A little parenthesis in my Lily-themed posts...(but don't worry, the 5th and final part of the Lily Diaries should be online pretty soon!) A while ago, I stumbled upon this picture while blog-reading (I don't know who was the original taker and owner of it, but I first saw it while reading Tami Lee's blog, Tami herself having taken it from ImageShack (here's the original link)) and have been looking for the right pattern to make the same dress, or at least something similar, ever since :
As I said, I don't know who took this picture, nor do I know who is featured in it, so, whoever you are, do feel free to claim the property of your picture!
I have no idea what the back of this dress looks like, but I think I'd like it to be a rather low, V-shaped neckline. I think it could look particularly gorgeous in a Japanese fabric, like for example this one :
...on the sewing front. Actually, I did try to work on my dress this week, but got stopped by an ironing mishap.
On thursday evening, I had decided to cut my pocket and neckline flaps in advance so they would be ready when time comes to sew the whole dress together,and when the moment came to press, I was all, "why the f*** is this bloody iron leaking like that???" Frequent answer to this kind of question is, RTFM. So I did. Handbook said, "your iron might be leaking because it's not hot enough". OK then, let's heat it up, shall we?
Well, heating up did stop the leaking...but it also burned my fabric and left a huge stain on the sole plate of my iron. You could guess how disheartened I was when I saw that my neckline flap was useless due to the huge hole in it...so I went to bed, and that was all for this day.
The next day I reported my adventures on the CP Forum...and was lucky enough to get an answer from Helen, thanks to whom I shall be much more careful when using my iron in the future. Thank you again, Helen, for reminding me that the steam CAN be switched off.
Therefore, during the week-end, I hacked off the burnt part from my neckline flap and replaced it, and was able to press all my flaps nicely. I also started basting my underlinig on my fashion fabric, and understood that I had overestimated my abilily to get this dress finished over the week-end. It seemed to take me AGES, and it's not even over yet - but probably because, a) I'm doing it for the first time, and b)I'm trying to keep the print as matchy-matchy as possible. I'm lucky I had ordered twice the amount of fabric necessary fo the Lily, because it seems the first piece of fabric I cut will not be enough (hopefully, once I'm done with the dress, there should remain enough fabric to make a shirt for my boyfriend...fingers crossed...)
On the right of the image, you can notice my already-underlined side-back bodice pieces, which I tried to overlap on my fabric so I can place the back bodice pieces close to them and make it so that the print matches.
Well...all in all, that was quite a wordy post, especially seeing that I had not much to say, actually. So I will leave you for the moment with pictures of hot rods, music and even burlesque (well, after all, my blog is also supposed to be about rock'n'roll, isn't it?) from an event I attended this week-end.
(NB : these are bands and artist I actually saw live during the week-end, but as I could'nt get to take as many pictures as I wanted, some of them will be from YouTube and so not my own.)
A friend's hot rod. The organizers of the event had decided not to invite many car owners this year, so there were mostly customized bikes and only 2 cars in addition to this one. As i like cars better than motorbikes, I was a little bit disappointed.
Hope you enjoy the music!
And this week-end, I think I should be able to finish my dress...just wait and see!
Hi everybody!
Last week you were left with a picture of a strapless and zipperless Lily...but I worked at it during the week and here's how it looked on Saturday :
Sorry for the mirror picture...on top of this it's the only full-length mirror in my flat, and not the best thing in front of which to take pictures. Maybe it's not really obvious, but the waist was actually too high, which makes my hips look huge.
So...Here are the critics for this first muslin :
waist is too high
skirt is not long enough (but this is only a matter of personal taste)
there seems to be some excess fabric at the back just above the bum, but this point apparently is only the result of the waist being too high.
Therefore, after taking a few measurements (how much length should I add for the waisline to sit at my natural waist, and for the skirt to fall just a little below my knees for a (in my opinion) kind of more authentic 50s look?), I sat with my non-woven pattern, pencils, scissors, tape and more non-woven interfacing and started slashing-and-spreading my pattern where it was needed. I proceeded that way :
First I drew a line on my pattern pieces. I chose to draw it 2cm above the bottom of each piece.
Then I cut...
...And taped it onto my sheet of checkered non-woven interfacing. I love this stuff, it's really so useful! And after taping, all there's left to do is re-draw the lines between the upper part and the lowest, cut it...
...and voilà! My four bodice pieces, with extra length added! Seems like they're going to match quite well, won't they?
Then I did the same to add some length to the skirt. Afterwards, I traced my new bodice on my muslin fabric...
Why do cats always choose to sprawl on your fabric when you're doing something that requires focus like tracing or cutting? Luckily, this is only muslin fabric...
...and then ripped apart the bodice from the skirt on my muslin, to sew the new bodice on. (I chose not to make another muslin for the skirt part, as I didn't think only lengthening it would dramatically alter the fit).
And by Saturday evening, when I went to bed, everything was sewn in place except for the zipper.
Having a busy Sunday (due to a meeting of the organization I am part of, which is currently organizing a gathering of hot rods, custom cars, choppers and so on, with garage and rockabilly concerts, DJs and other cool stuff), I could't sew a lot, but still managed to hand baste my zipper so I could try on my muslin, and...
IT FITS!My hips don't look as huge as they did now, do they?
And from the back, no sign of too-much fabric left anymore! It might look a bit tight , but that's because I left a big seam allowance as I sewed the zipper on. I won't let it that big when I sew the dress for good.
All in all I had the time to get a good deal of work this week-end, as I even traced the patterns pieces on my underlining fabric and cut them roughly before going to bed. If I can find the time this week, maybe my dress shall be ready to be worn next week-end...
