Plus, it gave me a chance to use my creepy "Lauren" blog post label! Haha! Yes, you have your own tag, ever since we became knitting twins!
I decided to put the two garments in their own posts so they don't get too super-long. You'll see the cardigan soon! (Okay, so you may be thinking "What the heck Jo? You just posted a knitted cardigan!" Don't worry, I'm not a ninja who knits a cardigan in a week, Washington Square just took me a long time to get around to posting! Heh :) )
So I'll start with the dress: La Sylphide by Papercut Patterns. I've made the skirt version before.
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La Sylphide only has one dart in the front, going from waist to bust, while Vogue 8766 has two (one from waist, and one from side bust). I initally rotated the bust dart into the waist dart to mimic La Sylphide, but remembering the nipply nightmare I had when I did that with my Cambie dress, I changed my mind and kept both darts. If it ain't broke, don't fix it!
So all I needed to do was steal the neckline from La Sylphide, draft on a buttonband to match, and make sure the neck bow was the correct length to match. My method of doing it was very made up, so I won't bother trying to explain, unless you're very interested. It worked, so I suppose it wasn't wrong!
It sounds kinda simple, but it did take me a while, especially since I triple-checked everything out of self-doubt!
Oh, and then I had to make sure the front and back skirt fitted to the front and back bodice.
Anyway it WORKED. Yay, and NO. MUSLIN.
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Pretty skirt! |
I'd never fitted the sleeve for 8766 though, so that was something new I had to do. I'd completely messed up the armhole of the bodice through my fitting changes, so the sleeve had to be changed too.
Since I'd done a forward shoulder adjustment, I used this tutorial to alter the sleeve. I made up a muslin sleeve and pinned it into the bodice. I wasn't too fussy about the fit, and it seemed good enough so I moved on to the real thing.
I had a look at the two sleeves, and noted 8766 has a much differently-shaped sleeve cap. I think 8766 has a lot more height, and mine definitely sticks up a bit at the cap. I bet La Sylphide's sleeve gives a more subtle gathered effect. UPDATE: Mel of the Curious Kiwi let me know that as drafted La Sylphide has no gathers, oops! Wrong info there. PS She made two adorable ones!
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If you can see what's going on.... La Sylphide is on the right. |
After I cut this out, I had a brief moment of panic when I realised I hadn't considered the print at all! (Though I was smart enough to cut it all out going the same direction). Should I have matched it along the buttonbands at the centre front?? Luckily, the WSBN girls assured me that for such a small print, it didn't matter. And they were right, you don't notice at all.
I also realised, actually, even if it was noticeable, most of the front is obscured by the bow, and the skirt falls into drapey folds so it really doesn't matter!
The print is really busy so the bow kinda gets a bit lost, but you can see it up close. It also looks really good sitting on top of my cardigan, which you'll see in a few days!
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Bows are fun :) |
Overall, I'm really pleased with the end result, and would like to make this dress again. There are definitely a few janky bits, like the sleeve-bodging, and the hem... It tried to do that gross diagonal rippling thing when I narrow-hemmed it, just like my Miette skirt did on the bias.
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Miette bias ripples of ugliness. |
I don't think I'd normally go this short, but got a little over-zealous when evening out the hem. It's still longer than the pattern is drafted though. That thing is SHORT! So I had to add an extra button I believe. Speaking of buttons, I was thinking of being lazy next time and not even making button holes for the bottom few buttons since they're not needed to get the dress on. I could just stitch them right on and make them fakeys! What would YOU do? Would that bug you forever? :P
So overall, I'd call this a win, even though it DID take me forever. I'm think it's a cute design and I love the fabric! Tune in the next few days for how it looks with my new Marion cardigan :)
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Bows :D |
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