top: self-made, pattern here // dress: thrifted // boots: Hunters // knee socks: Target
Renfrew is awesome. That is all.
Actually I lied. That’s not all. I can’t for the life of me get the neckband to stay flat in the center front. It’s fine all the way around but keeps wanting to stick out in the front. Am I not pulling it tight enough in that area?
Halp!
(Five days to freedom! Thanks for all the good wishes!)
dress: self-made, pattern here // belt: thrifted // boots: Boutique9
My Master’s thesis-y capstone paper thing is due in exactly eight days. Not scary at all.
Actually, I’m nearly done. All the tough writing stuff is done, I just have to go through and fix some formatting, do some last-minute proofreading, and add in a couple references. Oh, and write an introduction. I’m crossing my fingers but I should be done in a few days.
On to the dress! I’d been wanting a lacy springy dress for about two years and finally decided I needed to just make one. I had originally cut the smallest size, which was a little tight in the bust, so I decided to re-cut a size 4 in the bust graded down to a size 2 in the waist. This turned out to be overkill. Whenever I get motivated enough to cut it a third time, I need to cut a size 2 bust graded to a size 1 waist. Get on that, self!
Since I was using a lace overlay with a lining, I omitted the neckline band. I also lowered the back neckline by a few inches to give it kind of a leotard-esque feel. I wanted the skirt to be a bit fuller but I cut it kind of stupidly so most of the extra material swings around the hips. Oh well.
Ok, back to editing.
PS If you didn’t already see, I announced the winner to the Sew Fun giveaway one post back!
dress: self-made, pattern here, fabric here // shoes: Swedish Hasbeens // glasses: Bonlook // watch: Fossil
We’ve all had our fair share of adventures in fitting. Sometimes patterns fit really great right out of the package and sometimes a lot of tweaking is involved. Some of us learn how to do FBAs and others of us (me) just wear bras with more or less padding as needed.
And sometimes patterns require so much tweaking and fiddling that you start wondering whether you’re shaped like a blob with one boob bigger than the other and arms coming out of your navel and how come this dress looks so effortless flattering on everybody else?!
Ok, I’m exaggerating a little but there was a fair bit of frustration that came along with making this dress. I’m pretty sure this was entirely user error because all of the ones I’ve drooled over have been absolutely gorgeous and no one else seems to have run into the issues I did. First the waist was too big. This happens a lot so I took it in some. But then the shoulders were gaping a bit so I took it in there. And then somehow the shoulders were gaping more. And then there was the skirt being too bulky, so I had to detach it and cut it into wedges* rather than rectangles. I’m almost positive I cut the smallest size but there’s a tiny chance I went a size up in which case that would be the issue.
Finally after lots of tweaking I ended up with something mostly wearable. I’m still not 100% happy with the fit so I might take it apart again and tweak. But not right now. Too soon.
By the way, how cute is this fabric?? Sarah’s got it in basically the entire rainbow and I’m pretty sure I need a romper with excessive bows in the turquoise one.
Anyway, this is actually my third version/attempt at this dress. The first one failed epically because the design I had in mind ended up being hideous. The second one is a surprise and has so far turned out AWESOME and I can’t wait to share. Except now I’ve jinxed it. Oh dear.
PS Don’t forget to enter my Sew Fun giveaway by Sunday! I’ve had so much fun reading everyone’s childhood crafting stories and you guys have been reminding me of a bunch of craft stuff I used to be into that I completely forgot about that I’m now majorly nostalgic over.
*I have no idea whether this is the right word for what I mean. Imagine a wide slice of pizza that someone’s taken a bit out of. Now make two of them and cut one in half vertically. That’s what the skirt pieces look like.
My sister and I often joke about how living together would save us a ton of money because we own so much of the same stuff. Despite having entirely different styles at least a third of our wardrobes are identical and, off the top of my head, we also have the same slow cooker, curling wand, gym bag, yogurt maker, etc. We think it’s ok because we live literally across the country from each other. She’s in San Francisco while I’m out here in Boston.
So when it came time to talk Christmas presents and she made a few sewn garment requests (she got an Archer and one of these peplum tops), I couldn’t resist making one for me too.
The pattern is Vogue 8815 (recommended by the Crafty Foxes), which I absolutely love. It’s meant for wovens but I just took it in a little at the seams and it worked out perfectly. I used a heavy knit with only a tiny bit of stretch so no zipper needed. Can’t argue with a top that takes twenty minutes to put together.
I have all sorts of plans for other versions of this pattern: one with a collar, one with some kind of a lace overlay, one with beading on the peplum and cap-sleeves, one with an exposed zipper, maybe one with a deep V slashed in the front, one with long sleeves.
My only issue with peplum tops is that I always find myself defaulting to pairing them with jeans. I’ve tried the skirt thing and it just felt like I was trying too hard and not quite pulling it off. Plus apparently you’re only supposed to wear them with more fitted skirts, which I feel weird wearing.
Anyone else have this issue?
dress: self-made // shoes: Seychelles // tights: F21
Everyone, meet Birthday Dress!
I’ve been so excited to share this and I pretty much ran right upstairs to take photos within three minutes of the last stitch. Did I mention it’s about 30 degrees outside? I had a severely runny nose by the end. Yikes.
Anyway, I can’t remember where exactly at the moment, but I saw this dress a few weeks ago (probably on Pinterest, actually) and decided right then and there that it was going to be birthday dress. I already knew I would use McCall 6646 and figured the black fabric wouldn’t be too hard to find, so I went to work looking up what types of beads to use.
Photo from Modcloth.com
I looked at Etsy, Joann’s, Fire Mountain Gems, and Sewfisticated and ended up cobbling together a nice selection of the necessary beads. If you look at the closeups you’ll see that there’s bugle beads outlining the curlicues and then inside them, it alternates one larger bead and three small seed beads. There seem to be three types of larger beads that are randomly alternating: pearls, montee rhinestones, and some sort of faceted bead. I had some pearls left over from a previous project and for some reason Sewfisticated sells 20g bags of 1/4″ bugle beads for $0.49 so those were easy. I decided to use bicone Swarovski knockoffs from Joann’s and then found these guys on Etsy.
The dress itself was pretty easy to put together but I got a little too excited and sort of jumped the gun and put the bottom half of the dress together before I actually bought the chiffon for the top bit, which meant that that was much more difficult to attach. Whoops. It worked out though! I just ended up making some bias tape out of the chiffon (SO much fun, guys) and reinforcing the heart-shaped neckline with it to conceal where the chiffon top attached.
Anyways, I’m incredibly relieved that I managed to get it done in time! My actual birthday was on Wednesday (27 – yikes!) but a super busy week means we’re doing celebrations tonight instead.
Have a lovely weekend, everyone!