As soon as I saw this lovely vintage dress, I just had to
have my own. And thanks to “
Make this Look” via The Sew Weekly, now I do!
And does anyone else remember this dress? I did not think of the connection until after
I completed my dress, but clearly, it was in my memory banks.
I wanted to copy the rainbow stripe look of the original,
but with less than a week, I was stuck with whatever fabric I could find at
JoAnn Fabrics.
I started with the clearance section, but nothing was
suitable. Next, I headed to the quilting
cottons. While I would have preferred a
crisp silk taffeta, I realize that was next to impossible. Besides, I needed seven yards of 45” fabric
to ensure that stripe matching was possible, and silk taffeta is a little too
expensive for a project that I am not sure will work out!
After pulling every striped fabric off the shelves that was
not completely hideous, I decided on this one.
The stripes are directional because of the thin navy line running
through each stripe, which made my cutting layout a bit of a bother. But I stuck with it.
To keep myself from going crazy, I marked the
turquoise stripes in chalk on each pattern piece for a frame of reference when cutting the second piece.
Well, I was so careful with my stripe matching, I forgot to
flip one skirt piece over while cutting out my duplicate piece. Whoops!
It’s been awhile since I made that mistake! Good thing I purchased a little extra fabric!
The original inspiration uses a lengthwise stripe and a
gathered dirndl skirt. When I purchased
Vogue 1172, I did not look very closely at the line drawing, and assumed that it was
a basic circle skirt. However, the wide
hem is created by inserting four godets between front, back, and side skirt
pieces. So, the question was, do I go
for an easy rectangle, basic circle, or hope for the best and go for the
godets?
Before cutting, I drew some very rough sketches of the dress
with crazy grainlines going every which way.
Most girls are told to avoid horizontal stripes at all costs, and I
would normally fall into this category.
However, when multiple crinolines are involved, anything goes.
And since I was messing with grainline, I decided that
lining the bodice with pieces cut on the suggested grain was a good idea. Being in a colorful mindset, I went with a
bit of color-blocking. Actually, the
navy colored cotton was out of stock, or at least, not to be found, and since I could
not decide between the two colors, I went ahead and used both.
On my fabric searching expedition, I wandered up the button
aisle, and found this lovely button. It
was the last of its kind, and I decided to rescue it. I decided I would make a little brooch for my
dress, which I had planned to place at the center front v-neck. But it just did not look right with my red
buckle (pulled from the stash) which worked to break up the stripes a bit. That, and it was easier than using a kit to
make a self-fabric one.
I cannot decide if I look like lawn chair furniture, or 1950s does nautical . . . but whatever it may be, I am very pleased with the
outcome.
And for your twirling pleasure – this is what seven yards of
fabric looks like!
Shoes: Seychelles “Babydoll”
in Off White
Fishnets: Hue
Crinolines: Made by
me + tea length crinoline purchased on ebay
Earrings: Rummage
sale. (I really loves these earrings,
but they have proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that clip-ons are EVIL. One of these days I will get around to
swapping out the devil’s clip with a post.)
