A Princess dress

Posted by: Paulette
This dress was onjly supposed to take a couple of days to make. It ended up taking about a week.

 

 

The first problem was the color. My friend wanted antique rose. This color can be interpreted as so many different colors. We decided together that the color she wanted was called mauve. But, mauve in Canada has more of a purple tint to it and there was some discussion as to whether the color we were both thinking of was the same.
Thinking that I could save my friend a whole lot of money, I went to the mill ends store in Tempe, AZ, called Sas. The first time I walked out of this store after browsing for a hour, I had the worst headache. There was just so much to look at and my brain was spinning with all of the possibilities.

I walked out with the organza that ended up on the finished dress and a whole lot of stretch satin which I decided not to use as soon as I got it home and started working with it. It was too heavy and thick for all of the gathering in the waist and to "float" over the crinoline that was built into the lining of the dress.
And there was some concern that the color wasn't right anyway. It was more of what I would call a raspberry, even though the thread colors said antique rose.
In an effort to save some money, I drafted my own patterns. I like the way the bodice turned out, but there are some things that I would have done differently with the skirt if I had another crack at it. Instead of making the skirt a large rectangle that was gathered at the top, I would sew together four triangular pieces that would then have less gathering and more of a bell a the bottom. I was concerned about having to do this with the organza, which would have visible seams all around. I also am not very happy with the sash. With the shrug on, it looks like too much fabric around the waist. I made the sash the same width as the bow, and did some gathering around at the back, sides and front.

 

After several starts and restarts, re-buying fabrics, and zippers, alterations, picking things apart and putting them back together, I am so relieved that this is finished. I hope I can get to my friend in Canada in time. I'm also concerned about how pink the organza turned out to be after three layers of the skirt are put together.
Will I ever be happy about making clothes?