False Colette Peony Dress

After the dress it took ages, I believe I managed another record: to sew a winter dress with a minimum fabric. I had a small rest of 1m of dark-brown wool which I bought during the sales for 3 euros. After pre-shrinking it, I got to about 95cm. Originally, I wanted to use it with some other rests to make a mixed colours dress, but I liked its texture and wanted to make another basic dress.

The Colette Peony dress is something I was eyeing for some time, but after reflection, I do not think there is anything special on it to justify buying the pdf pattern. Therefore I decided to copy it based on the Burda Parisian dress.

The Burda Parisian dress was one of the first ones I have made a year ago, without a muslin, at that point of time. This time, knowing I could not allow myself to make any mistake due to the lack of fabric, I muslined everything properly, including the skirt and sleeves length.

I used an A skirt with darts on the back, as well as on the front. Therefore, I added the front darts on the bodice to match the skirt, and eventually decreased the size of the side darts. I also wanted the pockets, as it is something I often lack on my dresses.

Here is the picture showing how just I was on cutting out the fabric. I have to admit that I might have a few rests of the fabric, no larger than a few square centimeters.

The dress is fully lined: with a black cotton-silk on the bodice and black rayon on the skirt. On another wool dress (unblogged so far), as well as on my original Parisian dress I did not put any skirt lining and I feel the skirt tends to stick to my tights.

So there we go: the dress which in the end costs the price of Colette Peony dress :o)

Inspiration: Colette Peony

Pattern: Burda Parisian dress

Pattern changes: bodice adjustments, skirt

Technique: matching the darts

Fabric: dark brown wool, cotton-silk for bodice lining, rayon for skirt lining

Time to Complete: 3 weeks

Total Cost: 18 EUR

Basics winter sewing - black wool crepe dress

I am constantly divided between all those great colorful and original dresses I see on the blogosphere which motivate me to create some as well and the fact that I primarily sew working clothes. With limited time dedicated to sewing, and almost zero possibility to find appropriate clothes (read clothes I do not have to adjust to my size and I like the colour and cut), the choice is quickly made.

So here we go with a next “basics”. Put in some black wool crepe from Laurent Garigue, a proven pattern (Butterick 6016), add a pair of sleeves and I do not ask for much more.

Not so many adjustments needed, just plain and quick sewing. The dress is lined with a rest of the flower silk, which I also used for the hem. Again, the wool crepe is forgiving but needs to be handled carefully to prevent fraying.

The black was really difficult to photograph, moreover with a new flash my photograph got last week. So the preparations took some time and … I got bored.

OK, enough talking, here is the finished dress:

Inspiration: …

Pattern: Butterick 6016 with sleeves

Pattern changes: sleeves

Technique: nothing special

Fabric: black wool crepe

Time to Complete: 2 weeks

Total Cost: 31 EUR

The dress it took ages to finish

And when I say ages, I mean ages: almost 30 hours of work, to be exact, all-in-all over a month to finish it, knowing that I do have a full time job and sew only on week-ends and rarely during the week.

Moreover, contrary to my usual sewing, this dress does not even have lining. Although the lining choice could have saved me some time in the end.

So why, WHY did it take so long?

First of all, this was my first designer dress from the Vogue collection. As a traditional Burda sewer, I discovered Butterick last spring and was pleasantly surprised by the fit. I still need to do some adjustments, but do not encounter Burda’s plunging necklines and large shoulders. I tend to sew, and wear, always the same style, so the Ralph Rucci V1317 seemed like an interesting innovation. Still a business dress, but a DIFFERENT one.

I have seen very different versions on the internet, from a very fine fabric, to false suede (which, btw, is one of the recommended fabrics). I took some risk and tried to sew it from a great violet wool crepe.

Wool crepe, you say, so fluid fabric, but also a lot of fraying. The pattern does not include lining and since it took me at least 2 days to understand how all the pattern pieces should be assembled, I decided to follow it and not to put the lining in.

Which meant: another solution to prevent the fraying: Hongkong binding, or something similar. Add to this the double stitching and the result is clear:

Every seam had to be sewn 4 times:

-       One for the seam itself

-       One for adding the binding

-       Plus the double stitching (attaching the binding at the same time)

All this on often curvy seams….

I was not 100% convinced by the model (round shoulders… hmmm, not quite my style, it makes me thinking of the 90’s), until I have sewn the kaliko. And there, the revelation: this dress could turn out pretty well. I guess I was this revelation moment which actually motivated me to finish the dress, because what came next was a serious attempt to lose my sewing mojo.

If you have narrow shoulders and a short back like me, this is not a model where adjusting is simple. Fortunately, the wool is somehow forgiving a few imperfections. I remember having adjusted the pattern correctly on the kaliko, but on the final model I still ended up taking in an inch or so in the shoulder area.

Then came the craziness with the binded seams, and I can tell you, I had a great training!

OK, let’s stop complaining and get to the positive side:

I have managed to finish this dress and turned out quite OK.

The colour is just beautiful, the double, or triple topstitching is perfectly visible on the dress and the fit is better than expected. I now also have a big stock of violet thread, as I was afraid of running out of it :o)

The only thing I am still hesitating on is the waistband. Put it on the front, in the back, or cut it out? Not sure.

To sum up: great pattern, great challenge, original dress and certainly going to buy some Vogue in the next weeks.

And of course with the Vogue pose:

Inspiration: Ralph Rucci

Pattern: Vogue 1317

Pattern changes: waist adjustment, shortening body part, only one pocket

Technique: Hongkong binding

Fabric: violet wool crepe

Time to Complete: 6 weeks, probably

Total Cost: 46 EUR

Black Flower Silk Dress

Or my most expensive dress so far.

I was eyeing this pattern since this spring, which I saw for the first time at Marie in the cave. I really liked the strict image of the dress and the large skirt. However, I ventured to do a few modifications.

Apart from the usual fitting issues, shortening the bust and straightening the shoulder area, I also shortened the sleeves and changed completely the skirt (as Marie did). The original pattern wanted a straight skirt, which is not particularly my favourite. I changed it to my usual semi-circle one.

 

I was hesitating to sew this dress for a long time since I wanted to have it with the perfect fabric. Finally I found the right fabric – black crepe de chine with little flowers, but for a full price. I have bought 3 meters of fabric and fortunately I did so. The fabric seems quite fine and semi-transparent. In the end, I doubled the skirt with the fashion fabric and lined the body with black cotton-silk.

It was kind of interesting and changed from my usual sewing habits to sew the standing collar, as well as the button strip.  I am getting used to sewing with silk so the slippery fabric is no longer a surprise for me, I would even say that I am having a certain pleasure with this challenge. A nice final (or more first) touch was sewing the pintucks, even though they are not very visible on the dress.

I have made a big mistake when attaching the front body parts and made the man opening instead of the female one. Oh well…. It happened.

Inspiration: Marie in the cave

Pattern: Burda 109-01/2010

Pattern changes: waist adjustment, shortening body part, semi-circle skirt

Technique: pintucks, stand collar

Fabric: black flower silk + black cotton-silk as lining

Time to Complete: 2 weeks

Total Cost: 80 EUR

First Worn: November 2014