All posts tagged: Ninon’s dress

Ninon’s dress: the back fastenings

I’m working on the eyelet holes for the back of Ninon’s bodice and it is soooo boring, and quite hard work. Pushing the threads of a tightly woven duchesse silk satin and three layers of linen far enough apart to make a decent lacing hole takes a lot of effort. I considered a couple of options for how to construct the back and the back lacings, some of which might have been easier to do. My first idea was that I could make a hidden placket by wrapping the lining of the bodice from the back of the bodice over to the front, and then put the eyelet holes through that. Then I could fold back my satin fabric, and sew it over the eyelet holes in a placket to hide the lacing from the outside. This is basically what Katherine did with her 1660s bodice. I was tempted to do this because it would be easy, and (if it worked), would look very neat. But it doesn’t always work. And, more importantly, it’s not …

Ninon’s dress: covering the bodice

Published by The Dreamstress

With my bodice finally fitted, boned, and adjusted for non-dorkyness, I could turn my attention to covering it with the fabulous golden yellow duchesse satin (aaAAAAAAAh). I had originally planned to cover the bodice with pieces cut exactly the same as the boned support, so there would be four pieces for each half of the bodice. Then I looked at some of the my inspiration images, and realised that many of them had eliminated the curved side-front seam. You can clearly see the front seam, but Mary’s frock has no curved side seams. It’s impossible to tell if the lady of the Walking Couple has a front seam, but it definitely doesn’t have a side seam. My original inspiration image of Elisabeth of Orleans almost certainly has side seams under those jewels, but I realised that if I didn’t do the side seams, I could always make faux side seams with trim if I wanted that look, but I would also have the option of the smooth sides. So that was that. The under-bodice has …

Ninon’s dress: angels out of tune

Published by The Dreamstress

Not everything is going perfectly with the 1660s dress for Ninon. I think it’s the fabric. If it’s not golden yellow silk satin, problems are still possible. I mentioned yesterday that the centre front point of the bodice was looking a little dorky. Now, I could have let this go, because, to be perfectly honest, some of the historical examples are pretty dorky themselves. Definitely dorky. But, Maria and her ‘look, my bodice point is so long and dorky I have to sit in a slump with my legs apart’ aside, I didn’t want a dorky dress. Ninon was not dorky! I want a beautiful dress! So I took inspiration from some non dorky dresses. Like this one. It’s a tiny bit dorky, but definitely heading towards the less dorky area. And this one is definitely not dorky. In fact, I love it. I can’t take inspiration from my main inspiration dress, because Elisabeth has her hands elegantly arranged in her lap, but I’m pretty sure it doesn’t have a dorky point. To fix my …