Party Dress Completed

My Party Dress is finished! It was finished last week already and I even got a chance to wear it to a little party but I had the hardest time getting good photos of the dress, in which the color of the dress would show. Eventually I had to take it outside into freezing temperatures, where my roommate helped me take the photos.

I spent the longest time ever on fitting this dress and all in all it turned out well. I followed the advice of Fit for Real People and chose the pattern according to upper chest circumference rather than bust measurement and went down a whooping two sizes from a 16 to a 12. I had to do a full bust adjustment and add some extra ease in the waist. Isn’t it strange how the hip, waist and bust measurements of a size 16 correspond exactly to mine and yet a straight size 16 results in the most terrible fit. Pattern sizing boggles my mind.

 

I also for the first time experimented with some more sophisticated ways of garment finishing. I used a Hong Kong seam finish on the skirt and used bias tape on the hem to make it easier to ease in the extra width of a rounded hem.

The only thing that sticks out like a sore thumb in this dress are the bust darts. There was just no way I could have made them smoother, without dimpling and bulging. I even converted the underbust dart into two smaller darts to be able to deal better with the bulk of fabric that had to be tucked away in the darts – but to no avail. They still look terribly frankensteined.

I was thinking that perhaps if you have a large bust and mine is a DD/E it is impossible to achieve certain styles. There is a limit to how big a dart can be to still look good and the amount of extra width and length I need to add in a full bust adjustment always results in monster darts. Is there a solution to avoid this problem or is it simply impossible to deal with all this fullness in one or two simple darts?

In future projects I am planning to make sure to reduce the size of my darts and rather convert the fullness into seams (like princess seams, which work well on a full bust) or gathering or dart tucks of varying sizes. Perhaps this is the only solution. And there go my dreams for this simple and perfect sheath dress with only a single, elegant dart. Sigh.

Sewing with Leather

I have had a very busy week but am back with a new post on sewing with leather. As you may remember I sewed a leather purse for my mum as a Christmas present last year.

I learned a couple of things during this project, which I would like to share with you. But keep in mind that I’m by no means an expert in leather construction. These are just some of the things I’ve learned along the way. At the bottom of the post you will find a couple of links, which may be useful if you are planning to sew with leather. So, let's get started.

DECIDING ON A PROJECT

As a first project with leather it’s good to choose something easy. As Rūta has pointed out in a comment on my blog, it is advisable to choose designs with few sharp corners, as they are difficult to achieve with leather. Sharp edges that require a lot of pressing and bulky seams with too many layers of fabric are also difficult to sew. I used the Diana shoulder bag pattern from BurdaStyle, which is quite simple. Also check out Rūta’s blog for some excellent leather sewing inspiration, for example here, here or here.

LEATHER DOES NOT FRAY

When deciding on a project keep in mind that leather does not fray. This makes the construction process somewhat easier and reduces the amount of pressing and bulk of layers. For the handle of my purse, I simply stitched two pieces of leather together at the edges on the wrong side and then trimmed the edges as neatly as possible. I did not, as would be ordinary with regular fabric, sew the handle with right sides together and turn.
The inside leather pouches of my bag are also not turned over at the edges but simply topstitched at the edges as you can see below. Keep this in mind when you design your project and cut your pieces for sewing. It may simplify things.

MARKING YOUR FABRIC

Tailor’s chalk does not work well on leather. Instead there are a variety of pens you can use to mark leather on the wrong side of the fabric. I used silver and gold markers. Permanent markers would probably work well too, if the material is not too dark.

PINNING

Leather cannot be pinned because pins would leave permanent holes in the fabric. There are different ways of securing your fabric pieces before sewing. I simply used regular tape to secure two pieces of fabric together on the wrong side of the material. Many leather sewing resources suggest using binder clips. I didn’t have any binder clips but I also didn’t have a lot of difficult matching to do.

In order to secure the zipper before sewing it into the bag I used a dissolvable glue marker. It worked like a charm and secured the zipper well.

Apparently this Aqua Glue Marker can be used instead of pinning or basting on all types of fabric because it can be washed out. I haven’t tried it yet, and will probably stick to classic methods but for those of you who find basting intolerably boring and time-consuming this marker might make things easier.

MACHINE SEWING

Most of the seams in the leather purse I made were machine sewn. A regular machine can handle leather well, as long as it is not too thick and you don’t attempt to sew through several layers of fabric. Two layers of fabric was the maximum my machine could handle.

Leather Needles
Leather needles are stronger than ordinary needles and are a good investment if you plan to sew with  leather.

Thread
Don’t use cotton thread, but a polyester blend or pure polyester thread. It is not necessary to buy stronger thread than the one you would use in ordinary sewing projects. I only used thicker topstitching thread in places where the stitches would be visible on the outside, simply because topstitching thread looks neater.

Stitch Length
Use a long stitch length on your machine. I used a stitch length of about 4 to 4.5. If you use a small stitch length more holes are punched into the leather and this may cause your leather to rip.

Leather Sewing Presser Foot
While I did not use a special leather sewing presser foot I will consider buying one for future projects. A leather foot ensures that the fabric slides easily through the machine. A lot of damage can be done to leather without a leather presser foot, because the machine can leave scrape marks! Lesson learned!

HAND SEWING

A lot of seams in my purse project had to be done by hand, because the machine could not handle more than two layers of fabric. Now let me tell you, if you have tried sewing leather by hand, you know why your machine is having trouble sewing more than two layers and you will stop cursing it immediately.

I bent three hand stitching needles in the process and would never attempt to sew leather again without proper leather needles. A thimble is a must if you don’t want needles stuck in your finger. Occasionally I even had to get out the pliers to pull the needle through. Sewing leather by hand is a true workout.

In order to make the stitches durable as well as neat from both sides of the stitching I used regular straight stitches one way and then went back over the same stitches the other way, inserting the needle in the same holes but from the opposite direction.

PRESSING

Many leather sewing resources online consider pressing leather with an iron a taboo, because heat and steam apparently damage leather permanently. Having only limited supplies and little leather sewing knowledge at hand, I ignored this taboo and ironed out my seam allowances all the same. I made sure to use a low heat setting and no steam. I ironed the fabric from the wrong side and used a piece of cloth for protection. The leather didn’t seem to be visibly damaged but the results were still rather poor.

Alternatively, I placed difficult to press pieces of leather under a stack of books overnight. For the flap of my purse I cut a piece of cardboard in the shape of the pattern piece minus seam allowance and put it into the flap and left the whole thing under a stack of books overnight.

Leather sewing experts recommend finger pressing or hammering leather with a wooden mallet and then cement gluing the seam allowance or hem to the garment to make sure it stays flat. In the video link listed below you can see how this is done.

 LEATHER SEWING RESOURCES

How to Sew Leather on a Standard Sewing Machine
Video: Make a Classic Leather Seam
10 Tips to Sew Leather by Hand

I hope some of you will find this information useful and I’d love to see some leather sewing projects from all of you talented seamstresses (and seamsters ?) out there in the future…

Design Inspiration: Lena Hoschek

Picture taken from designmonat.at

My latest fashion inspiration is the Austrian designer Lena Hoschek. Lena Hoschek is originally from Graz, Austria, but studied Fashion Design in Vienna. After graduation she did an eight-months internship with Vivienne Westwood in London. According to an article about her on the austrianfashion.net Hoschek was very surprised to see how differently pattern construction was approached at Vivienne Westwood. Apparently squares are cut and modified with slits and notches and then made up into patterns. This seems very interesting but difficult to grasp and I would like to find out more about this intriguing method of pattern construction, which seems to be more about draping onto a form rather than flat pattern cutting, because how else could you find out how to manipulate your mountain of squares if not on a dress form. Hmmm. Alas, I couldn't find anything about this on the interwebs.

Lena Hoschek's designs are very Vintage inspired, particularly by the New Look of the 50s. She also loves a good old Dirndl and likes to incorporate traditional Dirndl elements into her designs. Curvy models, tattoos, Rock’n’Roll and Dita von Teese are equally prominent inspirations in her designs and all of these seem to go together beautifully in her collections.

I have been coveting some of her pieces for a while. Here are some of my favorites from her more recent collections, as seen on her homepage:

 

I would love to draft some of her pieces and sew them up myself. I am particularly fond of the big, slightly rectangular neckline with the collar, which she uses in some of her dresses and jackets. I am also a fan of the high-waisted skirts and of her interesting blouse designs. I am planning to make some Lena Hoschek inspired pieces this spring. Maybe I’ll start with something a little easier like a high-waisted skirt, or the yellow somewhat 40s inspired top, which looks beautiful in this shot from Fashion Week in Berlin:

Picture taken from vogue.de

Since she has a shop in Vienna I was thinking I could show up in her shop pretending I was a Bobo with mountains of disposable income and try on some of her pieces. I should make sure not to forget a pair of big bug-eyed glasses and a designer purse to go with the Bobo ensemble.

For more on Lena Hoschek, check out her homepage or a video of her most recent collection presented at Berlin Fashion Week and pictures thereof which you can find here.

For those of you who can read German, you can find an article about her here and an interview here.

Mormor's Apron

I wanted to share this apron with you which I made last spring as a birthday present for my grandmother. My grandmother is English but has been living in Norway for more than fifty years, so she's offcially my Norwegian grandmother and that's why she's called "Mormor" - the Norwegian word for your grandmother on your mother's side.

My grandmother likes to wear half aprons when she's in the kitchen but unfortunately she's had a bad fall a couple of summers ago, in which her shoulder got dislodged. This damaged some of her nerves and now she has trouble tying knots or doing other delicate things with her left hand. Most aprons, however, can only be put on by tying two strings in a knot. So, I decided to make a special apron for her that was knot-free and hopefully easy enough for her to put on. The apron can be closed in the front and has a long strip of velcro for adjustment.

My grandmother also loves butterflies and all things colorful. She hates black. I don't think I can remember the last time she wore anything black. I doubt if she even owns a black pair of pants. So, the colorful butterfly fabric was an an easy choice and I think she loved it!

Sadly, my grandmother's troubles with her hand have also forced her to stop doing her own needlework. She used to do loads of embroidery and knitting and is an expert in both these fields. I hope the physiotherapy she was recommened to do will help her get better and maybe I can show you some of her brilliant work in a future post some day.

Fit for Real People

I'm still working on my Party Dress and even though I started to work on it last Wednesday I still haven't even gotten into cutting the fabric. I'm taking the fitting process very seriously for this project and I want to be sure that all the pieces fit before I cut into my fashion fabric. For this prupose I bought the book Fit for Real People just before Christmas. Many people seem to recommend this book and I wanted to finally solve all fitting problems forever - one of those New Year's resolutions.

The book has a very cheesy cover but is full of tips and pictures and alteration instructions for every possible fitting problem imaginable. The method proposed by Palmer/Pletsch is the tissue fit method. Basically you cut into your paper pattern tissue (or as I choose to do, trace the pattern onto tissue) and then you pin the tissue and put it on - as if it was made of cloth. According to Palmer/Pletsch this method is accurate and time-saving because there is no need for a muslin.

Now, let me tell you I did not smile like the woman in this picture when I wore my pattern tissue. The whole process was extremely messy and it was very difficult to tell whether the tissue fit proplerly or not. I was so unsure of the pattern tissue fit that I made a muslin anyways. Not one muslin, but two! And before I cut into my fashion fabric I might even make a third. So, time-saving is not the word I would use.

The alteration methods proposed in the book are fairly easy to follow because they are very well illustrated. The difficulty lies in recognizing what alterations are necessary. Do I have sloping shoulders? A round back? A high waist? Palmer/Pletsch suggest that everyone should make a Bodymap in order to recognize how your body is different from the standard proportions. So this is what I did:

So, apparently my left shoulder is lower than my right, I have a short waist, am long-crotched (not something I would use to describe myself to other people) and have long legs. Make any sense? Now I don't quite know what to do with this information but lengthen all my skirts and pants like I've always done. Palmer/Pletsch suggest that one should also do assymetrical shoulder alterations if one shoulder is lower than the other, but that seems like going a bit far. Does it really matter? In the end all I'm doing is a Full Bust Alteration and adding some extra ease and length here and there.

Still, the book has some very eye-opening information. In one chapter Palmer/Pletsch compare pattern companies' standard measurements and show how every company essentially uses more or less the same measurements, even when European pattern companies (i.e. Burda) are compared to American ones. Therefore they reason it should be sufficient to fit only one pattern to your body, record the alterations and then apply them to all other commercial patterns. So maybe all the hard work I put into fitting this one pattern will prove to be useful and time-saving for future pattern alterations.

However, I ask myself yet again: is it really worth working with commercial patterns? Perhaps it is better to draft your own. Drafting takes some time, particularly in the design department, but at least a good fit is ensured from the start. I'm still undecided about this topic and don't want to give up on my pattern fitting efforts just yet. How about you?

Party Dress Project

Christmas is officially over and that means more time to sew for myself. Yeah! My current project is a Party Dress. Originally I had intended on making a dress for Christmas or New Year's but there simply wasn't enough time. Although I have no particular occassion in mind I still reasoned that it would perhaps be wise to make a Party Dress way in advance. The next party is bound to come around sooner or later and that's when I'll be prepared. No more sewing under pressure and no more wearing of store-bought ill-fitting old party dresses I find in the back of my closet. Ugh, store-bought!

For this dress I'm using Vogue 9668 which I posted about in November. I want to make View A with the short sleeves and heart-shaped neckline. I bought a beautiful purple wool flannel on sale yesterday, which I hope will be perfect for the dress. I don't really know how I ended up with purple wool flannel. It was meant to be wine-colored with only a hint of purple and something velvety with a slight sheen to it, but I always get sidetracked when shopping for fabric. So many choices! A wool dress will only work on a not so glitzy party but then again I've never been a shimmery rhinestone kind of girl, so a wool flannel dress might be the right choice after all.

At the moment I'm still in the pattern fitting stages - something I'm taking very seriously for this project. I don't want to end up with gaping necklines and wonky misplaced darts yet again. I purchased a book on fitting to make things easier but so far I'm still very confused. More on my fitting adventures will follow soon...