30th Birthday Dress

So I don't do a lot of 20th century sewing, but my girlfriend is turning "29 again," and needed something pretty to wear. Now since those idiots who mass produce clothing out there see fit to make plus-sized clothing look primarily like mumus (with the sole exceptions of Lany Bryant and Torrid) she gave me the opportunity to try my skills.

Twentieth century stuff makes me nervous. I can't help it. It's just not my comfort zone.

But I've sucked it up and gotten started. I picked the dress at right (McCall's 6073) since she lives far away, I can't do any advanced fittings, and this should be a little forgiving if I am off a bit. Plus, I love the crossed bust and the high waist. With some recent changes in my own figure, I've been gravitating more and more towards empire waists, and I thought I should spread the love.

I picked a bright floral fabric because damn it all, if it's your birthday, people should notice you! Of course, with this pattern, I also had to use a lightweight, drapey fabric, which gives hives of anxiety just thinking about it shifting around under my presser foot.

Luckily, this Joann's Fabric find has just enough body to say put.

It is, however, light enough enough to be quite transparent, and my efforts today were put on hold when I discovered that I need to go out and find something to line the skirt with or everyone will see my dear friend's panties through this.

A word of warning to those who try this pattern: The fools who designed didn't seem to think that someone using a lightweight fabric would want to line the dress. Lining the skirt won't be too much trouble to hide the raw edges, but the bodice is a bit of pain. If you have a serger (which I don't), you will probably want to make use of it.

Back in Action?

You might have noticed I've been out of commission for an entire month now. Go figure--as soon as I start a real blog, I flake out on it.

My apologies! I have been downed due to a personal illness (I won't share the gory details), but I am hopefully getting back on track now. I am just sitting down to some alterations today--the first time in front of my machine in almost four weeks.

Hopefully soon I'll be back up to full speed and rambling on about costumes again like the crazy drunk girl you got stuck next to at the Renaissance Faire.

Layer Cake

I am the underwear nazi. I mean, I guess it shouldn't surprise anyone, since I spent a full year of graduate school obsessing about teenagers and corsets for my thesis. But really, when you are going to dress up--historically or otherwise--it's your underwear I'm checking out most aggressively.

Okay, I promise, I am not going to go around peeking under anyone's skirts. That's not the kind of underwear I'm worried about. It's just that I like to see that if you put the time and effort into procuring a lovely outfit, don't spoil it by stopping at the surface. This goes for anyone: brides, reenactors, fancy costume lovers of all kinds.

Underwear shapes your body and the clothes over it. Cloth is soft and it needs the right support to make you look utterly fabulous. The human body is soft too (unless your a super model--and even they get their arm flab air brushed out) so you need something to give it the right silhouette.

Lesson 1--Brides: Wedding dresses can cost a small fortune. It's one day when we ladies have some extra drive (and a nice excuse) to really look fabulous.

But even a nice simple $100 dress can look stellar with good alterations to fit you properly and the right undergarments.

Torso: Ladies, very few of us have a perfectly smooth figure. That's normal. The "lunch meat" on the sides flops over. The boobs slip down and flatten out, and then there's that irritating lump that I have right above my belly button.
But it really does look better in a dress (for anyone size 6-26) to smooth yourself out with a good foundation garment. You don't need a steel-boned corset if you don't want one (I didn't). Even just a good $50-$100 modern shaper will do the trick. Tuck your waist in a little bit and keep your boobs up where they look their best.

Even if your gown is boned, taking this step will take the stress off the dress, leaving the underwear to do the work.

Want to go whole-hog for a steel-boned corset? Awesome! They look gorgeous, and can make your posture look stellar (which is worth more than you would think). Think carefully about what kind will serve you best. Try my blog entries here about how to pick it out.

Just be sure that no matter what underwear you get, you wear it to each and every fitting!

Skirt: Please, please, please do not buy a gown with a big puffy skirt and then try to save money by cutting out the petticoat. If you want a sleek silhouette, go for it, but big skirts fall flat without some help from below. Check out the difference it can make in the 1950s dress:

Same dress, but on the right I added the petticoat. See how much better that is? Making your hips and skirt look bigger also has the added bonus of making your waist look smaller. Nice.

Until you get used to it, you may feel a little funny. But please put something under there!



Lesson 2--Historical Dressing: This is the one that always gets my goat. You cannot slap on a pretty dress and call yourself done. Historical silhouettes are based on enhancing the natural body. See the lady in the blue dress? This Copely portrait was done in the mid 18th century. I can tell you for a fact, that when this lady got undressed for bed, her boobs were not that flat against her chest. She is wearing a pair of stays (also called a corset by modern Americans). Like this pair. They're not just important to make you look skinny. They're important to make you look right. That sexy shelf bra look that we like now was so uncool in 1775.

Also, don't you dare skimp on the petticoats. It takes a lot more than you think to get this kind of pouf. One or two is a start. But try getting bold and pile on three or four. You will notice the difference right away!

The same goes for the Victorian era. The corset seems obvious. You need a smallish waist, and you need to get your boobs up to make this look right. But, you think this gal's butt is naturally this big? For all 60-ish years of Queen Victoria's reign, volume was in. And there were so many ways to get it. Piling on the petticoats is the first step. And Victorian petticoats have extra layers sewn onto them to make the bottom fuller. They're called flounces.

If you really want to get involved, you can start adding bustles, hoopskirts, etc. Just make sure you pick the right one for your decade. In the Victorian era, fashion started to move almost as fast as it does today. Every decade had it's own look. You wouldn't want to be caught with a '80s bustle under your '50s dress! This would be just as odd (fashion speaking) as wearing your 1980s big feathered hairdo withr your 1950s poodle skirt.

Just remember, not wearing enough undergarments in your historic costume (from an historic point of view) would make you look poor, sloppy, and half-dressed. If you are trying for authenticity, pile on the layers. Even just adding a few can really improve your look.


I am in favor of this for Halloween costumes as well. Even when I sell my pinup dresses (at left) I add not just one, but two petticoats to get the right pouf.

Once I was super disapointed when, in a pinch, I ordered a costume from a major producer of sexy Halloween get-ups, and the cheap fabric clung to every lump and bulge and then fell flat over my pudgey butt. However, by throwing on two fluffy short petticoats (oh God I love petticoats) and just a basic plastic-boned corset, I had a super-sexy look that gave me pinup curves.

So don't be shy! Layer it up. Get your best look by building a frame for your dress to hang off of. Rely on a good foundation garment (corset, waist cincher, or bustier) and be sure to add enough petticoats to get the volume you want.

Buying Vintage Patterns

(A Vintage post transferred from my old blog)

I am visiting family and friends in Pennsylvania this weekend, and thus I am three hours from my sewing. But I do have a few hours down-time so I thought I'd take some time to expound on one of my favorite fashion-shopping weeknesses: vintage patterns.

It started last year when I was in "50s mode" making my own bombshell wedding dress.

You see, I got so excited about it the era and the shortage of good repro patterns, that I started cruising eBay for vintage patterns. And lo and behold, they are abundant on eBay. When I discovered the "Collectibles-->Sewing-->1930 to now" category, I was one excited little seamstress.

They range widely in price, from $2 to $30 or even as high as $80. My own personal price limit is about $8 apiece (plus shipping), unless I am in love with something specific and hard-to-find. 50s bathing suit patterns, for instance, have such a high rate of competition that I think I paid $20 for mine.

When I started out buying these patterns, I bought almost indescriminately. As long as I liked the pattern, and the seller thought all the pieces were there, I would place a bid. I bought a heap of patterns this way, until I have almost filled the top drawer of my filing cabinet (please, no one even hint to my husband how much money I spent on them. He doesn't need to know).

After my initial lust for vintage patterns was sated, I began spending a little more time taking stock and building some criteria. I had bought some good patterns, but now I could be a little more picky. After thinking about it quite a lot, I learned to look at a few things when it came to getting the most out of my purchase.

Size: This didn't start out as being very important to me. After all, I can re-draft just about anything, right? Well, yes, but it does save time (and I have come to look at my time as begin worth money) not to have to size everything up or down accordingly. Many vintage patterns are tiny. I assume this is because the larger patterns got used, abused, and thrown away. As a historian, I have to shout it, people were not smaller back then! Remember, this is your mom's or maybe your grandmother's generation. If we as a species grew at the fast a rate, our grand children would be about 6-7 feet tall-- and that's the women!

Maybe we were a little less chubby on the whole in 1948, but size 32" bust can never have been the norm. For whatever reason, these tiny little patterns seem to be what has survived, and you should take a moment to look before you buy. Sizing up from a 32" bust to a 36" might not be hard. But going from a 32" to a 44" might be a bit more dicey.


Silhoutte: This is easy to recognize. Are you buying 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s? What is a little more important if you are buying a bunch of patterns is that you not buy a bunch of the same thing. In my search for the iconic 50s New Look day dress, I bought about 4 patterns whose main difference was just in manufacturer and the picture on the cover. Duh.

Except for the scalloped neckline on the one on the left, these two are essentially the same dress. Same bust and waist darts, same circle skirt on a round waist. Once you've got a few basic patterns, you might start looking for unusual details that you don't think you can draft yourself.

Think about this one instead. It's got a gored skirt, halter neck, and a great wrap-around button detail.

If you find yourself intrigued by just different the fabrics or minor details pictured on the front of the pattern, save an image of it in your computer and try to replicate it using the pattern you already have.


Condition: This will matter to you differently depending on how much of a collector you are. I don't care if the envelope is torn, provided all the pieces are there. But to some people, it does. Are there water stains? Are the pieces inside all chopped up? Be sure to read the description carefully.


Mail Order Patterns: These babies have quickly risen to become my favorites. Mail order patterns appear (from my very minimal research) to have been popular up until about the 60s, and have petered out through the 1970s. Most often they are highly wearable styles. The packaging also is drawn in really easy-to-interpret style so you can generally get a very good idea of how the garment will fit. Mail order patterns cover everything from evening gowns to underwear, and they often are priced a little cheaper than the fancy-shcmancy Butterick or Advance patterns.

Unusual or Hard-to-Find Patterns: I already mentioned my quest for a bathing suit. That was an ordeal! I was out-bid about a dozen times before I finally won one. And even then, I had to watch it until the very end so that no one bid-Snyped it out from under me (bastards).

Most of us have a few iconic images in our head that we are conjuring up with these patterns: Marylin Monroe over the air vent or in a pink wiggle dress singing "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend." But there are lots of special occasion looks and even daily-wear items that be vintage and still surprising.

Play suits, slips, bathing suits, aprons, and even bath robes can all make good additions to your vintage wardrobe, especially if you have the creative knack to work them in properly. Don't dismiss something just because it doesn't look like what you remember seeing in a movie! There are a lot of nifty patterns floating around out there that are just waiting to be turned into something fabulous!

Pattern Whore

So I got a bonus day off of work today when my car wouldn't start. I was feeling a bit depressed while I watched my car get hauled onto the rollback so I thought I would salve my soul by cruising eBay vintage pattern sales. Except, I'm also worried about paying for car repairs so instead of buying anything, I'll just share my favorites and live vicariously through anyone else who buys them instead of me.

This dress is all about the button detail on the front--probably something a patient seamstress could draft on her own, but perfect for the lazy amongst us (that includes me). At a 32" bust, it will need sizing up for most of us.







From my favorite eBay pattern seller, this 1940s dress was enough to make me think very hard about whether or not I should bid (my thin wallet prevailed upon me not to). I am always a sucker for 40s gathering and the panel cut into the center front of the skirt like that. This one I could easily slip into my work wardrobe and get loads of compliments on (as long as the insertion of that panel went well. It's bound to be a bit tricky). Bust 36"!? I love you. *wipes away a trail of drool*



This one I hesitated to put up because I wasn't sure if it was quite original enough. I finally decided that with the princess waist and inset sleeves (a little hard to find on 50s dresses and kind of a pain to re-draft), it was worth it. I love the scalloped neckline, and I think this could easily make either a pretty cocktail dress or a killer wedding dress. At a 30" bust, it will definitely require sizing up, bat that shouldn't be too bad with its configuration.

I'm also pretty sure that for most of us, proper waist-cinching undergarments and petticoats will be required to make this flattering.

Nevertheless, it's totally adorable.


Wow! The wrap detail on the front of this is spectacular, especially when complimented by the gathers at the hips. Beware though: that wrap detail could be tough to size up for inexperienced seamstresses, and at a size 32" bust, that will almost definitely be a requirement.

Cover it Dummy!

A few weeks ago, a friend off-loaded bunch of dummies on me from the attic of her museum. Score! These were not items from their collections, but rather old junk dummies that had once been used to display historic clothing.

They had spent a loooong time in the attic, and they were officially disgusting with dust and attic "gross." The two 1970s Acme dummies on the right reacted well to a good vacuuming and a light sponging, but the one on the left...

Well, that one is from the first two decades of the 20th century, without a doubt. It is paper mache (so no sponging), with a terrific turned wooden base. It appears to once have been covered by a knit black fabric, but no more. Dust is caked up on it. In short, it is really gross.

But nevertheless, it is a gem in disguise. Since it is from an era when corsets were still worn, it is a much better way to display my corsets than those straight figures of the modern dummies.

So, filled with envy for the magnificent dummies that Lace Embrace uses to display their corsets (at right), I set about covering this one to make it usable.


I started by draping acid-free batting over it (I am a museum nerd after all), snipping it to shape, stitching it down. White satin was draped over it next, cutting a (too big) hole for the neck and adding darts to fit it properly at the waist. All of this require a lot of pinning a smoothing a re-pinning.

From there I began hand stitching up the sides with a large needle (to avoid loosing it inside). Once I reached the armpit, the question of "what the hell do with armscye" became obvious.

This required some artful pleating around in a circle. I was thinking of doing it something like an upholstered chair arm or gathered pillow, though it came out a little more uneven than intended. I will cover the center with a button, and it should look a little more finished.

I still have to stitch down the darts along the bust and back and figure out what on earth to do about my gaping neck hole, but my attention had wandered again, and I haven't touched it in two weeks.

This week I am frantically getting ready for my next UnderWhere? lecture at work; this time it will feature fashions of the 1880s. It runs this weekend (March 27th and 28th), and I still have to finish a petticoat. This weekend I've already enlarged the bodice (I had a giant 4" gap where it wouldn't close over my bossom--that was a first for my sad little chest), made a new chemise with matching drawers, and made collar and cuffs out of fine white lawn (fabulous fabric from Farmhouse Fabrics, by the way. I recommend it). I also bought new high button shoes and net mits to compliment the outfit. Hopefully someone will be available to take pictures this weekend (and lace up my corset because ther is no way I cat get tight enough on my own).

The Empire Strikes Back

There it is. With practically no measurements, except "I bought a size -- bridesmaid dress, and they altered it a lot for me," and only 14 hours to finish it in, I managed to pull it together, petticoat and all. Empire--I love you!

The extremely thin, gauzy material was ideal for this dress, and it floated around my pal all night whenever she moved, making her look vaguely like a goddess. The bodiced-petticoat was a necessity to keep that fine fabric from being completely indecent in the skirt. And, the heavy linen lining in the bodice also provided a perfect sturdy base to keep the dress from feeling too fragile.

Sadly, this picture makes the sizing look terrible, but once we realized what was going on and pulled the drawstrings in tighter, everything worked out (note: bib front is a little tougher for multi-sizing than leaving the opening in the back as the pattern calls for). The sleeves will also need to be pulled in a bit, as you can see. They are decidedly shapeless right now.

Construction photos to come; it appears that my husband took the camera they were on when he left for the weekend. But at least I got a few new pictures of the red 18th century Polonaise gown while we were there. Sadly, the pictures lacked the super-perfect hairdo I wore to my own party--that was a pro job. But Kate did a nice job with what knowledge she had, and she loaned me her exquisite repro jewelry from Amey's Adornments to me so I could feel extra pretty.