On With The Satin Goddess

Finally I have had the time to make the pattern for the Satin Flower Dress! This dress will be one of the most complicated designs I have attempted yet. It has the scary strapless element that needs to somehow defy gravity! What I really do not want is a dress that you have to constantly keep pulling up - no-one wants to wear that! This means that the bodice needs to be very well constructed and fitted to make sure it stays in place.

How am I going to do this you may ask... well the answer is I haven't fully figured that out yet! Its a working progress. What I do know is that I will be using boning for the first time and I will be adding extra support at the bust so it can be worn without a bra. I haven't quite figured out how I am going to do that yet but I'm sure it will all work itself out in the end!

First things first - the pattern. That I can do! To draft the pattern I used the following book, which I do use for most of my pattern construction. Its a great book with excellent and clear instructions on a whole host of designs and garments. Perfect for teaching yourself pattern making - which is what I have used it for.

I made the pattern for a Strapless Princess Bodice which is essentially just adapted from the simple sloper with a few alterations for contouring. I actually forgot to take any pictures of me making the pattern (sorry!), but here is the finished article.

Front pieces for the princess seam. 

Yes I know this is upside down! For some reason every time I try to import into the blog it flips, hopefully you get the general idea. Its not a very exciting pattern piece anyway.

With my pattern finally done I was on a roll and decided to go ahead and test it out on some muslin. So here is it all cut out and ready to sew together.

Look at me being all productive! Next step is to sew this together and if all has gone to plan, which of course it very rarely does, the bodice should fit perfectly! If not stay tuned for some potentially very tricky fitting problems and see how I go about fixing them.

All comments and questions welcome!

Jive Dress in its Full Glory!

As promised here are a few pictures of me in the jive dress I created. If I use it again I will definitely be adding some more bling to make it sparkle a little more. But with the limited time frame this is as far as I got! The only change I made after the dress rehearsal was to add an extra strap across the back to stop the shoulder strap from falling off. I made the strap in nude but realized too late that it wasn't actually the color of my skin. I think I might end up changing the strap to the red color to make it part of the design as it looks a little weird. But hey ho it seemed to work at the time.

I also made a bracelet from some sequin trim I found in JoAnn's to add some sparkle to the other hand.  

The jive routine went well in the end with no major mistakes. Our first performance in public was very nerve racking but has given me a confidence boost and I look forward to our next outing! We are learning the quickstep and tango next so will probably plan on making a full length gown next. Looking forward to that!