We got together last weekend to work on the wedding dress. Here, more or less, is how that feat happened:

"Hi, are we still on for this weekend?"
   "Tom can't make it. He has Suzuki recitals all weekend."
"Ah. Well, Teresa can't be here, either. She'll be in Seattle, judging a barrista competition."
  "Ok. Well, when's the next time we'll all be together?"
"Not till June, I think."

Silence.

"We only have 14 weekends left until the wedding. We won't be able to get together for all of them. Maybe we should get together this weekend anyway."
  "Yeah, I think we better do what we can even if Teresa won't be there."

Jenny Drafting the Bodice Overlay Pattern

Alas, my car is bunk, and unreliable. And so it came to pass that Mary drove after work on Friday to pick me up after my work day was done, to bring me back to St. Paul, to put in some focused creativity time on the dress. It was a rainy, cold weekend, and Mary's workspace is bright and airy, with lots of big windows overlooking a lovely perennial garden and the street and sidewalk below. It was cozy and comfortable indoors, and felt really good to be working together on this beautiful project.

Saturday morning we set to work: we needed to draft patterns for the foofy layers that will go over the main skirt. We actually tried different pattern combinations with each layer, at first cutting several narrow pieces for the tulle layer, then moving to larger pieces and fewer of them for the next overlays. In the end, we realized that the larger pieces worked the best - that's really helpful because that will cut down on seams to sew and pieces to gather - a big time-saver. And probably makes a more elegant silhouette as well.

Ta Da!  Success!

On Saturday we realized that our mannequin was not up to her task - she began dropping screws out of her platform, and became so wobbly that we couldn't rely on her to hold up the dress any longer. To be fair, she was never meant to be used as a dressmaker's form - she was always a lightweight prop, asked to do more than she was capable of. We decided to pick up a real dressmaker's form, and got a good deal on a nice one from JoAnn's. So our woozy prop was given early retirement, and as I write, she is back home with me, holding up scarves for me to choose from as I wish. She's tipsy, it's true, but she doesn't give up!

Bodice with Overlay

Once our new, sturdy dressmaker's form was put together, we were able to put the bodice and skirt layers on the form and began to get a sense of how the pieces were going to work together. And they looked great! We got the bodice and skirt layers joined on Sunday morning, then spent some time playing around with appliques, and were very pleased with our progress.

Bodice with Appliques

Side View of Bodice

And let me just say, it's really amazing how beautiful cotton muslin, overlayed with repurposed polyester curtains can be! 

Draft Dress Side View

Draft Dress Back

Draft Dress Front

A Photo Essay of the Progress so Far

These are photos from our first few sewing sessions. They illustrate the creative process we've worked through to get to the draft of the dress we are currently working from.

Possible Lace Overlay 1

Another View of Lace Overlay 1

Possible Lace Overlay 2

Base Pattern Number 1: The Drop Waist

The Veil Pattern

Possible Lace Option #3

Possible Lace Option #4

The Skirt and Bodice Patterns to Fit

The Skirt and Bodice Patterns View 2

Skirt and Bodice Patterns View from Back

Laying Out the Muslin

The Train Piece

The Muslin Draft #1

The Muslin Draft #1 From Back

Possible Bustle #1

Possible Bustle #2

Bustled Dress From Front

Bustled Dress From Back

Give Me Time

March 1-2, 2014

Our constant problem is the ticking of the clock as it whittles away at our ability to accomplish the tasks we've set for ourselves.

Our New Favorite Tool: Fabric Weight

We began the weekend by looking over our notes from the previous sewing session. We had purchased new needles size 60s and wanted to know if they would make any difference with the silk. To our disappointment, they did not.  We went back to our tried and trusted 70/8 Microtex sharps.  We also found we preferred the sulky viscose rayon to the silk thread I bought.  We may still want the finer needles when sewing the chiffon and gossamer layers.  We'll have to wait and see.

Jenny hard at work

We went out and bought boning for the bodice, and got to work assembling the new pattern.  But before we could get to making the bodice out of silk, we began working on added panels to the satin skirt.  Teresa wanted a fuller look, so we took it apart and created new panels.  We made 4 more panels that are self-lined, but time ran out before we could sew the panels back together.

These panels have a back and front to them because the silk wrinkles easily and the right side has fewer wrinkles.  We also noted that we need to remember several things when we put the dress together:

• We need to build in spaghetti straps to the bodice.
• We need to build in hanging straps to the dress.
• We are worried that we might need to buy more silk for the bodice to have it self lined because we used more than we planned to make the skirt.

New Top with Crinoline

However, we did make a list of accomplishments:

1. We lengthened the bodice, and it fits great.
2. We gathered the side seams on the bodice to make darts. This gave it a nicer shape.  

When put into a list, it seems a small a set of accomplishments!

New Back of Dress

Things we need to consider:
We need to sew the muslin bodice to the muslin skirt to fit it to Teresa without clips.
We need to start working on the gossamer and chiffon layers to practice sewing on them.

New Front of Dress 

Teresa needs to wear exactly what she plans to wear under the dress from now on so we can be sure the fitting is exact.

Our goals for next time:
1. Piece together the skirt
2. Play with the sheer layers.
3. Make the real bodice of silk.
4. Decide on the sheer overlay for the bodice--spaghetti straps or satin?
5. Begin the appliqué applications.

The More Things Change...

We had been full of hope and optimism after our early success with the muslin, and although we knew not to say out loud that we expected things to go smoothly, we were clearly both thinking that we had this dress in the bag, so to speak.

Appliques

With Stephanie's wedding dress, we learned the laws of karma dictated any time we predicted how far we would get or how many hours we had left before the dress would be finished would be compensated with like number of hours redoing our work, ripping out stitches, or shopping for supplies.  We knew this, and so neither dared to say it out loud, yet we both expected to get the dress nearly done in the weekend. 

That was our first mistake.

We came away a bit shaken at our mistakes.  And yet, looking back, we spent over 100 total hours on Stephanie's dress. What made us think that the second go-round would really be any different?

Dress Top 1.0

We had run into difficulties sewing the pieces together.  The needles seemed to be too big, and were causing little runs in the fabric, no matter what size we chose.  We were alarmed at our mistakes, but we regrouped and made notes. Lots of notes.  We made lists of things for the next sewing session and lists of our worries for the future

NEEDS

• We needed different needles or maybe different thread, or both. Maybe 70/10 sharps? 40 Wt thread?
• We needed a scissor sharpener. It's amazing how dull they get and how quickly!
• Bobbins. We never seem to have enough.
• Hem lace. If we are going to add length to the dress with lace, we need to find the lace to match at Treadle.
• Need to get pearls for the dress--cream/off white, small, irregular
• Need boning for the bodice
• Dress form. We had a mini-me for Stephanie, but with Teresa living nearby, we didn't make one. A mannequin would give us something to work off.
• Need to make a hoop skirt?  We were using the crinoline from Stephanie's dress, but we discussed making our own hoop. We'd had one before Stephanie's wedding, but it got damaged in the wash. It was over 50 years old. We found ourselves wishing we'd repaired it instead of using the crinoline. We may be making our own hoop skirt yet.
• Practice material--chiffon-y for the layers practice

WORRIES

• Sewing on super fine fabric.
• The bodice: We need to lengthen it, create sweetheart neckline, figure out the gossamer over-layer, and the appliques.  
• How much length do we need to add to each layer so that they are long enough?
• What to do about the weight of the fabric?  

NEXT STEPS

• Our next steps are to figure out the bodice.  
• We will need to create a new pattern, and then make the silk bodice. 
• We also need to make sure the gathering on the skirt matches the new bodice. Then, we need to begin looking at the skirt layers.  
• We will want to add extra panels to the skirt to make it fuller.  
• We want to see about adding 2 layers of gossamer instead of just one, plus the organza and the chiffon.

Great Expectations!

We got together again the first weekend of March. This time we planned to Make the Entire Bodice. We had scaled down our expectations a bit from the last time. We were confident we'd be able to get this done; we only had to lengthen the bodice, make sure it fit to the skirt, fit it as perfectly as possible to Teresa, and voila! Bodice finished! Sewn to skirt! We have a wedding dress!

Dress Top 2.0

First we had Teresa put on the muslin bodice and silk skirt, and took measurements. We decided to add 4 inches to the length of the bodice, to give us a little wiggle room for sewing it all together.

Meanwhile, we asked Teresa what she thought of the skirt, now that it was sewn together. Um... Could it be fuller? Yes, sure, absolutely, it can be fuller! Hmmm, which piece should we use to make it so? We had a choice of two side panels we could use, one being fuller to begin with than the other. We decided on the fuller piece because that piece had the curve to the train built in. I was charged with redrawing the hemline to match it up with the existing side panel, not hard to do, and we were very pleased to have the pieces cut out and fitting into the skirt perfectly.

Now for the bodice. We needed 4 inches added to each piece, doubles of each piece for the self lining, and we needed to line things up properly with the grain. We decided to make another muslin of the bodice, since it was to be a new one entirely.

New Length of Dress

Note to self: cutting and pasting is easier in a word document than it is on a tissue pattern and muslin material. I'm just saying it took longer than I expected; I expected it to take minutes to stretch out the pattern pieces, and it took much longer. In my defense, I wasn't good at geometry in school, school was years ago, and I was being careful. Trying to think of everything that could go wrong. Listening to that little voice that I ignored last time.

I think taking such care panned out - the bodice went together beautifully. It fit Teresa beautifully. And it fit the skirt beautifully. Oh, and the lengths of skirt and bodice were - perfect.

But now it was once again Sunday night and we were finished for the weekend. We didn't get to the silk bodice at all. And we realized we're not ready to sew it all together, either. We need to plan out the foofy layers that go over the silk, both skirt and bodice. And there are all the appliques...

 We took some more notes, packed things away, and planned for our next get-together.

What's That Whispering In My Ear?

We got together with the high hopes of: Making The Entire Dress, during the first weekend of February. And why shouldn't we be so hopeful? We experienced fabulous success with the muslin, and we were going to be meticulously careful about fitting muslin pieces to silk. It was going to be a one-to-one switch, very straightforward, relatively easy.

Jenny Ironing the Sil

I (Jenny, sister of Mary, aunt of Teresa), was to lay out the pattern pieces and cut out the silk. We thought it best to cut out the biggest pieces first, so we put the train piece out to cut. Um... this can't be right. Mary? Why doesn't this train piece fit on this bolt of silk?

After serious consultation, we realized that the muslin was over 100 inches wide, which meant we could cut it out in one piece, and not on a fold as directed by the pattern piece. The silk, however, was rather shy of 100 inches, and the train would not fit in one piece. We needed to fold the muslin pattern piece in half, add on the seam allowance, and cut 4 pieces. (We learned from making Stephanie's dress that a self-lining of the silk makes a much more beautiful fabric, so we needed to double the number of pieces to cut.)

Whew! Still plenty of silk for the rest of the skirt! I next cut doubles of the front piece, and then the side panels. Then we started putting them together, first matching up like pieces for the self-lining, then matching pieces to each other to make the skirt.

Um.. Mary? Why don't these fit? What's going on? What did I do wrong? Did I just waste a bolt of silk? Oh, no! I should have flipped some of the side panels to match the curving line that goes from the front of the skirt to the train! Aaaagh!

Appliques

More consultations. We decided I could come down from my tree, and set the wrong cuts aside, cut new pieces from the silk that was left, and we'll worry about the bodice silk later. Ugh! I was so mad at myself, because there had been a tiny voice in the back of my head, asking querulously, "Shouldn't we be watching the curve of the pieces? Shouldn't we be making sure the right sides of the silk are going to match the curve? Shouldn't we... oh, never mind, you're not listening." Sad little voice, ignored and sulking in a corner of my mind. Didn't even gloat when proved right, but continued to worry and fret about new possible problems.

Finally, with all the pieces cut properly and fitted to each other, Mary transformed them into a skirt. We were elated! It had gone well! It was turning out beautifully. We called in Teresa to try it on with the muslin bodice.

The Skirt

Um... It's... shorter than the muslin. How did that happen? What went wrong? We experienced pits in the stomach and sharp pains in the head. We felt dazed. We consulted. The only thing different from the muslin, well, with the exception of that being cotton and this being silk, is that we self-lined the silk. And that took up a couple of inches in length. Aargh! Now what?

We experimented with the idea of adding some beautiful lace to the hemline edge. Very pretty. But would it look like an add-on? Could we extend the length of the bodice? Would that look strange? The fit was so perfect, so beautiful with the muslin, and now we were going to change it. We decided to give the 2nd option a try.

But now it was Sunday night, and the end of our time together. We would have to make careful notes, pack it all up, and wait for another weekend.

Let the Dress Making Begin!

We began making the new wedding dress in earnest the first weekend in October.

We began by making a muslin of the dress using patterns we took from a variety of places, including the train piece we used on Stephanie's dress.

We were pleased with how well the pattern pieces matched up.

The muslin fit together perfectly.

We were pleased with how the dress seemed to fall into place.

And we tried different looks for the top.

We even got a start on how the bustle will look.

Empowered by our success, we made plans to resume sewing in early February.