Finished

So the Sleepy Hollow dress is finished, photographs will follow of the finished dress but i havent got round to taking any good ones yet.

I have yet to find any fabric that will look good on the sleepy hollow riding dress, so that will be put on hold until that appears unfortunatley. My next project is a Robe ala francaise.



I bought a few metres of this fabric off ebay. Its a grey/blue colour with a gold apple tree pattern. Its really nice. Unfortunatley there wasnt very much available so i may have to deviate from history a bit and just make a dress out of whats there and hope it looks like a proper Robe ala francais. Thats cosutming on a budget for you.




The stomacher and underskirt are going to be made from the stock of fabric that i have that i used to make this pink dress out of ( on the left worn by esther)
I think the contrast between the grey blue and the pink will look nice. I hope anyway. We will see :)

I have broken up from school now and only have two exams left to revise for, so i should be able to do this dress quite easily over the next couple of weeks in the breaks from my revision :)
Its nice to have something fun to do in my breaks.

I will post some progress asap as well as the photos of the stripey dress.

Sleeves finished

As promised, here are photos of current progress.
Sleeve trims are finished and the first layer of pleating on the skirt is finished.

Shoes

I was looking through screen caps of Aristocrats on 'The Period Movie Review' blog, and i noticed in this shot the character, emily i think, shoes are visible. And is it just me or are they remarkably similar to the shoes i just bought with the ribbons and everything...

(click on image for larger picture i dont know how well you can see them)

Maybe they are more historically correct than i once thought... although maybe i shouldnt be basing this on a tv series, but still makes me feel even better about them :)

Oh and update on the sleepy hollow dress, i have almost finished all the trimming and edging on the dress and the pleats on the underskit so photos will follow once its all done.
Then i just need to sew on hooks and eyes etc to fasten it all and its done :) yay.

I added the trim to the neckline last night. I think the stripes on my dress are a bit thicker than that on the real thing because the trim looks a bit wider. Ah well. It doesnt looks so bad. I left off the white frayed organza from the trim though, because it didnt look very good, which okay isnt accurate to the original cosutme but i am also wanting it to look good aswell as accurate so you know. Also, i havent found any black lace to put around the neckline that looks right so that might have to just be put on when i find it. Other than that its alright.

Fitting

So i tried the dress on for the first time since i sewed the skirt on. Plus i hitched it up. So heres a couple of photos that my mum took on the first proper fitting. The sleeves arent done, obviously, and the skirts need hemmed, and the back of the skirt isnt exactly the same as the film one but...it was my first try at an en fourreau back!. Plus the Stomacher is too flimsy so it creases alot, so i think i will put some boning or interfacing or something in it to keep it straight.
Other than that though, i am rather ridiculously pleased with how its looking :)

Stripey Dress

So i have been working a bit more on the stripey dress, and for one afternoons sewing i am quite surprised about how much i have got done. It's coming together quicker than i thought it would. Although i think one thing that will take a long time will be all the trimming and stuff, but i am not up to that yet.
Anyway, yes i drafted the pattern for the bodice and it fit perfectly so i started with the real fabric.



So once i had amde the pattern and cut out the fabric for the bodice i sewed it all together, and then i attempted my first 'En fourreau' back, and i reallly like how it turned out. It might not be exactly the right way to do it, but it worked for the dress so i'm happy. Also, the stripes made it quite easy to pleat the back and get it the right size, which was helpful :)

I have also now added the skirt to the bodice aswell, which is kind of in the wrong order as i havent sewn the lining of the bodice yet, and yes i am getting a bit carried away because i am excited about finally starting it, but it will be fine.
So heres some photos of how it looks so far. Obviously the skirt isnt hitched up yet or anything.

Underskirt

So i have finally got round to making some progress on the stripey sleepy holloy dress, I started sewing the underskirt last night. So i have never actually worn a bumroll before underneath my dresses so i am vaguely excited about that, as it will give it a better shape (although i am a tad worried the one i have is too big, but we will see) but it also made it slightly more difficult to pleat the skirt. So i started by just pleating the skirt straight into the waistband as i would if i were doing a flat skirt, but of corse because of the added shape of the bum roll, it just didnt work. So i decided to actually pleat and shape the skirt straight onto the model and hopefully that will help me get the right shape. Anyway, here are some photographs of the progress i have made so far. I think it looks okay with the bumroll?







p.s sorry about the darkness of the photographs, it was night time at this point and the light in my living room isnt that good for photographs.

The shoes have arrived!

The shoes that i ordered arrived this afternoon!



They are pretty nice actually :)

So i finished my history coursework yesterday afternoon and i decided i would have an evening of sewing as a reward :) So i managed to get a fair bit done on my stays, sewed all the boning and then started putting it together. i am pretty happy with the way its looking at the minute. i was a bit worried the fabric would be too thick but i think it actually works well for it. The last time i made some stays i made them my dress size and they were slightly too loose, even when laced so that the back was fully together, so this time i made the size smaller because then i can tighten it with the lacings at the back and it will mean i can have it tighter or looser as i please.


The bottom flap things arent properly shaped yet and they havent been binded or anything. Not too far off finishing i dont think :)

Before the summer i have decided to make a new pair of Georgian
stays because my old ones arent very good and are a bit too big now.
I had a panel of fabric that i bought because it was really beautiful but i didnt know what to do with it because it was quite a thin panel that there wasnt enough of to make a dress or a jacket. So i have decided to use this fabric for my new stays.
Heres a photo of it all cut out



And heres a closeup of the jacquard flower weave;



It might take me a bit longer than usual to complete these because of work, revision etc but i will work on them in my breaks between owrk and hopefully get them finished before i break up for the summer, ready for the enw dresses i want to make.

Shoes!

So i have been looking for 18th century style shoes to wear with my costumes forEVER, but i think i have finally found something that could work :)
I found these on ebay;



for only £15, which isnt so bad. Now, okay the ribbon on the front looks a bit tacky and not right etc, and they are just wedding shoes so they arent historically correct or anything. But i think if i took the ribbon off, added a buckle or something and maybe dyed it...well I might be onto something...