Fabric Junkie

On my birthday one of my mom's friends brought me three big bags of fabric, patterns and notions from her stash. She is downsizing, and I think, realized that a lot of the projects she started will never get finished. I've been having fun picking through the stuff, and have found some real "gems." But even though I have plenty of uncut yardage waiting to become something wonderful, it's very difficult to curb the compulsion to buy more fabric, especially when it goes on sale for riduculously cheap! My latest acquisition is this fabric (above) which I thought would make a humorous "Cocktail" dress. It's 100% Japanese cotton lawn, which for you fabric dummies, has a lovely soft hand and is almost sheer. I'm thinking it'll be cocktail/sundress for Spring/Summer '08.

New on the Blogroll

I've just added "A Dress A Day" to the blogroll. I don't know this blogger personally, but I happened upon her page last night looking for vintage patterns, and I think we must be kindred spirits. If you like dresses, you'll love her site. Enjoy!

Ta Da!

The dress that had been consuming all my free time and creative energies (hence no new posts) is finished and much to my great satisfaction, also was an apparent hit at the Christmas party. Merci bien! MK, for letting me put these up! You rook mahvelous!



Okay, so about the dress. MK was inspired to have one similar to one she saw at Anthropologie. I developed a pattern, made a mock-up and once I established a good fit, we decided to raise the waistline a bit in front and remove the skirt gathers at center front to make it more flattering. The fashion fabric is a white taffeta flocked with black velveteen and the sash is black cotton velveteen cut on the bias and hand stitched in place. I underlined the fashion fabric of the bodice with white silk organza to give it more structure and less transparency in the white areas. The bodice is also supported with boning along all the seam lines except center back where there is an "invisible" black zipper. The dress is fully lined in white to maintain the "whiteness" of the taffeta. Because I was working with a limited amount of fabric that MK had purchased prior to the designing of the dress, I chose to add a black point d'esprit petticoat layer to give the dress a little more length and oomph. I'm especially proud of the motif matching I was able to achieve considering the limited yardage and a few fabric flaws I had to work around.
MK purchased the shrug and then doctored it up a bit with her crochet genius. She also made her beautiful choker and handbag! I expect this won't be the last time we combine our creative talents...