Into the Archive: My Little Black Dress
I guess I’ve been sewing for quite a while now, (since mid-2005). Every now & then one of my friends will ask me how I made something & then after I’ve explained it to them, they follow up with, ‘I could never do that’. To be fair, if you’ve never sewn before it would be … Read more
This dress was the fabric’s fault
I made this dress to wear to a friend’s wedding in March. The red & navy silk brocade was a new purchase, but everything else was made with scraps & remnants already in my stash. The side drape is made with the rayon wool blend that I used for my navy strapless dress, the silk … Read more
A new dress just for the sake of it.
So I wrote this post 13 months ago. For a dress I made about 14-16 months ago. I don’t know when exactly I made it, but it was sometime during the summer of 2011-2012. But I never got around to taking photos of the dress to go with the post. This probably gives you some … Read more
Side Projects
When working on something like my Valentino copy dress, I often end up completing quite a few smaller side projects at the same time. This is just because sometimes I want to sew something that can be finished quickly & isn’t too much of a challenge. Some times it works out quite well, for a … Read more
Blue Chiffon Dress: Draping & Drafting the Overlay
The pattern for the chiffon overlay for this dress was simple & complicated at the same time. To be honest it was beyond my basic flat pattern making skills, so I decided to use a combination of drafting & draping to create the top section. First I cut out a piece of fabric (that based … Read more
Blue Chiffon Dress: Yes, there’s actually been some progress
The last month has been a bit manic, but in between all of the festive fun I’ve managed to squeeze in some work on my Valentino Copy Dress, in fact so much that it’s almost finished! OK so the photo was taken at night & the lighting isn’t that great, AND the overlay is in … Read more
Blue Chiffon Dress: Progress Update
So here’s the progress update: I’m exhausted. This dress is killing me. I spent almost all day today making teeny tiny hems all over the dress. I added it up, I had to do over 25m of teeny tiny hems. This dress uses a deceptively large amount of chiffon and it requires SO MANY HEMS. … Read more
Blue Chiffon Dress: The ‘Under Dress’
I’ve been working away on my Valentino copy dress & it’s coming along quite nicely – I’ve finished the under dress & have started work on the chiffon overlay. This is the under dress on the dress form. I haven’t hemmed it yet (waiting for my new gold shoes to arrive in the mail), but … Read more
Blue Chiffon Dress: Pattern Study
Photo credit: style.com Before I could start cutting or sewing this dress I first had to do for this dress was work out what the pattern looked like. This was pretty tricky with the limited photos I had of the dress, but I think I have now worked it out. The first thing I noticed … Read more
Next Project: Blue Chiffon Dress
There’s only a couple of months left in the year but there’s a couple of projects that I’m keen to finish. The first is an evening dress, which will probably be a fairly blatant copy of a Valentino dress I like. Here’s a photo I found of the original dress from the Valentino Couture Show … Read more
