Today was a productive day! I decided to machine sew all of the things I had pinned yesterday-the skirt seam and all the bodice seams. Before I did this however, I machine sewed the muslin to the calico so that it lay flat.
I then decided to work on the sleeve sample. I first created a simple one piece sleeve bock using the measurements from my mannequin and my own arm where appropriate. From this I then looked at my research and realised that it was slightly gathered. I then looked at 'Period Costume for Stage and Screen-Patterns for Women's Dress 1800-1909' as refernce as to what to next.
These are the pages I used:
From these I realised that it would be beneficial to divide my own pattern into 2.5cm sections so that I could apply the same shape of that in the book to my own pattern. From doing this I realised that my sleeve head was far too small and had to be a lot bigger to allow for all the gathered fabric. I also realised how small the side seams were that fit underneathe the arm pit, this just shows how small the sleeve really is.
My Pattern:
From this I then traced out and cut my calico. I had previously asked for help but then decided to try and work this one out myself as I feel that by making mistakes it seems to sink in a little better!
When gathering both the sleeve head and bottom Dexter advised me to use this technique to avoid any snapping when pulling thread through the fabric-this is especially handy with thicker/dense fabrics! You simply secure the thread at one end of your chosen gathered area and then zig-zag stitch over the top on a machine keeping the thread away from the edges of the zig-zag. Makesure you finish each end of the zigzag stitch off properly. Then just simply pull the thread thats underneathe and voila! Gathered fabric! This means that the fabric tends to lay flatter and can be pleated closer together.
When I had gathered the sleeve and then refered back to my pictures the sleeve seemed a little 'too' puffy. On the picture there is a lot of embroidery and I do not want this to be lost if the sleeve is to gathered. However when I actualy gathered the sleeve to the correct measurment I realised that the sleeve wasn't too pleated and the pleating would not intefeer with the embroidery. I shall ask if this is ok tomorrow as I was going to re-construct the sleeve in a different way by dividing the sleeve head into strips and then fanning the pieces out to allow for the extra fabric to be pleated.
Once I have made sure the sleeves are ok I want to do some sort of sample of fabric manipulation for this dress. I need to remember to hem the skirt, whether that being by hand or on the machine.
Time wise I am running slightly behind schedule as by this point I should have started my second piece. I feel this is because last week I was not very well therefor missed out on about a weeks worth of time. I am hoping to make up for this in easter by finishing off any loose ends then so that I can come back after and start my third piece.
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