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Recon: The Hawaiian Sundress

I’m still slogging away on my Bombshell dress – although right now it appears to be more of a bed than anything:

More on that later! Today, we will talk about my newest recon.

I actually started plotting the making of this dress on Friday afternoon – I found this sweet Hawaiian maxi dress and I spent the rest of the afternoon obsessing over how to make my own. My drive home from work ended taking A FUCKING HOUR AND A HALF (I drive about 5 miles & it usually takes 15-20 minutes – tops! 25 minutes is long enough to make me feel desperate, no lie) – thanks, Country Music Marathon! – so I had plenty of time to plan the making of my new dress. I realized the head start was actually hanging in my closet.

If you’re feeling underwhelmed, well, so was I. I picked this dress up at the thrift store last summer – I loved the print, and it’s rayon which is my faaaavorite fiber to wear in the summer. Also, it was $2. Unfortunately, it’s a big shapeless muumuu. I thought I could cinch it with a belt and be done with it, but belting that much fabric leaves some weird gathers & poof, so this was a dress reserved for hanging around the house.

This was a REALLY easy (and fast!) recon – I sewed a strip of wide elastic at the waistline, cut 6″ off the hem & sewed that to the elastic neckline. Done and done!

The original inspiration is sleeveless, but I actually like the extra ruffle the sleeves give, so they stay… for now.

It is hemmed a little short – you can’t tell from these pictures, since I have the tripod angled, but I could definitely use an extra inch. Although I did wear this to shop the flea market with my mom on Saturday & she never mentioned the length (or lack thereof), so maybe it’s not as bad as I think it is.

I got a LOT of compliments on this dress! Probably more than I’ve ever received for any of my clothing – funny! It seemed like every other person I ran into had something nice to say about it 🙂

Oh, and thanks to the elastic waistband – it looks great without a belt! This will be extremely important once the rest summer heat+humidity hits 🙂

Some construction notes…

The elastic waistband was really easy to insert – I measured the elastic around my waist, and then sewed it to the middle of the dress (try it on first to check the placement), giving the elastic a good stretch while I sewed it on. I just used a straight stitch, since it’s not a really high-stress area.

From the front – it gathered up nicely, I think!

To make the ruffled collar, I sewed cut-off dress bottom (hem intact!) to the inside of the dress, wrong side up. Again, I stretched it as I sewed so it would gather up.

Then just flip the ruffle of the outside, hiding the seams.

The hem is finished with a small rolled hem. No, I didn’t take a picture. I’m sure you can use your imagination 😉

And that’s it! Easy, breezy, beautiful… err, this’ll be great for Me-Made-May 🙂

As for the flea market… well, the pickings were pretty slim this go-round 😦 I did meet two vendors who said they have loads of fabric they need to sell off, so I gave them my contact information and hopefully I can spend the money I didn’t spend at the flea market on their fabric 🙂 Haha!

I did pick up this pattern… there’s not a listed manufacturer anywhere, just the pattern number.

I love the button placket.

It’s undated, but based on the fact that it’s unprinted & it has THIS across the top of the (sparse)instructions, I reckon it’s from the war era 🙂

I also bought two pieces of stretchy fabric, although they were from the thrift store, not the flea.

Probably going to save this one for winter, it’s kind of… velvety? I like how loud it is, though. And yes, my cat is modeling because she refused to get off the table.

This is polyester, but I just love those 70s stripes!

The Bombshell is making excellent progress – and it still fits! YAY!

Tags: Bombshell dress, dress, fabric hoarding, flea market, minidress, reconstructions

Comments 20 Comments
Categories completed projects - reconstructed

This Is Why I Can’t Buy Fabric Anymore

9 Jan

You guys.
Remember this?

That is my fabric stash as of last week. And before anyone goes, “Oh! That’s not too bad!” may I point out that the fabric is double-stacked – i.e., there are piles of fabric behind the stuff you can see. Also, I have smaller piles lurking in my sewing room closet & attic. Eep!

So, I knew I was going to put myself on a fabric-buying ban. It seems silly to keep spending money (especially when you consider my expensive taste when it comes to fabric) when I have soo much perfectly usable fabric hanging out at my house as it is. I mentioned this at the beginning of the year (aka last week) and a few of y’all commented that you should also follow suit, but felt like you couldn’t stick to it. To be honest, I kind of felt the same way, but after pulling out my stash & really combing through it, I am actually pretty excited about this upcoming sewing year. I have so much good fabric! So many gems I had forgotten about!

Over the weekend, I pulled every single piece of fabric off my shelf, measured it (both yardage & width) and took a picture. I was going to upload everything to Pinterest – well, I started, anyway – but their site is all buggy and half the pictures don’t show up and idk, I just got pissy & moved everything to Flickr. Whatever! I also took the opportunity to pull any fabric that hadn’t been prewashed (I try to prewash everything as soon as I get it home but in some of these cases, this fabric has been hanging around for years… long before I because the Queen of Prewash) and get that taken care of as well.

I’m not going to bore you with dozens of pictures of my fabric stash, but if you are feeling lurky, I have allotted it it’s very own set on flickr. I am kind of embarrassed that there are nearly 50 photos, especially when you consider that this is ONLY my woven garment fabric with significant yardage. I have more stacks of muslins/interlinings, linings, remnants/scraps, and an entire cabinet full of stretch fabrics. Plus I never got around to that stuff in the attic lol. Baby steps, y’all!

I cut little swatches & hung them on my bulletin board as well:

The swatches to the left are the ones I want to try to sew up over the spring/summer. The swatches in the middle are fabrics I want to use before them (aka now). The giant stacks at the bottom are the rest of my swatches. Oh, and the little white papers stuck on everything show the yardage & width – so I can figure out if I have enough of something without actually unfolding it and getting measure on. Did that once, not doin’ it again!

Then I got really inspired and decided to document my entire pattern stash as well. And, well, guys… I have a lot more than I thought I did. And I’m kind of embarrassed. But we’re not judging each other, right? This is a safe space, yes?

Ok, well, here’s the flickr link to all 158 of them.
Don’t judge me!

For your troubles, here is my favorite weird pattern that I had forgotten I own:

lol wtf is even going on here?

So there you go! I do feel more organized about my various stashes – I’m already planning my spring wardrobe in my head 🙂 Hopefully this is inspire some of you to take control of your stash, too! And then share pictures, because *I* like to lurk 🙂 Heehee.

Tags: fabric hoarding, patterns

Comments 35 Comments
Categories misc

Of Muslins & (Fabric) Musings

3 Jan

Welcome to 2012, everyone! Did you make any resolutions for the new year? I only made one, forreal-legit resolution, and I actually made it just now (as opposed to pre-2012): I have decided to enter the world of adulthood & start using proper capitalization on this blog. No real reason in particular except that it makes it easier to read. So there you go – my Christmas gift to y’all!

Another goal for 2012 started running through my mind last night while I was working on my coat muslin:

Dear Lauren,
You are not allowed to buy anymore fabric this year until you cull that stash under control.
Love,
Lauren.

EXCEPTIONS (ah, but isn’t there always an exception?): January & July, my amazing local fabric store has a 40%-50% off sale on all fabrics. I generally use this opportunity to stock up for the upcoming season, and to pick up fabrics that I know I will use but are normally a bit cost-prohibitive (such as silk organza, and extra yardages of rayon lining to, er, hoard). So I’ll allow myself to buy stock-up fabric during these sales, and also a piece or two for funsies. Another exception is anything that involves my mega-cheap fabric scores – flea markets, yard sales, thrift stores, donations, etc. I mean, they’re practically paying me to take this stuff! I’d be a fool to not grab it and go, amirite?

Speak of the fabric sale, I already hit that shit up yesterday (first day!) and picked up a rather modest pile (considering my usual history of how much I tend to spend…):

The top two don’t count; they are shirting fabrics for Landon’s Negroni. More on that when I make a muslin!
That black under the plaid flannel is dark-wash denim with a slight stretch (for another pair of wide-legged trousers), the stripey is jersey knit with navy & white stripes, the white is boring old cotton batiste (for lining summer dresses), the shiny blue is silk shantung (actually from Mood fabrics), the green is Bemberg rayon lining for my coat (yes! I went with green!), and the big blob at the bottom is my coating fabric from Mood.

Speaking of my coat – have some muslin pictures!

This is actually my second muslin – the first muslin was almost workable, but needed a little bit of tweaking. This is what I ended up with:
– Remove 1/4″ from top & bottom sleeve side seams
– Reduce sleeve head ease (appx 7/8″ at peak)
– Taper lapel 1/2″
– Shift button position
– Shorten back belt 3/4″ on each end
– Remove 5/8″ from center back seam
– Remove 3/4″ from side back seam
– Raise underarm seam 1″
– Reduce shoulder width 5/8″
I think I’m pretty happy with the fit! Tell me what you think, fitting princesses & princes.

The underarm seam was the most confusing adjustment I made. Clearly there was something wrong with the first muslin, as I couldn’t move my arms at all without the entire coat joining the parade. I checked several fitting books, but none of them mentioned the actual armhole unless they were referring to a sleeveless top. I finally determined that the armhole was too low (which makes sense, as the pattern is a slight bit too large for me), and raising it 1″ pretty much eliminated the problem.

the lapels were also a little too wide around the neckline which resulted in some gaping. I pinched out the excess and re-smoothed the lines. There is still a small amount of gape but I want to be able to wad a scarf in there so I’m ok with it.

The back in cinched in via the belt, which is a design feature i loooove. Check out my mismatched sleeve caps – I put one in before I realized it needed to be reduced.

Side looks okay.

What do we think about the overall length? I folded back the sleeves the suggested 2″, but I think they are a smidge too long (like, no more than 1/2″). I like the coat length, although I realize now that I hemmed it 2″ and the pattern calls for 3″. So – current length or 1″ shorter? Eh?

Transferring the fitting adjustments was a PAIN IN THE REAR. This coat has separate pieces for everything – coat, lining, and interfacing! So every adjustment was transferred three times. And I will just (wo)man up and say right now that I did it all to the pattern tissue – no tracing. Whoever owned the pattern before me wrote all over it and made their own fitting adjustments, so I didn’t see much of a point in preservation. I will include my fitting notes should someone obtain this pattern after me, and they can re-add the stuff I cut off. Or something. Don’t be mad!

Anyway, I’m pretty happy with the overall fit of the coat! I think everything looks good & I’m ready to cut straight into the coating fabric. I have my (green!)lining & I picked up some giant covered buttons. Oh, and 3 yards of 72″ horsehair interfacing. Hopefully I won’t need to buy interfacing again until 2013 😉

Tags: Fabiani coat, fabric hoarding, muslin

Comments 28 Comments
Categories work in progress

more flea market goodies

20 Dec

i have a personal rule that i don’t buy myself gifts right before christmas, but i broke it over the weekend because… well, it’s the flea market! how can i resist the beautiful siren song that calls to me on the 4th weekend of every month (3rd weekend in december)? no. i can’t.

but i can share my goodies with y’all. ooh! let’s talk fabric & patterns!

the first batch of patterns are, sadly, not my size. they’re not terribly off – i usually wear a 32 or 34 bust- and i figure i can use them to learn pattern (down)grading. or maybe save them for a giveaway? 🙂 what do you think?

look at that awesome jacket with those sassy shorts!

i wish my hair did that.

this one reminds me so much of new look 6000, no? or maybe it’s just that pretty blue color.
i’m sad the envelope is so torn 😦 it was in slightly better condition when i bought it, but i ripped all the way when i pulled it out of my bag. waaaaah!

so that lot was $4. yep! i love this particular guy – he always has patterns for me, and his booth is full of cool antiques & records. speaking of which, in the same general building, there was a guy selling a singer featherweight for $250. my dream machine! i was ready to drop all my cash right then & there (and subsequently spend the rest of the month bicycling to work & eating ramen – seriously!), but i tested it & it was having major stitching issues 😦 aaand he wouldn’t go down on price. so we will wait on the featherweight.

flea market fabrics:

idk what this is, some kind of stretchy sateen fabric from the 80s lol. it is actually 3 irregular pieces, but i think i can make some kind of cute little cycling top out of it.

giant piece of plaid fabric that might morph into a jumper.

isn’t this one pretty?? there are about 2 yards, and it is sooo soft.

haha this one is pretty indulgent – and very small – but how could i leave it behind? peter rabbit corduroy? COME ON.

the colors are off in this one, it’s navy blue & white. it’s a sheer polyester something – i’m thinking either a chantilly or the peony with no sleeves.

my favorite – some class of terrifying plaid polyester fabric! i am seeing another pair of clovers already. of course, my boyfriend took one look at the fabric & said it looked like the kind of shit we used to buy at hot topic 10 years ago (you know, back when they sold velvet gothic dresses & vampire energy drinks lol), but i have decided to ignore him.

a couple big pieces of this creepy green fabric… after i got it home (and ew it smells like an old man), i realized it is obviously some kind of upholstery fabric.

a nice sized piece of bandana fabric, which is clearly destined to be some class of skanky halter top, amirite?

there were several yards of this one… i think it’s a linen-blend? kind of 80s.
fun fact: serging the edges for prewashing looks like shaving a mustache lol

hahha so southwestern! i think this fabric is sort of ugly (and, i quote my boyfriend, “that looks like an ugly set of curtains i ripped out of a house i was gutting”), but it also looks very 50s to me & i think it would make a great shirt dress! especially since there is a LOT of it. i didn’t measure, but at least 4-5 yards.

i LOVE this floral fabric. it is kind of stiff, but i think a wash will soften it up a little.

total for all the fabrics: $6.
they also all smell like a really really old man, so they’ll be getting a proper wash tonight. where? at my boyfriend’s house, of course. he can’t insult my flea market fabrics & get away with it.

i also tried to buy a singer spartan sewing machine for $25 at the last booth i visited, but the woman got all bullhurt at me because i wanted to test the machine (you know, to make sure it sews!) and then yelled at me for pulling off the throat plate to check that the bobbin was intact. she accused me of trying to break her sewing machine and wasting her time because i obviously had no intention of buying it. i will admit, i cried a little after that confrontation. kind of dampened my mood… i just went home. but you know what? at least i only had to deal with her for a few minutes. she has to put up with her bad attitude for the rest of her life.

more patterns! i picked these up at the southern thrift store by my house. they have this terrible policy where they dump a bunch of “like” items in a plastic bag, staple it shut, and make you buy the whole bag. i convinced the cashier to let me open the bags & dig through, but she wouldn’t let me swap out patterns. there was something like 15-20 patterns per bag, and 4 bags of them, so you can imagine how much she hated me by the time i was done 🙂 haha! i bought 2 of the bags… here are some of my favorites.

i don’t even like this pattern, but i LOVE THAT PONYTAIL

really really REALLY wish the envelope was intact 😦

lol i can’t even

LOVE this one.

welp, there’s the shirt dress!

and there’s the jumper!

this is totally ridiculous. the girl in the pink is my favorite.

is this a maternity pattern? it looks a lot like one of the dresses posted on liz’s blog (~new relaxed silhouettes~, third image).

i will confess that i end up with a lot of patterns just based on the illustration. helment-hair over here is no exception.

and look! a couple of men’s patterns!

too bad my boy is too small for these 😦

the bags were priced at $5.99 each, and i bought 2. in addition to the pretties here (and many many more that i haven’t posted), i got some uglies too. not a bunch of really bad ones – most were just stuff that doesn’t look good on me, like 60s A-line dresses – but oooh here are a few of the worst.

this is a bad picture of a picture, but i swear those pants…things are cut out of an actual fleece blanket.

yep.

there are quite a few more patterns that i didn’t post (48 photos in all!), so if you want to see the rest, check out the set!

Tags: fabric hoarding, flea market, patterns, vintage

Comments 13 Comments
Categories misc

nashville flea market? don’t mind if i do

25 Oct

i caved into internal peer pressure this weekend & went to the flea market. at first i immediately regretted my decision – october is traditionally the busiest month for our local flea market, and this year was no exception. the place was PACKED – moving was very difficult & i kept running into little old ladies who thought it was perfectly acceptable to just straight stop in the middle of the moving aisle (forreal, who thinks this is ok? anyone?). i eventually figured out that people were staying out of the sun, so as long as i avoided the air-conditioned buildings, i avoided the crowds. yay 🙂

anyway, let’s talk loot.

first, some patterns! i got all 4 of these for $3:

simplicity 1799

vogue 5381. someone on ebay is asking $53 for their copy lolwut. also, i definitely have the 80s version of this pattern as well. what can i say, i’m a pattern hoarder.

advance 2540. can i say now that i’m kind of weirded out that the vintage pattern wiki has a different envelope picture for what is obviously the same pattern? uhh…

mccalls b-100. now this is a weird one. it’s a basic sloper pattern, except the pattern is printed on something sturdier than tissue (it feels like mediumweight interfacing, tbh) so you can try it on and make adjustments. after you have fitted the sloper to your liking, you can make view B or C, or use the sloper to adjust a different pattern.

i’m bummed that it’s missing the instructions, but meh.

fabrics, $4 for all. the prints are cotton, and that big dark blob is actually a deep purple speckled linen.

lingerie elastic, 10 yards for $1, or rather, 40 yards total for $4. can’t wait to make slips & undies!

serger thread, $5 for the whole set. he actually had a LOT but i limited myself to only buying groups of 3. except for that orange. i needed the orange, wouldn’t you?

non-sewing related purchases:

DIS SUIT & fur collar (the collar isn’t part of the original suit, but doesn’t it look nice! i bought it from the same vendor), and this shirt (that i can’t seen to get a good picture of), $7 for all

love my vintage suit! it is really well-made (100% wool, fully lined, bound buttonholes) and it fits me perfectly. none of my friends like it, though, trolololol

totally randumb, but i also found snes control pads for $5 apiece:

YES.

in other sewing news, i have yet to perfect my pants muslin. i traced the pattern & pulled a GIANT horizontal tuck (like, more than 1″ sup short crotch) and added a small FBA to the rear. muslin #2 still needs work; it’s barely passable, but sarai’s clovers on the coletterie are totally smooth so i will keep chugging along. meanwhile, my muslin pants are now muslin shorts and i am running out of stretch fabric, hey-o!

Tags: buying shit i don't need, fabric hoarding, flea market, FUR, hot damn this is my jam, patterns

Comments 12 Comments
Categories misc

plans for fall 2011 sewing

14 Sep

i suppose it’s time to get crackin’ on my new season wardrobe.

i already pooled through my fabrics & clipped swatches of what i want to use… yardages are noted on the swatches. look at how organized i can be!

as a side note… i don’t have a whole lot of storage in my sewing room, so i box up my out-of-season fabric & store it elsewhere. opening this box & pulling out all the pretty wools & autumnal colors was like christmas! wheeee!

now i’m pulling out my patterns & trying to figure out what to match up with what. i can already tell i need to go buy more fabric. my life, it is so hard.

here is my ~board. it is very simple because i really can’t be arsed to make it pretty. ha!

some discussion:

butterick 5078 – i bought this really sweet knit dress (also maggy london, actually) at the thrift store a few weeks ago and I WANT TO LIVE IN IT FOREVER. so comfy! clearly, i need more knit dresses. i consider myself a global ambassador of the knit, but i’ve never actually sewn a knit garment from a pattern (as opposed to the zillions of self-drafted knit stuff i’ve made… seriously, queen of knits over here). i would love to make this in a deep jewel tone, like that lovely green (which is actually a shantug over at gorgeous fabrics but the color is A+)

self-drafted circle skirt – i’ve already started this one! i had *exactly* enough of that tweed to cut it on the fold – barely under 2 yards at 60″ wide, cut for a 27″ waist & 26″~ length (knee-length for me with a 3″ hem). the pink is the lining – i bought too much so it will probably end up lining something else. ooh matchy!

vogue 1059 – thinking about making me some wide-legged denim pants. i will wear them with a vest & button-up shirt & pretend that i am annie hall.

parfait – ok, my corduroy is a little more navy (navier?) than this one pictured, but same idea! the parfait looks great layered, and corduroy is very seasonally-appropriate.

ceylon – i have a nice olive green wool twill that i think would work with this dude. well, provided i can finagle the cutting layout – i only have two yards. SHIT.
anyway, yeah, covered buttons & a covered belt, y/y? ooh i just love olive + red. or olive + cream. a beautiful beautiful marriage indeed.

clover – my favorite of colette’s new pattern offerings! i never even realized i needed skinny cropped pants until these came out lol. i want to make mine in a stretch suiting – tweed or herringbone – cropped at the ankles. LOVE.

simplicity 8155 – continuing my annie hall fantasy… a vest in grey herringbone. btw, this is *exactly* want i want for the clover pants, except the one i have doesn’t stretch. boohoo.

violet – i think this will be lovely in this autumnal floral fabric, with matching self-covered buttons.

vogue 8280, aka the galaxy dress – been hanging onto this pattern for a hot minute, waiting on the perfect fabric. i think i have it: tweed wool suiting. yeeeeesh, this stuff is itchy! depending on how much i can squish the cutting layout, i may be able to use the rest of that pink lining for this dress. i want to line the whole thing.

i also have simplicity 5154 that i would like to make, but i need to find a good fabric. and by ‘good fabric’ i mean exactly that plaid that the model is wearing. i need that plaid in my life!

sooo my fall/winter sewing plans are a little ambitious, to say the least. i doubt all of these will be completed by the time i am sick of winter clothes, but it’s nice to have a plan written out, at least for my own record.

what are your plans for fall sewing? tell me!

Tags: fabric hoarding, fall 2011

Comments 7 Comments
Categories work in progress

another ginger – western style

28 Jun

i love this ginger pattern, y’all. it’s so easy to sew, flattering to wear, etc etc. after casey posted a tutorial for scalloped pockets, i knew i needed to make another one asap. here’s the fun part of the story – i stopped by a moving sale on my way to the fabric store (i needed to have my scissors sharpened & i thought i would buy some khaki twill to make into a western-y skirt) and ended up buying a gigantic bag of fabric for $20… including 4 yards of khaki twill! haha i love it when this stuff works out in my favor!

i still got my scissors sharpened, though. they now cut like a hot knife through buttah. and the scissor man complimented my excellent choice in shears. yes, i blushed.

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Tags: completed, fabric hoarding, ginger, skirt