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A Little Bit of Red dress

Published by The Dreamstress

Last week I blogged about all the stuff I wanted to get finished for Art Deco Weekend.  I didn’t get everything I wanted done, and that wasn’t all a bad thing – it turns out that evening gowns aren’t really a great idea for street dancing in sweaty heat (actually, street dancing and sweaty heat aren’t a good idea either, alone or together).

One thing I did finish was my floral chiffon 1930s dress.

It’s made from Excella E3137, one of my vintage patterns.  I made it up without the hip ruffles, because really, hip ruffles?

I’ll do a proper review of the pattern in a bit, once I finish the dress properly.

I mean, it’s finished properly (rolled hems, French seams & double sewn seams), but I’m not happy with it.  Somehow it just looks uninteresting.  Somehow I failed to notice that except for those hip ruffles it’s just a sack with quirky seaming.  And the quirky seaming doesn’t even show with the print!  Maybe it needs those hip ruffles after all!  So I’m going to take it apart just a little and see if I can’t give it some flair.  Any suggestions?

So the dress as you are seeing it now is Little Bit of Red dress V.1.

And when I feel like fussing with silk chiffon again, I’ll pull it apart, and we’ll have V.2 .  Almost as good as a new dress!

Uninteresting or not, it was lovely to wear on a sweltering Sunday in Napier.  It kept me nice and cool, the breeze blew the chiffon about, I ran about on the beach and sat on the gravel and took pictures and even got in a dance or two.

And went in the fountain again:

In fact, I even drove home in it, all the way to Wellington!

So what do you think?  Are the fabric and a belt enough to make it interesting, if not spectacular?  Or do you have a brilliant suggestion for spicing it up?

Elise’s gift: the leaf green velvet jacket

Published by The Dreamstress

Silk and rayon velvets were very popular in 1930s fashion, particularly for evening wear.  Last week I showed you a devore velvet gown in royal blue (the most fashionable colour for velvet).  This week Elise’s gift is another velvet item, but in a much more unusual colour.

Leaf green velvet jacket

Isn’t the colour scrumptious?  Silk velvet in that colour is top of my fabric wish-list at the moment.

The jacket is a lovely example of the Renaissance influence on 1930s fashion.  You can see it in the puffed upper sleeves, and in the padded, sculptural collar.

Puffed sleeves and ruched collar

The sleeve puffs are controlled and structured over the shoulders with rows of gathering stitches.

Controlled gathers over the shoulders

The controlled gathers at the top of the sleeve turn into soft, unstructured gathers at the bottom of the poof, so it droops gracefully over the slim lower sleeve.

The sleeve

Lines of gathering stitches also keep the ruching of the puffed collar

The elaborately puffed and ruched collar

As you may have guessed from the elaborate and clever cutting and shaping of the jacket, this garment, unlike the blue devore dress, probably isn’t a homemade article.

The cream rayon jacket lining

It doesn’t have a label inside, so either it has been taken off, or the jacket was made by a very skilled seamstress who didn’t label her work.

Commercial or skilled seamstress, I really want to recreate this jacket.  First, because I love the colour, second because it is so clever and cunning and darling, and finally because of this:

Terrible insect and age damage

Sadly, the jacket is in terrible condition.  It’s got small holes on most of the proper right half, extensive damage on the PR collar, and is missing huge portions of the PR sleeve.

Damage to the collar and sleeve

While the damage is sad, and makes the garment unwearable, and un-displayable, it does have the lovely advantage of really allowing the construction details to be studied.

Fabric disintegration on the collar

The collar is padded out with loose cotton wadding, held in with a cotton mesh .  The cotton wadding is quite natural – very lightly processed.

The muslin inter-lining on the sleeve

The sleeves are interlined with a very lightweight cotton muslin which has slight overall foxing.

The sleeve interlining

All of the interlining adds a little support and structure to the very soft velvet, but without adding weight or making it too stiff.

So that’s the jacket: lovely but damaged.

I can just imagine how it would look over a really simple 1930s evening dress like my wedding dress.  Mmmm…yummy!

I’ll keep you updated if I ever find that leaf green silk velvet!

Maggie & Johnnie dressed up

Published by The Dreamstress

I’ve shown you a bit of Maggie’s costume on the dressform, but of course you are still waiting to see it on a person, and to see Johnnie’s uniform.

Here are the very talented Rowena and Stuart in their costumes as Maggie (as a maid, and then a rural wife) and Johnnie (as a gunner in the New Zealand Expeditionary Force, the Wellington Infantry Battalion ) pre-dress rehearsal for  Home.

Maggie starts out the show as a domestic servant (in huge demand in early 20th century New Zealand).

Then she meets Johnnie, but 1914 comes, and he goes off to war:

Later in the show Maggie gets to take off her apron and be a rural housewife.  Isn’t Rowena just adorable?

Home has just finished up its run in Hamilton, and is off to Auckland for a few shows.  Do make an effort to see it if you can, it’s so sweet (and starts with Mairi’s Wedding, so I was always going to love it), and such a fascinating glimpse into a really important period in New Zealand history.