A UFO completed

And it's not even my UnFinished Object! I've completed my latest squirrel project - making a dress out of a part-made skirt which I acquired in an auction lot.

The bodice pattern I was using had been drafted with a centre back zip, but the skirt consists of two panels sewn together at the sides. I didn't want to cut into the back panel to make an opening, so instead I moved the zip to the side. This involved opening up one side seam of the skirt enough to accommodate the lower part of a 30cm/12" zip once it was attached to the bodice.

Unfortunately, even though I unpicked the overlocked edge to retain all of the seam allowance, it was still too narrow to support a zip. Rather than make the skirt narrower, I increased the seam allowance by adding strips of the deadstock cotton for the top underneath and overcasting the seam allowance onto them. The neat selvedge of the cotton came in very handy, as it acted like seam tape, and the raw edge of the strip was tucked into the fold.

Widening the seam allowance with fabric strips

The top was very easy to make, as it is only three pieces plus the facing. Even though I had changed to a side opening, I could not cut the back on the fold as it is not cut on the straight grain. I included an opening at the back neck, but as I have since taken the completed dress off without remembering to undo the buttons (from my button box) first, I think that this was probably unnecessary!

The back, with superfluous opening

Once the top was complete, I pleated the skirt to fit it. Purely by chance, the patched area ended up hidden inside an inverted pleat - yay! My local fabric shop had run out of white zips of the length I needed so rather than wait for a new delivery, and in line with the general make-do ethos of this project, I used a longer zip from my stash and cut it to length.

When I was cutting the top out, I had been careful to place the pieces on the fabric in a way which left a long section down one side intact, and I used this to make a long sash. Finally, I attached the three remaining buttons to the front to add interest.

And here is the end result. It isn't especially vintage (although 1990s and 2000s are now classed as 'vintage', and I think that the skirt is older than that), but I've styled it here with vintage accessories.

Not bad for deadstock and leftovers!

It's nothing special, but I think that it's going to be a real everyday workhorse dress. My two maxi dresses (the same design, in two different colourways) are about the only RTW items which I still regularly wear, so it's great to have a me-made replacement for them. The skirt is a very lightweight cotton - as is apparent from this photo taken in a slight breeze - so it should be cool while providing some sun protection.

Even a slight breeze catches the skirt

And I really love this neckline. I may add some lingerie straps because it is so wide, but my favourite What Katie Did bra works fairly well with it. Plus, the grown-on sleeves provide a bit of cover without the hassle of fitting a separate sleeve. I can see a lot of iterations of this bodice appearing on this blog in the future.

#sewnshownseated shows off the neckline

And for once, that new fabric on the Stashometer has gone straight back out again.

Back down to a mere 17m deficit!

Whoops

Yes, again.

"At the Sign of the Three Squirrels" - Goslings Bank *

At least it gives me a chance to use this photograph I took last time I was in London. (And yes, we have reached the stage where I take photos of squirrel-related things when I see them, because I know they will at some point be useful for this blog!)

This is what I should have been working on.

Exhibit A

And this is what I am working on.

Exhibit B

The two are actually related. When I am making a bodice toile, I always struggle to get the length right. What seems fine initially can change completely once a skirt is attached. To get round this problem with the bodice of the pineapple dress, I decided to use a skirt which I had acquired in a box of sewing stuff bought at an auction. It appeared to be part made - two panels of batik fabric sewn together at the sides and hemmed, with what I'm guessing was a very haphazard channel for a drawstring at the top but no drawstring. I had unpicked the top, closed up the misaligned drawstring holes with tape, pressed under the top edge to a uniform length, and got no further.

Drawstring holes (I assume) from right side and wrong side

It has been folded up in my workroom ever since, until I had the idea of using it as a 'mock skirt' by pleating it roughly to size and basting it in place.

Attached to the bodice mock-up

It worked very well for checking the bodice, but you can guess what happened - it looked so good that I immediately wanted to make it up as a dress. To speed things up, I decided to use the bodice pattern I had just drafted but with the neckline of Simplicity 3662. Unfortunately, despite having lots of plain blue cotton in various shades, none of them really worked with the skirt fabric. So it was back to the fabric shop to look at yet more plain blues. While I was there, I spotted a roll labelled "original vintage cotton". The staff couldn’t tell my anything about it, but the fact that it is only 90cm/36" wide, has a proper woven selvedge instead of a modern fluffy one, and also has some discoloration along said selvedge makes me think that it is indeed vintage deadstock. Either way, the colours blend perfectly with the skirt.

Such neat selvedges!

So now I have not one but two dresses on the go, and more fabric.

Another 1.6m

* - Goslings Bank was a very old bank on Fleet Street, which eventually became part of Barclays. While geese might seem more appropriate for the sign, squirrels were chosen for their thrifty habit of storing nuts for the winter. Sadly all of this history did not protect the branch from the onslaught of online banking, and Barclays closed the branch in May this year. I wonder what has become of the sign?

I bought some fabric!

I've been trying very hard not to buy any 'new' fabric this year (vintage or other second-hand fabric is acceptable), and have mostly succeeded. The only yardage I have bought was for a specific project, and has been made up. Unfortunately, I can't claim that this was down to iron-willed restraint - I just don't allow myself to go into fabric shops!

No!

I have even created what I call the 'Stash Shop' - images of fabrics in my stash, alongside possible pattern choices. These have been printed out and pinned to a noticeboard in my workroom. I find this approach less restrictive than my old MakeNine/UseNine attempts, but when I'm thinking about a new project it acts as a useful reminder that I have plenty of choice already without going out and buying anything.

Part of the Stash Shop

My next project from the Stash Shop is to finally use a length of cotton which has featured several times on this blog, but has never got as far as being used. According to the invoice I found folded inside, it was bought in February 2020. After a lot of thought, I had settled on making Butterick 5556, but was never really happy with this choice so nothing happened.

Not entirely what I wanted

Looking at it again, I decided that I wanted something with a fitted bodice, but a wider neckline and much shorter sleeves. After considering and rejecting various patterns I have made already, I decided that Butterick 5748 was the best match - but it needed more shoulder coverage.

Closer, but still not right

I had recently bought Simplicity 3662, and decided that the grown-on sleeves were exactly what I want for this dress.

Getting there

Yes, I could have just used 3662, but I would have had to redraft it to fit me, which seemed silly when I already had a very similar bodice pattern which fits perfectly. Then I remembered that Tasha of Tasha Could Make That had a video on merging patterns like these two - the link is here, and the video is excellent.

I started with the back piece, as this was easier. The two fitted together perfectly, but there was one issue. 5748 is cut on the straight grain, but 3662 is not.

Note the grainline on 3662

I assume that there's a good reason for this, presumably to do with fit. Tasha mentioned in her video that she always matches the grain, so I decided that the simplest solution was to mark the grainline on my new piece to match 3662.

The front pieces are more complex, but again matched well. Even the bust darts were almost the same size - note the word 'almost'!

The two fronts

I used the neckline of 3662 but made it higher at the front, for reasons which will become apparent later in the making process, and started on a toile. This was when I discovered that the front side seam was shorter than the back. Luckily I was able to fix the problem by reducing the bust dart to, ooh, about the size of 3662's dart!

In line with my ongoing sewing goals, I want to do something a bit more complicated than just make up a mash-up dress in this cotton, and this is where the purchase comes in. I wanted some plain fabric in a toning colour, but was expecting to have to concoct it myself using white cotton and fabric paint. But to my amazement, when I went to the fabric shop to buy paint, I found a cotton poplin in a very similar colour to the background of the printed cotton (the brown stippling over the top makes it look darker), and a similar weight to boot. Half a metre was actually cheaper than a jar of fabric paint which was a less good match - it would have been silly not to buy some!

I could hardly believe my luck

Half a metre in will hopefully lead to far more out

The next stage is drafting the extra details for the dress.

Making a beautiful shape

Only a very short post this week, as I've been unwell for most of it, and still don't feel tip-top now.

Yesterday's Guardian newspaper included a cartoon based on Edward Hopper's Nighthawks (the link is here) and seeing it got me thinking that I have never explained my profile picture on this blog. It's based on another, far less well known, Hopper painting.

Girl at Sewing Machine, Edward Hopper, 1921

Hopper's paintings of solitary figures are often regarded as representing themes of loneliness and isolation, but as a sewist I always feel that this one looks like absolute bliss. The décor of the interior suggests a comfortable domestic environment rather than someone forced to sew to earn a meagre living, and the position of the treadle machine provides excellent light to work by. Clearly the girl is not expecting to be disturbed, as she is working in her undergarments - both cooler, and much easier for doing fittings of the item she is making. To my mind, all the ingredients for a pleasant afternoon's sewing are there (well, apart from a cup of tea!). The painting is in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum in Madrid and one day, when I have fewer commitments which limit my travelling, I shall go and see it.

My treadle is in my workroom, but I do sometimes use my handcrank on a table in my sitting room, especially if I'm working on something fiddly which needs good light. So when I had the machine set up last autumn, I decided to don my Edwardian slip and create my own version of the image.

My version, 2022

Finally, the title of this post is taken from this poem by Mary Leader, which was also inspired by the girl absorbed in her sewing.