In Which I am a Silly Goose

Here is what's left after my marking and cutting out what I wanted for the dresses:

This is what the pieces look like:

The parts that make me horribly miffed with myself:

To summarize, I cut out two right fronts and only one back of a jacket I was planning. Sigh. Now I must think my way out of this predicament that still gets me a pretty bolero.

Playing with Patterns

What I really like about drafting doll patterns is how easy they are to fit in my field of vision. This makes pattern drafting so much easier.

For today, I will walk you through a couple of new things I drafted. First is where I got the basic shapes. Dolly Dolly magazine used to keep patterns sized for Volks MSDs in the backs of their issues. I picked up this one for the school uniforms, though I've made many alterations depending on what I want to make.

Here is a front piece I altered and used for two of my previous 1940s dresses:

As I want to make a wrap front with a collar and reverse, I added a sort of triangle to the front so it can close the way I want it to. I did the same with the facing. Let's compare:

For the companion dress I wanted to put in a gathered detail in the front, as well as a contrasting waistband and cap sleeves. I shortened the bottom of the bodice, altered the shoulders and made them separate pieces, and slashed and spread the rest. This is what it looks like.

Once More, with Pink

My mind is wandering back to the 1940s. I still have fat quarters aplenty, and lots of white and striped scraps from a human sized project I'm working on. Recently I came across an ad in 1942 or 1943 Vogue for a shirtwaist dress that had pleated insets by the hips, reminiscent of the 1920s.

This also gives me a great excuse to use this lovely pink Asian inspired print. I'm a bit preoccupied with human sized things at the moment, so this will stay in the planning phase for now.

Theme and Variation

Here are a pair of alternate dresses made with the same patterns as these two, with different fabric and some light alterations. Instead of plaid, I took a fat quarter of Asian print fabric and some brown scraps.

Yu Wei is wearing the lapel dress, this time without a collar, and for a different solution to the front. The front bodice pieces are shorter than the ones in back. Last time I adjusted at the side seams, but this time I pieced in some brown cloth as a mock waistband.

Yu Lian wears the wrap front pattern, this time without a pocket, and the only contrast in the collar.

Bobby Suit

Not much to say here I'm afraid. It's a 40's style bobby suit adapted from a Bleuette pattern and made from a striped fat quarter. I think I like the concept of the suit more than the result. It's not bad, but not as exciting to look at as other things I've done.

 Silly picture with a better angle.

Forties fun

After reading my book Forties Fashion (see my Library) a few too many times, I got an itch to make some 40s wartime dresses. As great an inspiration as the book and its many photographs is, I wanted some other sources to glean ideas from. After some poking around online, I found the Blitzkreig Baby website and its descriptions of uniforms for women serving in the various armed and medical forces. The dress uniforms, while pretty, didn't grab my fancy, though the work clothes did and I started sketching, stealing aspects here and there.

What with fabric consumption being carefully maintained during the war years, skirts were fairly short and narrow, and it was common for garments to be made from multiple materials. I pulled out a large scrap of checked material, some muslin and other smaller bits of cloth and got to work.

The idea for this dress was taken from the striped Army Nurse Corps uniform, though I left off the tie as I wasn't sure how to get it to hang right in 1/3 scale. I was going to leave off the pockets, as I couldn't get the two to sit on the skirt and look balanced, and then I realized there was only one on the skirt. Silly me.

I don't remember what uniform inspired this dress, only that i liked the idea of a collar and lapels on a work outfit.