Vintage Yellow Dress + Brooch Give-away!

Ok so my love for the classic shape of Butterick pattern 5603 (modified) has been well established. Making the re-fashioned pattern three times will do that.

But now it's just getting annoying. Seriously, I'm starting to creep my self out now after making this silouhette for the fourth time. It's like a sickness. Even my tired pattern pieces are giving me a concerned look:

Butterick Pattern (BP): "Oh honey, I don't know how to say this, but I think we need a break."

Me: "What? But we're meant to be together! We're made for each other."

BP: "Actually no, this is really awkward but ... I was made for a mass commercial market. Millions of people actually."

Me: *Gasp* "No! BP5603 you floozy!"

Though perhaps the fact that I think my pattern pieces are talking to me is of a more serious concern.

Whatever.

I made this dress in a 100% wool crepe that I purchased on my recent trip to Washington D.C.

 

This fabric has such a wonderful drape and feels like heaven. It's also a dream to sew with. Every time my Janome sunk it's teeth into the fabric, Marvin Gaye's 'Let's get it on' inexplicably started playing.

 

I made a sweet little collar out of left over lace that I purchased from Tessuti Fabrics a while ago. I had previously used the lace to make this dress:

I fully lined the dress and added sleeves.

The bodice also features a V shaped back.

 

I accompanied the dress with a new pair of shoes ...

 

... and the perfect vintage accessory, a beautiful brooch.

 

Don't you think the brooch just makes the dress?! The wonderful Lorraine from Ruemiraldi is also a lover of vintage accessories and personally picked a stunning brooch for me from her fabulous online vintage accessories store. 

The best part? She has also given me three extra beautiful vintage brooches to give away to three of my lovely readers! True story! Release the give away streamers!

Check them out:

 

Want one?

To be in the winning simply comment on this post

Three lucky readers will be randomly selected to win one of the three brooches.

Entries are open to everyone from anywhere in the world.

Entries close on Friday, April 20, 2012 Australian EST

One random winner will announced in my next blog post on Sunday, April 22nd, 2012

 

The thing that keeps drawing me back to this dress is the flattering vintage shape.

So here are the other dresses I have made using Butterick 5603.  On all four I drafted my own skirt for a more pencil look. You can see how I made the alterations here.

Click on the photos if you want to see the full blog post.

In honour of the yellow of this dress, I thought I'd leave you all with one of my favourite songs. This song is also called 'Yellow' and is sung by the beautiful and gifted artist India Arie. The YouTube clip is below.

Have a lovely weekend everyone!

 

Mustard and Lace Dress + Give Away Winner!!

If you can't eat it ... wear it.

I recently found out that I'm not supposed to eat mustard. But nobody said I couldn't wear it.

I have not however been given restrictions on lace, though I'm sure it's not entirely good for me to eat. Or is it ...

So I made me up a dress with a lace bodice and a mustard skirt. In your face nutrionists!

Now before I get carried away with my ins and outs of my new fancy pants dress, let's talk Give Away. Oh yes.

I'm very happy to announce that the winner of this months give away, chosen using the Random Number Generator is the very Purpelicious ......

Naomi!

Congratulations! You are now the proud owner of 2 metres of pure silk Peau de Soie/Duchess Satin. I will be contacting you via email shortly.

Ok, now that the balloons have been released from the ceiling let's talk latest dress.

I made this dress using just over half a metre of stunning french lace that I bought from the Tessuti Fabric Store in Melbourne. They had just recently sent out an email to all us fabric addicts showing us their new stock of laces.

Seriously I should just start getting HR at work to pay my wage directly into Tessuti's bank account. I am addicted to their fabrics and cannot stop myself from buying everything that comes into that store.

Any way ... Here's a photo of some of their laces.

Seeing those photos was like a starving man seeing a leg of lamb. My mouth started salivating and I started banging my head repeatedly against a wall. My husband thinks I'm like the self-punishing Dobby from Harry Potter. Which in my opinion is totally off;  I never wear loin clothes. Much.

I love the pattern in this lace. A lot of laces you see now a-days have floral features on them (which I love). I found this pattern delicate and unique.

I featured the beautiful shaped edging by making little cap sleeves out of them.

I underlined the bodice with a cotton lawn so that my bodice wasn't seethrough. Otherwise you would be able to see through to all my wires and buttons and discover my secret that I'm actually a robot (with feelings).

Underlining is great for giving fabric extra-support, drape or to stop a fabric being see-through. It can also help to bring out the colour in your fabric shell. In my case it also stopped the loosely woven lace from stretching and changing it's shape as I sewed with it.

For those of you that have never Underlined before, here's the deal-io.

First, you cut out the identical pattern piece for both the shell and the underlining fabric.
Typically the underlining is a lighter fabric than the shell but not always. Here I've used a cotton lawn as the underlining and the fabric shell is lace.

Look how naked the lace is!

Then, you place the wrong side of the fabric shell (lace) onto the right side of the underlining fabric (cotton lawn).

This means that both of the good sides of the two fabrics are facing up.

Pin the shell to the interlining.

Then carefully you baste the two fabrics together within the seam allowance using a long stitch.  You can do this by hand or by machine. I used the machine for mine.

I used a pink thread so you can see my stitches.

Once you have basted the two fabrics together the piece now acts as one piece of fabric.

Now my lace is underlined and no longer see through!
My example is a little wonky as I rushed it. Yours will look much neater I'm sure.

You can then go ahead and make all your notches and markings on the wrong side of your underlined piece.

Now when you do darts and pleats the two pieces of fabric are kept together and the folds are hidden at the back of the piece instead of being visible from the front.

 

And there you have it. Doesn't that make it look neater?!!

Back to the dress!
I made a scoop neck front and back because I love the shape of it.

I then made up the skirt part of the dress in a quilting cotton that I found on special at Spotlight. Sold! it has tiny little white flowers in it that I find incredibly satisfying in an unexplained way.

I lined the skirt (good girl Julia).

I added two strips of fabric on the hem of the skirt also as a little feature for the bottom half of the dress. These strips were cut out and then folded in half so that they were self faced. I then attached them by machine onto the dress.

The skirt and the bodice are joined together at the waist, with an invisible zipper down the centre back.

And there you have it. I have combined two of my favourite things into one dress. Lace (I don't think I'll ever stop loving lace) and mustard, which is everywhere at the moment ...

...except on my dinner plate.