Like Daddy like Daughter

A Day at the Office

I love this job.

Happy Birthday!

Today I’d like to share a rare non-sewing-related post with you all.

For as long as I can remember, my mother has just loved beautiful glass artwork. When I was a child she only owned a few vintage pieces, heirlooms that had been passed down from my great-grandmother. As the years went by (and we rugrats grew up into more cautious individuals) she gradually started purchasing pieces of her own. When she bought her house, the home I spent all of high school and much of college in, and where she lives still, she moved into a full fledged collector.

It’s an older home, nestled under the spreading branches of a half dozen mature oak trees. It is full of windows. In every room of the  house, every single exterior wall has at least one window, and in many rooms the windows stretch nearly the full length of the wall. Furniture placement has always been a challenge. My mother has never minded. She loves the natural light, and loves the beautiful views of her ancient oak trees, her hibiscus and boganvilla, the curly leaf philadendron and king sago palms, the plumbago, and the two dozen other varieties of plants growing cheerfully in her Florida garden.

And all that natural light dances off the colored glass that has found its way into every room of the house as well. There are glass vases, bowls, sculptures, and glasses everywhere – on the coffee table in the living room, on the bookshelves in the family room, above the cabinets in the kitchen, on her dresser in the master bedroom, on the shelves and filing cabinets in the home office, and perched to receive the most daylight on windowsills throughout the house.

Not long after I set up my shop on etsy, I met a glass artist there who is very close by to me here locally. We’ve met in person a few times to discuss our respective work. She is not only a talented artist but also a lovely person. So, of course, I asked her to custom design a piece for my mother for her upcoming birthday.

My mother’s home is decorated largely in rich jewel toned blues and greens. She is always in search of beautiful glass pieces that combine the two, but this has always proved a surprising challenge. Brilliant cobalt blues abound. Beautiful emerald greens are plentiful. Pieces that combine the two can scarcely be found. I asked Michele to create such a piece.

What she came up with is simply stunning! The blue and green are both brilliant shades. The hand cut sections of glass form waves of color. The patterns are irregular, asymmetrical – and yet beautifully balanced. The whole thing continues to be interesting even after gazing at it for quite some time. I was delighted to be able to present such a gift to my mother for her birthday this year, as she was to receive it! This newest piece, I’m told, was granted a space in a window sill in the living room, where the light shines through it all day.

You can see more of Michele’s work in her etsy shop and her own website.

Then, I made a skirt for Eva!

I used every possible square inch of blue fabric for my skirt, but had plenty of the black and white polka dot fabric leftover, so I made a quick skirt for my girly girl!  No pattern here, I just cut a 10″ wide strip of fabric about time and a half what I’d need to wrap around her body, and a narrower strap almost twice as long as the first.  hemmed and gathered the long strip, sewed it to the shorter one to create that flouncy look at the bottom.  Stitched up the back seam.  Folded over the top to create a casing for some elastic (which I then added, and stitched the hole closed).  Voila!

I let her try on the skirt and – the girl is well trained! – when I grabbed the camera she rushed over to the curtain we always use for a back drop.  Then, she struck so many cute poses I couldn’t pick one.  Here – enjoy a multitude of pics!

Note to self: don’t bleed on the dress

My aunt Bonnie came over this afternoon to try on the white dress – hooray!  Shortly before she came, Eva just begged to go pick blackberries in the back yard.  I always get scratched up to no end from the tiny hook shaped thorns on the blackberry bramble.  So despite a thorough handwashing, I didn’t notice that one finger was still bleeding slightly until I saw the BRIGHT red drops on Bonnie’s dress as I was attaching the hooks and eyes.

Thankfully, prompt application of hydrogen peroxide removed the stain *completely*.  We determined where the hooks and eyes should go on the neck strap, confirmed that one spot on the hem in the back needed to be straightened, and addressed the corset which was bunching slightly in the front.  All three minor issues have since been resolved and the dress is finished!

We took a few pictures when Bonnie was here this afternoon.  I hope to take better photos (with better lighting, where you can see the difference between white chiffon and white satin) soon but for the moment I will go ahead and post what I have.  Looking good, Grantie!  Looking good!

Under Dress

I’ve been in an absolute frenzy the past few days but making so much wonderful progress!  I now am far enough along on my Aunt Bonnie’s white dress to have something worth showing. 

The photos below show the foundation for the corset and bodice, as well as one of the three skirt layers.  I debated sewing all three layers directly to the outer dress.  Instead, the two layers of chiffon will be attached to the outer dress and the lining is attached here.  This way the seams can face towards each other and a finished surface is what will face towards the body, which I imagine will be more comfortable.

In the outer dress the distinction between the corset and bust will be a bit more pronounced, as they’ll be made of different fabrics.  For the under dress, different fabric wasn’t necessary and the boning runs the full length to provide the best support.  Still I think you can really begin to see the shape this dress is taking!

Progress Report

Bonnie came over Thursday afternoon to try on the test corset.  It looks like a pretty much perfect fit!  I also showed her the skirt muslin and we talked about the design a little bit more; and I have a green light to continue as planned, no further modifications needed.  Hooray!

This has taken less time and tweaking than the first dress, which makes sense since it’s the second time I’ve sewn for my aunt Bonnie, and a bit more aware of the details to fitting for her.  It’s very nice to spend less time on the pattern and get to move on to the dress!

So, Thursday afternoon and Friday morning (my days off, by the way) I got to work on the actual fabric.  All that had arrived so far was the chiffon and the fabric lining.  I didn’t even have my nice quality thread to sew with.  I cut every single piece of lining and chiffon I would need, and pinned them all together, and had them waiting in a pile.

Finally, Friday afternoon a box with all my remaining items from JoAnn’s arrived (hooray!) and I was off in a frenzy sewing and serging and ironing.  I’ve made splendid progress.  All three layers of the skirt are sewn together, and the lining for the corset and bodice is all sewn.  I’ve also cut and pinned the first of 2 layers of satin for the corset and bodice, and will hopefully have time to sew that together this evening.

No photos yet… nothing was really to a point where I could put it up on the dress form.  But I’ll take some in the next day or two I’m sure.

Creating the Corset

I’ve started working on the corset for Bonnie’s White Dress.  I used McCall’s pattern 4109 (view C) as my starting point, primarily because I already owned this pattern.  M4109 is an overbust corset, and of course we had decided to create an underbust corset, but I figured this was fine since regardless of what pattern I started with, I was going to need to alter the top edge so that it matched the pattern pieces for the dress bodice.

I started by selecting the pattern size based on Bonnie’s waist measurement (since the bust part wouldn’t be used in the end), and I traced and cut the pattern pieces in their original shape and size.  I then cut and basted together a quick muslin, using leftover linen from my first 50’s dress (I needed something stiffer than my diaper twill, and this was the strudiest fabric I had on hand already that I could part with).  The result was a loose, baggy, and downright frumpy looking corset.  This is the second time I’ve used this pattern, and it turned out insanely loose the last time as well (though at the time I blamed myself and assumed I had miscalculated the figure modifications I made).  I will remember in the future that the pattern runs larger than I want, and base my sizing on the finished garment measurements rather than the size chart.

In addition to being too large overall, the corset also widened far too high above the hips (which actually makes sense, since Bonnie has a longer torso than most women her size and height).  So, I pulled out the seams and recut my pattern pieces and fabric to a smaller size, and also adjusted a bit for that extra fullness where we didn’t need it.  The result, shown here, was a corset that fit the dress form much better (though not yet perfectly).

I didn’t actually expect to get a perfect fit while the corset still stretched over the bust of my dress form, so I put off more detailed fit modifications until after reshaping the top of the corset.  To get a line that would match up with the dress bodice, I used the final version of our pattern for the black and blue dress and pinned it right on top of the corset, and traced the line right on to my muslin.  Then I picked apart the muslin once again and traced the new lines onto the pattern pieces, checked and double checked that I’d done it right, and recut the pattern pieces and fabric.  I transferred markings from the top part of the pattern pieces to the area below the cut.  And I sewed the whole muslin together a third time!

From there I got into nit picky fit adjustments.  It involved a lot of trial and error.  I sewed a zipper into the back of the corset so I could put it on my dress form correctly.  Then I put it on the dress form and fiddled around with it a bit (pulling the loose areas tighter along one of the pairs of seams or another) to decide where I wanted to take it in.  I took it off the dress form, took in the seams, put it back on, and checked it again.  I ripped out a few of the new seams, tried taking in different spots instead, until I got the fit I wanted.  Also, the original pattern had a very blunt curve to the waist in the front, and we want more of a pointed waistline.  I redrew the pattern front and middle front pieces to come down more, cut new fabric, ripped the old pieces out and sewed the new ones in.  And I altered the pattern a bit more after the point I was at when I took this last photo.  I also decided that I don’t want that front center seam, so I cut away the seam allowance from the pattern piece and marked it to be cut on the fold.

There are probably one or two more tweeks I’ll make to it, once Bonnie comes to try it on, but I believe it’s very nearly ready!  Just for kicks, here’s a comparison of the original pattern, and what I ended up with:

Bonnie’s White Dress: The Plan

When we first started talking about the all-white dress, Bonnie’s initial comment was just how unflattering white tends to be.  We all know dark colors are slimming, and white is … not.  Plus, bright whites tend to sort of wash a person out; there are very few skin tones that are truly flattered by white, and even those tend to look better in a color.

Still, I couldn’t help but think that brides pull it off every day!  Most of the girls and women walking down the aisle where bright white, and most of them look truly lovely.  So I spent a bit of time mulling the issue over.  Does the traditional construction of wedding gowns, with fully boned corset-style bodices and full skirts, successfully compensate for the not-so-slimming color?  Are the fabrics used in wedding gowns - satins, silks, brocades, lace and chiffon – more flattering than what we normally wear?  Are we just completely BRAINWASHED to believe that brides look beautiful, regardless of how true this might be?

I believe the answer to all three of these is “yes”.

So the bridal gown was my jumping off point for creating a design for Bonnie’s white dress.  If brides can pull it off, there’s no reason why Bonnie can’t.

DESIGN #1

This is the most bridal of my ideas for Bonnie’s dress.  As you can see, this basically looks like a bridal gown, cut short at the knee.  The idea was to work with a fully boned corset as the bodice, with a halter neckline since that’s flattering to Bonnie, and a full A-line skirt.  The entire dress would be made of white satin, and I thought that adding some floral lace appliques in an asymetrical pattern, sort of sweeping down from the waist to the hem on the opposite side of the dress, would add visual interest and have a slight slimming effect.  I’d specifically imagined looking for flowers that would compliment the Hawaiian shirts the men wear on these occasions, and thought the flowers could possibly be an accent color rather than just more white.

My concerns with this design, and the reasons I kept redesigning, were that the heavy satin fabric would be too formal next to men wearing white pants and pastel Hawaiian shirts.  The gown was really going to look like a bridal gown, and might not compliment them as well as another style might.  I was also aware that the satin would probably be HOT when Bonnie performs outdoor gigs, and I thought a lighter weight fabric might be preferable.

 

DESIGN #2

 I thought it might soften the dress, and make it just slightly less formal and also less likely to induce heat stroke, if we introduced some chiffon rather than making the entire gown in satin.  Design #2 is largely the same as the first, but with a softer, chiffon skirt.  I was still thinking of a full A-line skirt with plenty of body, so I thought about possibly layering the chiffon over a single layer of heavier fabric (tafetta perhaps?) or a few layers of tulle.  Since the whole halter neck corset bodice with tulle skirt was a bit too similar to the wedding dress my cousin plans to have someday (and no doubt influenced by Bonnie describing her daughter’s plans to me) I abandoned the halter neckline and switched to a simple sweatheart neckline, with sleeves.  I figured the chiffon would do nicely for the sleeves, and sketched out two different possible shapes.  I didn’t have the same feeling of “this won’t really work for the occasion” that I did with the first dress, but as I sketched out this design various modifications came to mind.  So on to the third design.

 

DESIGN #3

 Well this is scarcely different from my second design.  The biggest change, was to work with an underbust corset and separate bodice.  Looking at my first two sketches, I couldn’t help but feel that the overbust corset was going to be less flattering.  The empire waistline is so great on Bonnie, and an underbust corset could provide that same affect.  My second sleeve concept for the dress design #2 got me thinking about a dress with a bit of a Renaissance feel.  The underbust corset and 3/4 sleeves with flounces.  Again, I pictured satin for the corset, and softer chiffon (over a lightweight but not see through fabric) for the bodice and skirt.  I think the contrast there between the sleek satin and the chiffon would have a slimming affect too.

 

DESIGN #4

 This fourth design came to mind because, as I switched to the underbust design in my third dress, I kept mulling over Bonnie’s black and blue dress that had turned out so flattering.  Why not do it again?  This fourth dress would use the same pattern from her black and blue dress.  Rather than reinvent the wheel, we’d use a tried-and-true design, and also save time and money on patterns.  I pictured satin or taffeta for the bodice, and a double layer of chiffon over an opaque lining fabric.  I got the fabulous idea here to cut the chiffon on a bias, and take full advantage of the extra movement that would provide.  I thought having two layers, the top one cut slightly shorter than the bottom, with a lettuce edge would make the whole thing very soft and feminine.  I frankly fell in love with this one once I decided on the bias cut.  I pictured the skirt moving with Bonnie when she walked, and short of fluttering in the wind when she’s doing outdoor performances.  I also imagined that this would by far be the coolest and most comfortable for wearing outdoors in the Florida summer.

I showed Bonnie all four sketches, and we talked them over a bit.  Bonnie’s first reaction was that she loved Design #3 and thought it looked very romantic.  She also agreed that the halter neckline would be cooler.  So, the final call was to kind of blend the third and fourth designs.  Our plan is to use the same bodice and halter neckline from her Black and Blue Dress, made of satin with a soft layer of chiffon on top, a fully boned satin corset through her midriff, and the double layer bias cut chiffon for the skirt.  I think it’s going to look awesome!

That’s the plan!  I’m working on a muslin for the corset now, and I’ll post about that soon.

Eva’s Clearance Dress

This is what I made for my girly with fabric bought on sale.  I did it without a pattern in a couple of hours the evening our fabric arrived.  She calls it her “puffy” dress.  It turned out a bit puffier than I’d intended, to be honest, but it’s cute nonetheless.

Like my own clearance pick, this fabric cost me just a couple of bucks and I already had the thread and elastic so the finished product was very affordable, right around $3.50 for this.  Not bad.

By the way, the boots she’s wearing in this picture are just about her favorite shoes.  She wants to wear them all the time, and can pull off the look of boots with a dress, boots with jeans, and even boots with a diaper!  That’s my girl!