Normally I wouldn't get
this excited about finishing a dress, but these are not normal times. I was chatting to my friend F the other night* and we both agreed that our concentration levels are hopelessly low at present. So I'm taking the completion of any task, no matter how basic, as a win.
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| Woohoo - a finished dress! |
This is my second dress made from
Vogue 2787. I decided that I wanted to finish it before I started my April projects, as it has been on a hanger on the door of my workroom for ages. I thought it had been there since last year, but actually I started it in August 2018!
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| The pattern |
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| Its previous appearance on the blog |
After I
made the front I sewed the centre back, shoulder and side seams, and that was as far as it got. Amazingly, I hadn't lost the facing pieces in the intervening 18 months, so the next thing was to sew those together and attach the facing.
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| With side seams, and pinned-on facing |
After that, all that was needed was the zip (hand-picked, as ever), the sleeve and skirt hems, making and attaching the shoulder pads, and the buttons at the back neck. Far and away the trickiest thing was selecting the buttons. Buttons of any yellow apart from an exact match - which of course I didn't have - looked dreadful, so I experimented with picking out the other colours in the fabric.
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| Possible button choices |
In the end, I settled on the vintage red set on the left.
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| The buttons in situ - with matching earrings |
The soft cotton that I used this time is a far more appropriate fabric choice for this pattern than the crisper cotton I used previously; the gathered sections drape much better.
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| Showing the gathered sections at the neck and hip. |
Sadly, because this was finishing off a dress already cut out, there's no impact on the Stashometer. However, the shoulder pads were covered with lining fabric taken from my 'lining offcuts' stash, and the seams beneath the armholes (the weakest point of this dress) were reinforced with tape from my 'leftover bits of tape and binding' box. Even though I'm a firm believer in wasting as little as possible, sometimes in the past it has seemed a bit daft to keep all these odds and ends when I live so close to a fabric shop and can 'just pop out' for anything I need. Suddenly however it doesn't seem so silly any more!
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| Home-made covered shoulder pad |
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| Tape to stop the side seam from tearing below the armhole |
I'm really pleased with how this dress turned out, and so glad that I finally finished it. I'm looking forward to it getting lots of wear when I can get out and about, and might even manage to get some pictures of it somewhere other than in front of a yellow wall!
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| Blending in |
* - Not in person, obviously. When we stopped to think about it, we realised that our socialising mostly consists of me going round to her house for a good natter and a couple of glasses of wine followed by copious cups of tea - all of which we could easily replicate over the phone. Sadly what I can't do is play with her cat; but he does recognise my voice over the phone, and miaows a greeting to me!
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| Missing this handsome chap! |
Well done! It looks great. I agree about the attention span thing--I can't tell you how many times I've found myself wandering around the house wondering what in the world I had set out to do or retrieve!
ReplyDeleteThank you Juliana. I frequently find myself at the top of the stairs with no idea why I came up, and remember as soon as I get back to the bottom. Still, it all counts as exercise!
DeleteI wouldn't call this dress "basic"! I have this pattern, and I haven't even come close to working up the nerve to make it. Yours is beautiful! And the buttons were the perfect choice, IMHO. Where do you source vintage or vintage-y buttons? We have no fabric store within an almost 2 hour drive- and their (JoAnne's) button selection is pretty basic.
ReplyDeleteI find myself spending a lot of time staring into space, frequently with a cat draped over me.
Thank you Laurie. The pattern isn't that tricky, once you've got the front made up. I cheated a bit and sewed the centre curve on my hand-crank machine as it gave me more control.
DeleteI'm very lucky to have a good button stash. My mum passed her button box (which included the contents of both my grannies' button boxes) on to me, as she doesn't sew a lot any more. Plus, I'm fortunate that there are a few vintage fairs held locally. I never buy clothing at these, as I prefer to make it, but I always look out for stalls selling patterns or buttons.
Lucky you, having feline company!
Lovely! A great fabric match for the pattern.
ReplyDeleteThank you Lynn. Matching fabric to pattern is not one of my strengths - I frequently get carried away by the print, and fail to consider the other aspects.
DeleteVery pretty, and it suits you! I'm glad you were able to pick up where you left off. I just made a Christmas stocking that I purchased the fabric for in December. Now I feel better that it only took four months. I too can't remember why I entered a room, but it comforts me to remember that I did that when I was a teen!
ReplyDeleteThank you Lodi, at least you now have the stocking in good time for Christmas 2020!
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