Onto the dress!
I traced the pattern and made a muslin. It was too small. To me my dd doesn't look any larger than she was when I took her measurements a couple of years ago. Don't assume anything. She has done a lot of climbing in the last couple of years and she has gained muscle mass and about 10 lbs. Wider shoulders too. I decided not to retrace the pattern, so boring and time consuming and altered the larger size and did a tissue fitting, at least of the bodice. I ended up using a size 10 at the shoulders and upper body and enlarging to a 12 for the waist and a 14 at her low hip. This is going by her upper bust, waist and hip measurements. The alterations I made were a 1" fba, a sway back of about an inch and a rounded upper back, and I lowered the princess seam. I kept a piece of narrow elastic tied at her waist to check the length and it made pinpointing her back issue easy. I then made a muslin of the bodice and skirt, fitting the bodice and skirt separately before attaching the skirt. I used the size 12 measurements to enlarge the skirt and didn't recut it. It was too big as was the bodice at the waist. Afterwards I realized that while I had lowered the skirt waist to where her waist is, because we wanted to emphasize it, I forgot that, duh, the waist gets larger if you lower it 5/8". Even if I had lowered it by folding out the 5/8" below the waist it would have been too big because it was meant to be above the waist, so larger to begin with. I ended up taking in the waist and the upper hip curve. She is straighter from waist to hip than Burda drafts the hip. I also have to move the shoulder seam back a bit. When she tried it on she found the neckline too high, and this has got to be the only time I've ever found a V neck on Burda to be too high! I pinned it under until she liked it. I also cut the back V deeper. The gored skirt is very flattering on her and she was happy. The biggest issue I have is that she was instructed to bring a good bra. What she considered her best bra was sorely lacking. She will be back at spring break with good underwear and shoes! Anyone know of a good lingerie store in Austin? She says that she is willing to travel to Dallas or Houston so any suggestion will be greatly appreciated!
The bodice is princess seamed with a gathered bias overlay and I am concerned that the princess seam won't have the correct placement because the bra wasn't good. Since the upper layer is going to be either chiffon or georgette I don't want to have to rip it. I am thinking of hand basting the dress to make it easier to alter. I will also cut wide seam allowances.
I sent for fabric samples from Emmonesock, Alex picked up some samples from Mood, and I just called Banksville Designer fabrics for more samples. I made Alex's bat mitzvah party dress with fabric from them 17 years ago, long before internet fabric shopping. I wish that they had a commercial website, but if you know what you want they are a great resource for well priced, high quality fabrics.
These were taken before I lowered the neckline front and back. She wants a 'hint' of cleavage. There's twirling going on in the last photo. Skirt perfect for it. There will be a gathered overlay on the waistband that I left off. Fitting this was a lot easier than I anticipated, these are pretty basic alterations that were easy to pinpoint.
I've got some winter sewing for myself before I tackle her dress. I need to get a roll of tissue paper too before I cut the dress. Does anyone have a good source?
Posts
