Challenge 5 Work dress

his is the bodice before attaching it to the skirt. The seams are all piped  and the bodice is lined I always put the sleeves in at this time than for no other reason than to beable to say "thats the bodice finished.

 

This is my Chalenge 5 - Work dress 

'The Mantua Maker 1825-1830 Day dress'

 I know I am late in starting it but better late than never. The  pattern I am using is from 'The Mantua Maker 1825-1830 Day dress'.

I have the tiole of the bodice finished and fitting all done.

 It will be made it in white cotton lining with gray cotton that has a tiny little flower with a bit of charcoal and yellow coloured pattern around it.

Well I have not got as much done as I would have liked  I hope that I will get the main fabric cut tomorrow  I think I may be struggling to get it all out of the material the patterns says 7 and a half and I think I only have 6 mts I may have to put a contrasting colour on the bottom. 

I stopped doing this gown as I felt I had to try and catch up and then perhaps get back to it.

Today 4th April I finally got back to the dress  I have now got the back and front done I will be putting in the sleeves tomorrow (I hope) and strt to get the skirt attached. No luck I read the instructions and I have to have the bodice done then put the belt on then on goes the skirt.  The piping and the sleeves are all done and it is all beginning to look good.

I have sewn the skirt and  I was right I did not have enough material but as I was doing a working class dress so I thought that folks would not have all that much money so they would have had three drops instead of four.  I cut the sleeves out which were masive and found that I would have to patch a peice of the material into the third length.  I know this is period correct as I have seen originals that have had pieces put in when material was short and they were middle class so how much more would the working people have done.  I did not think it was going to be so hard to get the dress out of the material I had but It is made and thank goodnes.  I have never had to make bias for the piping out of such small pieces some pieces were as small as 4 inches long but it is all finished and all I have left is a piece approximately 2x3inches.

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I have opened the front so it can be seen how I lined but mostly to show the construction of it.

 The finished item puffs in sleeves you will just have to imagine what it would look like once my arm is in as well  they will be a bit larger.

 close up of the bodice and waist band which is a little lowere that gowns were in 1810's

 Side view

 Full view

The Challenge: 5

Fabric: Cotton

Pattern: Mantua maker 1825 dress

Year: 1825

Notions: piping cord, brass pins

How historically accurate is it? Machine sewn so I would say it is 90%

Hours to complete: This is a bit hard to say as I stoped and re started the dress a guess would be 40 hours

First worn: only when being fitted

Total co; Material bought on special about one year ago for $5 a Mtr I had six mtrs so $30.

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1873 Challenge 4 Embelishment

  Please excuse my dummy  I had to make it  bigger and as you can see it is not quite right but it had to do or I would never get the costume finished.
I know I am late in getting it on my blog but I have been ill for almost three weeks the result of that is I will be three weeks late with every thing.

 Challenge 4 Embelishment

Trim the costume started in 2008  

I did not have a pattern for the bodice so I searched my library and the web to get some ideas of how I could trim it using only what I had in the house. I dont think there will be another costume like this but I did my best with what I had.

There are three parts to the costume 

Bodice, Apron and Skirt

The  lace I had was quite old (I dont know how old) it was the only one that I had plenty of and you need a lot for the 1870's .The lace was a tan colour  which was no good for my costume so I decided to bleach it and see what colour it came out, to my relief it did not fall to pieces and it came out a nice creamy colour

which went very nice with the shot green.

Although I was running late I decided I would still hand sew the trim  as I dont think the sewing machine does as nice a job

I tried various ways to trim which took some time as I sewed then unpicked about three times and finally ended up with using the lace double sewn together around the neck and sleeves then added braid to hide the seam in the centre where it was joined.  

On the apron I used the trim single and put braid  on the top side to hide my stitching

I decided to make a few bows and rosettes as both were popular in the 1870's 

The skirt only has the hem tape and a six inch facing this has still to be done but as I wanted to start the next challege I decided to finish it another time.

 As I had no pattern for the bodice I researched my library and the web to get some ideas on what to do

The bodice has nine hooks and nine thread loops

The eight buttons are hand made  I do not know what you would call them except they are material circles which get a gathering stitch round to form a bowl and then stuff the edges into the bowl draw up the gathers and stitch the gap which then if you wish you can make a stem to either put through an eyelet or as I had done use them for decoration only.

The vertical trim down the bodice is there to hide the piece I had to put in as I had grown a bit since 2008.

The back of the bodice has a large bow with tails and a Rosette on the centre of the bow and the tips of the tails and the waist strap is in place.
 

 The Apron has single trim with braid on one edge I made the bows and attached them on the side

 The back with the Rosette's, I cant help feeling that they could be mistaken for the wings of a butterfly.  I started making the rosette's with a gathered piece of the main material then added two rows of the lace then the braid went on to make a nice neat edge. The buttons are trimmed with a bit of tatting I had.and the edges of the tails are trimmed with some antique lace

The rosette on the bow is slightly different as I run out of the lace but I think it still looks okay

The Challenge: 4 Embelishment

Fabric: Silk and Cotton

Pattern:  none


Year: 1873

Notions: Lace,  and very old trim

How historically accurate is it? 90%

Hours to complete: hand sewing of trim 12 hours

First worn: never
 
Total co: unknown as I had all in the house bought many years ago

1897 Corset Cover

Today I had to re draft the pattern for the Corset Cover as it was only 42" Bust and I am 46". That took me some  time but it is now finished. I then cut out the first  toille hopefully  it will fit. Tomorrow I will don my 1890's corset and see how well I have drafted.

The tiole fitted fine so it is now ready to be sewn.

The pattern called for spotted foulard which is a silk material I dont have. As I aim not to spend any monies on this garment I look through my stash and found this lovley soft cotton with a discreet shine on the right side which would do just fine. I also found the trim in my stash so the only thing I had to buy was the sewing thread.

 

 This is the finished corset cover I like it very much and will enjoy wearing it.

This is the corset cover on my dummy which still has the 1873 costume which is ready now for challenge 4

The Challenge:                       Three
Fabric:                                    Cotton Sateen
Pattern:                                   Ageless Patterns
Year:                                      1897
Notions:                                  Sateen ribbon
How historically accurate is it? 100%
Hours to complete:                  approx twenty four
First worn:                              not worn
Total cost:                               nil

Corset cover

This is what I am going to do as the underpinnings Challenge make a corset cover the one I decided on is the crossover one with bows to fasten the era is 1897. I chose this easy challenge as I had such a bad time doing my UFO.

1873 Bustle Gown

Well here it is my UFO not quite there but nearly done.  I felt like throwing it out of the window as it was so hard to pick up from where I had finished it in  2008/9 and if that was not enough I had grown somewhat as you can see from my dummy the bodice doesn't fit at all.

I will leave it now and hopefully will get it finished with all the embelishment on it which I am sure will make a big difference as you cant see any of the detail that has already been sewn.

The Challenge: UFO

Fabric: Cotton silk mixed
Pattern  Truly Victorian Parlour Skirt and Apron and the Bodice self drafted
Year: 1873
Notions to be added  at the embelishments challenge
How historically accurate is it? 85%
Hours to complete: too many to remember
First worn:  not yet
Total cost: I think the material was bought on 'special' at a very low price a number of  years before 2008

1912-15 Edwardian Evening Gown

In order to save money and reuse some beautiful old gowns that I have grown out of (as well as improve their historical accuracy), I decided to redesign my 25th Anniversary Wedding Vowel Renewal dress. I made this gown long before I had begun learning about historic garment construction. The Anniversary was a Titanic themed evening with 11 courses and 4 different wines. One wine, was the most amazing tasting champagne from New Zealand. We even had waiters to serve the meal. The entire family dressed up and each guest took on the name and persona of a person on the Titanic to add to the atmosphere. It was a lovely evening and one I will never forget.

Betty and I at my vowel renewal, showing the original dress.

Inspiration for the new design.

For the komodo sleeves and front panel.

 For the front panel. Another example.

The main inspiration for the draping of the skirt and the overall shape and sleeves.

As I said this was long before I had begun learning about historically accurate sewing. There were many aspects of this dress that I was unhappy with in my current knowledge. It was also sewn a unspecified number of years ago, in which my body has unhappy changed in some aspects. As the dress still had a lot of emotion attached to it I researched originals for ideas for a few months before beginning to pull the dress apart. I also found that I required a contrast fabric as I did not have enough of the original to make the final design. This worked out well as the contrasting dark green silk brings the dress more to life and makes it pop.

 My best friend Lynne and I at a Delhi Debar Dinner. This photo shows the front of the completed dress. The back is almost an identical copy.

 A close up of the details on the top of the bodice.

 I just love this photo with my friend Danielle, due to the contrasting colours. I also really like the composing of this photo.

Augusta Auctions 1820s Inspired Dress

While perving on the amazing creations on the Augusta Auctions website I found this amazing 1820s dress. I had previously cut out some yellow cotton damask to make a regency dress quite a few years earlier. I was inspired to dig it out of my ufo's (unfinished objects - mostly unidentifiable) pile. After digging for some time I found the cotton and with some consultation realised that it was possible to make a yellow and dusky green version of this lovely creation.

 

The original dress from the Augusta Auction website.

I had in my stash a beautiful dusky green  silk chiffon fabric that was perfect for the sleeves. Unfortunately, I did not have enough of the yellow damask cotton to create the beautiful decoration on the bottom of the skirt. I do not believe the feature would have the same impact as the stripes have in the damask (which makes me feel better for the lack of fabric).

In trying to replicate the dress I consulted with friends on the different construction techniques possible for the decorations. Most of it is bias tape and piping, which ended up looking far more complicated than it actually was. This was a wonderful and joyous thing. I did have to construct most of it by hand. This was a challenge as I am not overly confident in hand sewing due to my arthritis. It did turn out wonderfully though and I have now started to use hand sewing more, as my confidence builds. 

I also decorated a straw bonnet to go with the dress. It was shaped off an original from the Kyoto Museum book on page 160. I also used this image as inspiration for the trim placement. Overall I am very happy with the resulting dress and bonnet and look forward to being able to wear it soon.

 

The front view of the completed dress.

 The back view of the completed dress.

 Regency Bonnet

Back view of the bonnet.