Sew For Victory 2.0 - Ding! Ding! All Change!

So today is the deadline for Sew For Victory 2.0. I've not long got back from photographing my finished dress, which I still can't believe I have actually finished, and while I work on editing and cropping my images I thought it would be a good idea to give you update before revealing the finished dress a little later in the week, (a sneak peak will be on Flickr soon) as things have changed quite a bit since my last post!

 So in my last SFV 2014 post, I was just about to make my first muslin of Advance 4599 and go and buy my fabric. I toddled off to Walthamstow Market in search of something lovely and after a hearty lunch of pie and mash I settled on some gorgeous purple crepe. Initially did struggle to find anything I really liked, the problem with having so much choice is it makes it much harder to choose just one fabric, but as soon as my eyes and hands located this gorgeous purple chiffon crepe (side note: I learnt today that 'crepe de chine' is the french for crepe from China, I had no idea I thought it had something to do with shine, doh!) I was sold. It is a tad sheer but at a whopping £1.50 a meter I really could not complain!

After securing my fabric it was time to get cracking on the resizing. I set to slashing and spreading each pattern piece, adding the required inches and with the help of an old duvet cover I made myself a toile/muslin of my altered pattern. Now prepare yourself, for she is an ugly blighter!

So this is my muslin. I am aware that a muslin will never look that good, but the sight of her in all her wonkiness is quite off putting, especially as my alterations seem to have made it way to big and pretty much shapeless. Now either the pattern is actually for a slightly larger size than it states (I am aware there is always a tad of ease), or my personal measurements are way off, or, the most likely scenario, my resizing has gone awry, in a big way!

Also, I realised while fitting this muslin, that my body shape really does not suit a dropped waist, and it certainly does not suit a dropped waist accentuated by a peplum! I would show you pictures of me wearing this muslin but sadly or thankfully, there was no one around to help snap a picture.

So it will come as no surprise, that after spending all of the bank holiday weekend, fighting with this pattern I decided, with just under a week to go, that I had to go back to the drawing board or should that be cutting mat, and move on to my backup pattern, Hollywood 1977.

This pattern also needed resizing but thankfully it was only by 2 inches front and back, and the pattern is much simpler to work these increases on. I made a quick muslin of the top check my measurements were correct and this time they worked out much better!

This last week and a bit has seen me working my butt off to get my new dress finished. It has involved a lot of hand sewing, as I wanted, despite the time constraints, to do the beautiful fabric justice by not rushing to top stitch everything on my machine, but to treat it a little more delicately by hand stitching wherever I could.

 Which is something I have actually found surprisingly enjoyable, especially when accompanied by some relaxing Sinatra!

Wendy x