problem... The centers were too narrow to pull the wider ends through. 

So what I did is I stitched just one side and then I pressed in the seam allowances on the other side and whip stitched them together.

Here is the front of the finished piece.

Here is the back, you can see my very coarse whip stitching. Coarse is ok because no one will even see it. :-)

Once all my little pieces were stitched together I laid them out on the muslin to make sure I was headed on the right path. Now it was time to cut out the back bodice pieces. I decided to just cut out the back bodice in case this all went sideways I would still have enough fabric to head in another direction. 

After sewing the center back seam I began stitching all the little pieces down leaving about 1.5 inches in the center of each piece open so I could lace the fabric tie up the center back when it was time. The rest of the bodice construction was pretty standard. I did change the neckline and drafted out a different collar, I also made the sleeves 3/4 length. At this point I tried on the bodice and I didn't like how the top two bow pieces looked. My upper back curves forward (bad posture) and those top two pieces really drew attention to my upper back curve. So I took them off and I really prefer how for me, less is more. The thing to give thought to as you are contemplating design elements is your frame size. I'm not very tall and some design elements are too much for my frame. Also I am short waisted and all that detail going down the back was a bit much. Another example, I have a short neck so when I'm making garments (even modern ones) I normally will shorten the collar stand and sometimes the collar piece itself just to make it fit my frame better. Sleeve cuffs are another one. Sometimes they are too big visually for my small wrists so I will make them smaller so they don't overwhelm me. Hopefully this makes sense. :-) 

Once the bodice was completely finished I used an extra long piece of ribbon and wound it up thru the center back openings to see how long to cut my fabric. I essentially made a narrow tube the length needed and just threaded it up through the center back. For the bottom of the fabric tube I just copied the original dress as best as I could interpret it. It looks like 3 loops, 1 knot and then three hanging streamers of fabric. That was my best guess.

There are other style details I added to the bodice that aren't part of the pattern. I just looked at fashion plates to find things I liked and then played with tracing paper and the pattern pieces. It all came together very well in the end.

TV221

Tie back underskirt is just that. I added pleated trim to mine and the top part of the skirt is actually cheap home decor cotton so I didn't waste any good silk on a part of the gown no-one would see. This skirt goes together easily and I had no issues with it.

TV324

Long draped overskirt. This is another simple make and my only dislike is how droopy it is. Even with nice crisp taffeta. I tacked some of the pleated gathers to make it drape better and overall I like the finished result. 

The eggplant colored fabric like to photograph brown but it's really not. I think the camera picks it up as closer to Aubergine which does have brown tones to it. The green is pretty spot on in color. Both fabric were bought from Silk Baron.

Well I hope you enjoyed this post. I quite like natural form and will certainly make other garments. Thanks again for tuning in to the chronicles of Mimi.

Simplicity 8578 the American Duchess Sacque Back Gown pattern

It was a success! I have been wanting to make a sacque back gown since watching Dangerous Liaisons when it first hit the theaters wayyyyyy back in my youth. I tried unsuccessfully to make one almost 3 years ago and I screwed it up amazingly. I used the JP Ryan pattern (I love JP Ryan patterns!) but this style did not work for me. On her pattern the front of the gown is essentially draped and I could not get it to work at all. About a year after that I was reading Period Costume for Stage and Screen. The author mentioned the easiest style sacque to make was one with a separate front bodice piece. There is an older Simplicity pattern that is a sacque of this style and the stomacher closes up the middle with hooks and eyes. It's out of print but can be bought on the secondary market. However along came the AD Simplicity 8578 sacque and I rejoiced! It has the separate front bodice piece I was looking for. Yay!

Pattern info:

Pattern is for the gown and petticoat. You will need panniers, stays, 1 under petticoat to add fluff. The gown is a fabric hog and the yardage requested is fairly accurate.

If you want to cut down on yardage you could just make your petticoat out of two 54 inch widths of fabric cut to the length you need. You can find directions on line to make a basic petticoat. The petticoat in the Simplicity 8578 pattern has a center piece and two side pieces for front and back. Hence the (6ish) yardage requirement. Several of my fancy gowns just have a basic two panel front and back petticoat. My panniers are average size. At my height (5ft 4ish) I can usually get away with 2.5 yards of 54 wide fabric for one petticoat.

Fabric:

I used silk taffeta from Silk Baron. Gorgon for the gown and Regatta for the petticoat. As far as trim I decided to keep the petticoat solid Regatta blue so I can wear it with another gown if I want to. Of course that would require me to make another gown......

Size and alterations:

I made size 20, bust 42. I didn't do a lot of alterations. This style gown is somewhat adjustable in size because of the ties on the inside back and the stomacher. I also knew this would be my first go around with this pattern so I would only do basic fitting tweaks. I had to shorten the bodice about 1/2 an inch because it was a bit too long and looking pretty janky over my panniers. The sleeves are a bit roomy so I did a 1/2 inch thin arm adjustment (I do not have thin arms. Mine are average don't ever work out middle-aged lady arms.) That's about it.

Side note:

Something to check next time. In the pictures on the Simplicity web site the front of the gown is longer than the petticoat. Mine is just the opposite. The petticoat runs a bit long and I did take a pretty deep hem on it. I like the length but apparently it should be shorter than I have made it. Eh.....no biggie.

Putting it together:

No issues. It is a lot of fabric to move around and it gets cumbersome. The instructions are clear and concise. The back neckline gown to lining RST seam is fussy as hell and mine looked not too good when I was finished. Lol. It's the reason mine has trim going all the way around the back of the neck. For my stomacher I basted one side to the gown and sewed hooks and bars on the other side. It's very easy to put on.

Final notes:

I love my gown. It's not perfect but I am so pleased to have finally made my dream dress! I felt so elegant when I was wearing it! I highly recommend this pattern and I will make another at some point.

I made this gown because I was invited to an 18th century party at the end of September. The Countess was also in attendance as well as some of my other homegirls. It was a magical day & evening!

 The lovely Countess wore her beautiful new gown!

 Ready to greet the guests!

 A fabulous group photo before supper was served. 

After supper photo by In the Long Run Designs. They were so nice to work with!

 Playing cards and winning! 

During the picnic both The Countess and I had scheduled a photo session with In the Long Run Designs. I decided to wear my trusty JP Ryan green silk gown. The Countess also wore green so we were like twins!! Lol, it wasn't planned but we had fun with it anyways. Here are some of the pictures  from the picnic.

 The green chicas

Contemplating nefarious shenanigans.... 

 A stroll in the garden.

Defending my virtue! 

The Countess looking pretty saucy!

This event was one of the highlights of my year! I have made some wonderful friends in the last few years and I am truly grateful for the good times we have together.

Thanks for stopping by and sorry I have been SO VERY neglectful of my little blog.