1860's day gown success

Yesterday was Gaskell's and Dickens Faire, we had such a great time.

The day gown was a huge success, it was comfortable and turned out quite lovely.

Ballgown bodice did not get completed, but I was ok with that. I would rather finish it up for the next Gaskell's rather than rush and get myself upset over it. So here are some pictures of the gown in action.

Maricica and I at Dicken's Faire.

Shot of the whole dress.

Here I am with my two boys. Robert is the one on the left in his little 18th century outfit, and Mathew is on my right. Mathew doesn't do pictures so I had to sit there smiling until he was distracted enough to stand still...

And now I have a pile of unfinished projects that I will work on completing after a week or so off from sewing.

Happy Holidays everyone.

1860's Day Bodice

After hours of sewing on hooks and eyes down the front. I have a finished daygown bodice.

I will probably add a little lace to the collar and potentially to the cuffs.

I may add a couple of buttons or somthing to the back.

Now onward to see if I can actually finish the ballgown bodice. If not then I can shoot for the Jan PEERS dance to have it done by.

1860's bodice update.

So after a couple of days of wrestling with the stripes of my day gown bodice I decided to go ahead and make the ball gown bodice to keep my momentum going.

Mock up of ballgown bodice.

The front comes down a little further than I would like but over all the mockup fit really well.

And here is the front view.

And a side view.

So now I need to add boning, sleeves, lining, and a bertha or somthing. Oh and hooks and eyes to the back. Then I will have a nice little ballgown bodice to go with my pretty skirt.

After I got this far it was time to suck it up and get back to the daygown bodice.

First I recut pretty much the entire thing...

While recutting I thought, gee I really like chevron fronts... and so I cut the front pieces differntly this time.

Then I began to panic because matching the stripes had been so incredibly difficult the whole time. These thick stripes are really unforgiving. But At this point I only had enough fabric for one more mistake so I continued forward figuring that I was saving the other pieces just in case.

And I am proud to say that I think I mostly won against the stripes.

Here is the back view now.

The fabric is folded a bit so you can't see how well they actually do match up.

And the front.

The only issue now is the sides because there was just no way that I could really match the stripes at all of the seams.

So the vertical runs into the horizontal, but I have decided that I can live with it.

And I am quite pleased that the back side seams meet so much better than before.

Now I need to add the boning, lining, and front closures to this one as well.

One week and 2 bodices that are about %75 completed. Heading into the homestretch....

1860's Skirt Complete

This evening I finished the last few things on my skirt. My weekends have been pretty full so I tend to sew in little increments of time here and there. I am quite pleased with how it turned out.

And here is a close up of the ruffle and trim.

I was so happy I almost began madly ripping out the stitches in the bodice in order to recut the pieces. Then I was actually smart and remembered that I have not cut out my sleeves yet. So I am going to do mock up sleeves then the actual sleeves and only then if I still have fabric left will I recut my bodice. And if the fabric gods are kind to me and I still have some left then I can entertain ideas of a matching ballgown bodice.

*Gleefully rubs hands together*

2 weeks left to complete.

1860's Day Bodice Progress

Thursday night I purchased my string and made my piping for the bodice. Funny how such a small thing like piping makes such a difference on garb. This is something in general I would usually consider skipping in the past. However during my past year of actually studying the garments and learning to appreciate the workmanship ect. I am happy that I took the extra hour to add it.

Here is my piping, since Khestral would not leave my sewing table, I decided he would be my backdrop for the piping.

I don't know if the piping made a huge enough difference for me to actually like how the stripes look on the back.

last night I  sewed the bodice together at the shoulders,  then I discovered that if I redo the front pieces I can in fact get the stripes to match at the shoulders and have a cool chevron effect instead of the weird thing that I have now.

I do really llike the overall shape of the bodice.

So I have about 4 yards of fabric left and really want to add a ruffle with the stripes diagonal to the vertical stripes. I am going to put the bodice aside and complete the skirt, then if I have fabric and time I am going to redo this puppy until I love it.

That will also give me time to decie whether I would like buttons or hooks and eyes for my front closure. I am leaning a bit towards buttons right now...

 Still 2 weeks left to futz over it.