I was pleasantly surprised and very pleased (!) with the many responses to last week’s challenge. At right, you can see the fashion illustration of the style.
The examples left by our visitors followed a pattern which is not to say there were not variations. The thing that struck me was that each person apparently did their work autonomously even though they could have used hints from submissions that had come in. We even got a lesson in provenance of the pattern from Sandra who says it was a Neue Mode circa the 1960’s which sounds good enough to me since I am not an expert on these things.
I’d like to bring up some points about the pattern that can facilitate figuring these out in the future. Handily enough, given points on the pattern are numbered and matched to their companion points to which they are joined. On the right below, I’ve provided a blow up of the bodice front and the skirt, those being the two most challenging of the pattern. You’ll notice I also cleaned it up and labeled it more clearly to more readily illustrate the complexities.
Between points 1 and 2 of the bodice was a scant dashed line. In retrospect, one could imagine this line indicates gathers. Points 1 and 2 of the bodice were gathered to match points 1 and 2 at the top of the skirt portion.
The skirt (see point 3) also had a gathered section. The skirt was intended to be gathered and joined to match point 3 of the bodice.
I think it would be interesting to see this style made up in real life. Any takers?
Some day we’ll have to have a grand pattern puzzle challenge and give away prizes or something. The challenge being, participants would have to actually make up the style full scale. I do have a great prize stashed away, namely a Japanese Vionnet pattern book. Do you have any ideas for a fitting pattern challenge? Maybe we could inaugurate the new year with one. Selecting a style could be tricky. We don’t want to use a current style that belongs to anybody as much as we may admire it because designers we’ve featured in the past have been flattered with our efforts so we don’t want to cross any lines and offend anyone. If you have some ideas, please leave them in comments.
OT Note:
For those who belong to the forum, today I posted some great resources for measuring garment and fabric quality. The garment checklist was nicely detailed, including defect codes. Not that you have to use it as is, each company usually determines their own defect codes specific to their product but the checklist is a comprehensive way to develop your own checklists. The fabric checklist amounts to a run down of the four point fabric inspection system which is available for purchase from ASTM.
On a personal note, I will be out of the office all day tomorrow attending to a private matter. The end of a long. agonizing. private. matter. that my husband would skin me alive if I mentioned. It’s nothing bad. Trust me, you should enjoy the respite. In another six months, I won’t shut up about it.
This dress is a nice variation on a Kimono sleeve style dress that created a eye pleasing flow from the top to mirror such in the skirt part of the dress. The genius of the design and the construction we now only now can find in Couture.
Wow, I really like this dress. I’m sorry I was so busy I didn’t get to see the first post but this is something I might make in the future. Not now….getting ready for a wedding on Saturday.
I love your challenges Kathleen they keep me on my toes!
I would like to make this dress…what do I have to do to get a pattern ??
Definitely Neue Mode, but the hat puts it 10 years earlier, into the early to mid 1950’s ;-) Got the buttons on the sleeve right, missed the ones on the centre front, but that sorts out the issue of fold vs seam. I like the belt across the front waist – the disjointed waist seam had struck me as clumsy. That would have been mentioned in the instructions as an extra piece to make and insert, but there would have been no pattern piece as it was a rectangle.
I’m on holidays for the next few weeks, so I’d like to have a go at making this up. I might have a look through the extensive stash and see what I can come up with. I’ll be cutting the sleeves short though – it’s high summer here, and we’re looking at a severe heatwave soon.
I’m somewhat possessed by this pattern and love the idea of it….so it really is on my “to do” list….between clients, it might take a while, but it’s grabbed the little gray matter, and won’t let go. These things can be really exquisite. I will put a gussett in the sleeve, I already can see there’s little or no movement there….