Monday, October 31, 2011

Renovated Thrift Shop Dress to 1920's Dress

A few months ago I got a few bags of clothes from the thrift store during their annual fill-a-bag-for-$1 day. I got this pink dress because it is 100% linen and at the time, I figured I'd cut it up to use for linings or something for medieval, 18th century or regency stuff. However, I never used it and it has been sitting on a shelf in my sewing room since then.

A few weeks ago I was wondering what the heck to do with it when I realized I had some pink cotton gauzey fabric that was a very similar color. The fabric had also been sitting unused on my shelf for quite some time. I then had the idea to combine the two to make a 1920's style dress.

I haven't had a chance to start work on my idea until this afternoon. But today I finally took scissors to the dress and began sewing it up.

To start with, I measured from my shoulder down to where I wanted the low waist to be. For early 20's, this is not extremely low. I decided to go with 19"-20" for my length, so I pinned a row of pins across the dress to mark the low waistline:

Then I measured a center panel 12" in width, from the waist of the dress down to the hem:

Then I cut out the sides following my pinned lines:

I then cut two rectangular panels of the gauze that measured the length of the dress from the waistline to the bottom hem. This was 33". I used a full width of my fabric which is about 40" wide, for each side.

I sewed the panels to the long edges of the dress, leaving the top (waist edge) free. I then pleated the top edge of the side skirt panels to match the waist of the dress:

To keep everything tidy, I basted the edges to a piece of hem lace:

And then covered the hem lace with a faux tab belt, stitched down to cover everything.

So far, I have only sewed down one side of the faux belt. The other side is just pinned. I also pinned up the hem to just above the ankle and tried it on the see how it is looking so far. I think this is going to work!

The dress is still obviously very rough. Since this was a generic "medium" size dress it does not fit my body very well. The neckline is too wide so I plan to bring it in a little bit by making a few tiny tucks that release just above the bust. I plan to add to the sleeves to bring them down to just above the elbow, and possibly add a V shaped faux insert at the neckline so the bodice doesn't look so plain. Or maybe a collar. :) I still don't know yet!

I'll keep you posted!

Love,
Sarah

5 comments:

  1. It's looking good, Sarah! I love refashioning thrift store finds, and it's so much fun to look through another seamstress's eyes and see what she saw when looking at a particular item. Some ladies are so creative. I like the idea of the faux neckline insert. It sounds like it might work better than collar. But both would be nice.

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  2. Oh, wow! That looks pretty. You could use the lace to do a geometric 'V' shape from the neckline to the waist to give an art deco feel to the lines.
    Your giving me lot of ideas for what I want to do with my dress. My smock/tunic dresses come up quite short so I'd have to look for a maxi dress to do the same....hmmm the sale rack at the shop calls me. lol!

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  3. I love where you're going with that! I think for the neckline, do the release tucks like you suggested then a collar. It looks darling!

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  4. I love the dress where can i find your completed version?

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  5. I came back looking to find the completed dress, too...

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Thank you for your lovely thoughts!