Author: The Dreamstress

Meet the Scroop Rilla Corset – the perfect WWI era corset pattern!

Published by The Dreamstress

Meet the newest Scroop Pattern: the Rilla Corset, a historically accurate World War I era corset pattern that is easy and detailed enough for even the total corset novice to tackle. Buy it here!   The Rilla Corset pattern came out of my search for the perfect WWI corset pattern for my Fortnight in 1916, and the realisation that what I wanted in a corset pattern of the era simply didn’t exist as a commercial pattern. The Rilla Corset is based on an original PD Marvella corset by Belgian corset manufacturer PD Corsets. The Marvella was one of the best-selling corsets worldwide in the second half of the 1910s, making the Rilla corset the most accurate representation of what the average woman wore during the period, and the perfect base for WWI and early 1920s costuming. With extensive instructions, and advice on achieving the correct fit for the era, the Rilla was designed to be an easy make for sewers with some corsetmaking experience, or a good introduction to corsetmaking for the moderately advanced sewer …

A petticoat for a 1916 evening dress thedreamstress.com

A cheater super-full 1916 petticoat

Published by The Dreamstress

I’m making progress on my romantic historicism 1916 evening gown. The under-bodice is totally finished: My biggest concern about this gown was how to create a petticoat to support the width of the skirt.  The bell-shaped silhouette of 1916 was so high fashion, and lasted for so short a time, that there are very few extent petticoats to use as a guide.  There are lots and lots of examples of petticoats to create the more common A-line silhouette, but the bell-shape is harder to source. There is this wonderful petticoat from a 1917 issue the Paris Journal of Fashion, and it’s on my to-make list, but I think I’m going to need to try a couple of versions to get it right, and I couldn’t find the right fabric. I was getting a little frantic, and then I realised that the solution to the petticoat puzzle was right under my nose – in my UFO pile. I’ve had this 1950s petticoat schedule for a re-make for a while. The construction and finishing is beautiful, and …

Rate the Dress: Uber-lingerie frock by Lucile

Published by The Dreamstress

With an impressive score of 9.3, last week’s Russian evening/court gown on Nadezhda Polovtseva continued our run of well-received Rate the Dresses. It came up in the comments, so I thought I’d reassure you that I’m really not trying to pick garments that I’m sure you’ll like!  My goal is always to choose something that I think it interesting and provides grounds for discussion, and (with a few exceptions) I can rarely predict how a garment will taken.  So let’s find out how this one does… I’ve been looking at lots of 1910s evening gowns for the construction of my Costume College Gala gown, so this week’s Rate the Dress is on-theme, with a confection by the queen of 1910s romantic froth: Lucile, Lady Duff Gordon. This dress is the ultimate mid-1910s iteration of a lingerie gown: a delicate lace frock which uses techniques borrowed from lingerie construction, like lace insertion, hemstitching, faggoting, layers of texture showing through sheer veiling, and dainty ribbon trimming. The overall effect is etherial, fragile, and utterly feminine, with a sweetness …