A vintage inspired dress.

Since this is the VERY slow season right now,  I have some time to pursue some other projects.  I have wanted to design some vintage inspired gowns, working my way through the decades.   I  was able to finish a 1920's inspired gown this week.  I Love it!!

This  is  a 1929 Mcalls pattern.  I fell in love with the black dress so I decided to duplicate it - with some updates.  

This is my version.  Made with ivory Charmuese, a short train and added rhinestones for some pizzaz.  

The back.  

A nice silhouette.  

I had a little trouble with the zipper.  It is an invisible zipper sew on the bias (read stretchy).  

Not good.....

I had to re-do it, carefully pulling it up so that it didn't stretch.  Much better.  

I am working on a 1910 vintage inspired dress now - stay tuned.  

Wedding gowns and Rwanda

For the past week I have had the privilege of  teaching two tailors in Rwanda.  Both Anne Marie and Comanda work at our Hope Vocational Training Center with ERM Rwanda (www.ermrwanda.org).  I have know for many months that I was coming and asked what they would like to learn.  I  was told "how to make a wedding dress".   Great!  I can do that!  

I  purchased the fabric with Anne Marie when I got here - wanting her to be involved in the process.  So many of the things we have readily available they cannot get here so best to buy what they can get again if they need it.   So following is some photos of the process and the final product.  What a priviledge to serve my Saviour by buildiing into these two lives!

CUTTTING THE PATTERN.  They don't typically use patterns here so this was new for them.  

Sewing boning.  This is one item that I brought.  It is  hard to find here, but available.  

Anne Marie working on pleatiing for the bodice of the dress.

So proud of the work they have done.

The finished product.  Pleated satin skirt, sweetheart neckline with pleated organza bodice, and I taught them how to make fabric flowers and we added that to the waist with a sash and lace.  Altogether  a very nice product for the first try.  

They are hoping to make more after I leave - so hopefully I will have the chance to see more products from these two special people!

An Antique Dress

I recently had a bride bring me a vintage dress that she had found at an antique store for $25.00.  It was lovely, however  the top was lace and the skirt was a sheer silk organza from what I could tell.  It fit her perfectly, but there was no lining  AT ALL.  So she wanted it lined, and wanted the skirt to have a few  more layers with a little fullness.  So she brought me some fabric the next week and I added knit (stretchy) fabric to the top, and a another layer of silk organza, a layer of lining and some crinoline to the skirt.  Here is the finished project. 

The lace covers the top, and it has a lace peplum.  

I love the detail on the back.

There is nothing that can't be fixed.

As you can imagine, being wedding season, I am immersed in wedding gowns.  I haven't had much time to even do normal stuff like laundry.  Thankfully two of my dear daughters are helping me this summer.  Jami is sewing with me doing bustles and such.   Traci is cooking and grocery shopping.  I don't  know what I would do without them.  

Blogging has been relegated to the back burned in the meantime, but I thought I would post a couple of photos of a recent dress.  The brides mom called very upset and said that they had taken the dress to another seamstress and it had been hemmed to short.  Could I help them?  My comment was, "There is nothing that can't be fixed".  

Here is the dress.

Cute ruffle on the back.  

Here is the solution we came up with.  

The ruffle fabric matches the back.

She was very happy.  In fact I think she like it better than before.  

See you in the fall!  :)

Before and After

Since this is my busy season, I have not had much time to do anything but sew, so I won't write much, but I can post photos.  This is a dress I completed yesterday.  

Before

 Dress was purchased at Adorned in Grace, the bridal shop that exists to help fight human traffiking in the Portland area.  

AFTER:  

Congratulations Katie!!

An ADORNED IN GRACE dress.

I often volunteer at a bridal shop in Beaverton area called ADORNED IN GRACE.  It is shop that is run by volunteers and the proceeds go to help educate and fight human trafficking in the Portland area.  The space that it is in is donated space, and all the wedding/formal gowns are new or used and donated.  Their website is www.adornedingrace.org.  Abolition Now is the non-profit that the shop is affiliated with and they have a website with more information on the mission.  

Anyway, this week I had a lovely bride that purchased her dress at the shop and needed alterations.  I thought I would share with you before and after photos.  

BEFORE:

The dress fit pretty well, but she wanted a lace up/corset back put in.  She also wanted a sweetheart neckline and a bustle.  We decided on a French bustle.

Here are the AFTER photos.  (shared with permission)

Today's project

Here is a photo of today's project.  This bride was a little uncomfortable with a strapless dress and wanted a little something to cover the top.  She brought me a photo of something she liked so I had an idea of what she wanted.  The only problem was she didn't have any lace to match the dress.  During the first fitting at some point she mentioned that she might want the train to be removed.  Problem solved!  I was able to cut off the train and use the fabric for the top.  I even used the buttons on the train for the top.  It turned out fabulous and matched perfectly!

Grandmother's gown part 2

I spent a good part of a day working on the vintage gown that will be worn by a granddaughter.  It is a classic ballgown style with a tulle skirt and lace top (see photos on previous post).  In order to replace the lace, the gown had to be taken apart.  

First I removed the bodice from the skirt.  Fortunately in those days gowns were more simply made.  Meaning that they did not have boning, several layers inside with lining etc.  There is the lace and then the fabric which is a lightweight satin. 

This is the bodice fabric.  The lace was stitched into the darts, so those had to be removed also.  

The lace pieces. It was lined with some tulle, with lace over it.  The tulle was in better shape than the lace, so it held it together where the tears were.

I removed the buttons on the sleeve and will plan to reuse the loops on the sleeve and the back.  It was in pretty good shape.

 This is the new lace cut out and put together front and back.  I plan to put an edge around the upper edge, and the sleeves will also have an edging.  

With the sleeves.

Fitting with the bride.  The edging was just tacked around.  We needed to mostly check for the fit. 

The back.  It will have the buttons and loops down the back.  The fit was nice.  Need to make a few nips and tucks, then reattach the skirt.  Stay tuned....

Grandmother's Gown

I have a bride that I am working with that is wearing her Grandmother's wedding gown.  The wonderful thing is that her mother also wore this gown.  It is truly a treasure.  The only problem is that by now the lace on the top of the gown was ragged in a few places and had some holes, so my job is to replace the lace on the gown.  Other than that we are not changing anything about the dress.

Here is the dress:

The dress fits perfectly, so it will just be a matter of carefully removing the lace and using it as a pattern to cut out the new lace, then putting it all back together.  Easy Peasy.  Well maybe not.

This is the lace we are using to replace the original lace:

It is an Alencon lace with a nice wide edging on both edges.  We will be able to use the edge on the sleeves and around the neckline.  

More to come......

Coat finished

Back from Rwanda, and it turned out I didn't get to see Jami after all.  I did finish her coat however.  Unfortunately I got so busy finishing it - I forgot to take photos.  I am not the best blogger  ha ha. Here is the finished coat however.  

I am on to another project now - so stay tuned.....

Next steps

I am leaving for Rwanda next week and on my return trip it turns out that I will be able to visit with Jami for a few hours.  I have a stop over in Amsterdam, so she is planning on taking the train to Amsterdam from Paris and visit with me on my layover.  So that means I have to get her coat done before I leave.  I guess it is good that I work pretty well under deadlines!  I have been working fast and furious over the past couple of days - with trips to the thrift store with Traci, dinner out with my girls, and a few other things in between.  I still learning about this blogging thing, so I forget to take photos sometimes, but here is what I have for next steps with this coat.  

After I cut it out I cut out the lining and the thinsolate.  Thinsolate is a very thin layer of insulation that looks like batting, although it is a different material than batting I believe.  It is great to add a little warmth coats and jackets.  

The next thing was to iron on the interfacing on the body of the coat.  As you might imagine I like to look at the inside of garments.  When I have examined the inside of wool coats, there is often a layer of a knit looking interfacing, so I thought it would be good to add that to this coat.  It gives the fabric even more stability and makes the wool smooth.  The only problem was that there are small holes in this interfacing and when it melted it got all over my iron.  

You can see it in photo - it is kind of see through and with small holes.  So just a warning.  If you use this kind of interfacing be sure and use a pressing cloth.  It takes much longer, but saves cleaning the iron later.  

I added more interfacing to the front lapel area and did what is called a "pad stitch".  You are supposed to stitch with it already rolled the way that it will eventually lay so that all the layers will lay correctly.  

I rolled the collar around my pressing ham and pinned it before I did the pad stitching.  

Sorry,  I thought this photo showed it with stitching and I don't know how to delete a photo on this app.  Anyone??

Pockets were made next.  I think I will sew them on by hand.  This is a technique that I learned at a sewing class I took in January.  Most of this I did by machine, but the flaps will be done by hand.  

Front sewn together at shoulders and side seams.

Back.   This is about as far as I got yesterday.  What fun.  It is not often that I get to create something from scratch.  Most of what I do is alterations.  So this is a fun project especially since it is for my sweet daughter.