With the bodice support all done and corded in the bust, and the skirt all done, it’s almost time to drape the bodice. I must say, the skirt looks pretty amazing: To attach the skirt and bodice, I sewed the front skirt to the front bodice, and the back skirt to the back bodice, and then basted the bodice sides together with wrong sides together, to make draping the ruching easier. Once the ruching is done, I’ll unpick the basting and sew the bodice right sides together, and then sew the skirt side seams. The bodice is just pinned up the centre back while I drape the ruching.  I’ll set in a covered zip and buttons after the ruching is done. To make sure that the ruching lies smoothly over the bodice, and that the cording doesn’t show, I’ve covered the bust with very fine flannel.  It makes Shell’s bust look enormous, but it will all be proportional once the ruching goes on.  For now, it just makes be laugh. Before I could begin draping, …

Actually, this post is about the skirt lining of Shell’s dress, because I foolishly neglected to take any photos of the skirt outer in progress. The skirt lining is cut to the exact same pattern as the skirt outer though, so you’ll get the idea. Because of the width of each of the four back skirt panels, and how narrow my fabric was, I had to put joins in the bottom of each skirt panel.  You can see them in the bottom right of the photo. They don’t look great on the lining, but I’m confident they will be barely noticeable in the final dress. I’m going to need to trim a lot from the skirt sides.  The train is also longer than it looks:  I have Isabelle the dress form raised to her full height. I’m in love with the dotted swiss fabric.  It’s such a lovely fabric to work with.  I wish I knew what the fibre makeup was. The spotted fabric ads a lovely, fun, touch to the dress.  You’ll just see …

While Shell’s dress is a modern wedding dress in most ways, I’m a historical seamstress.  So I’m using historical construction techniques to make the dress. This is most noticeable in the bust.  To create the perfect shaping, and to make sure that there would be no chance of nipply weather, no matter how cold the day, I corded the bust panels. Based on my previous experience with the evilness of cording, I decided to cord full pieces of fabric, and then to cut the bust panels out of those (rather than cording pre-cut panels). Shell watched me cord the first piece of fabric, and got quite excited about documenting the process. Felicity got excited about the process too.  Felicity loves Shell.  She can literally walk all over her. It was fun letting Felicity get involved.  Usually when I sew for clients I lock Felicity out of the room, and she sits outside the French doors and looks sad.  But Shell is a good friend, and loves Felicity, so kitty got to sew with me. Shell …