It sounded so simple right, a commercially available multi-sized reprint of a 1940's pattern. I have made tones of 1940's dress, most of them requiring resizing from something crazy like 30" bust. A week tops right. Enter Crepe De Chine....
I bought the Crepe de Chine (polyester) from Pitt Trading in a remnant bundle 3m for $5 - who can say no especially when one is already paying postage for other fabric. It was a soft dove grey colour and reminiscent of a dress worn by the mother in the queens gambit. I had the pattern already in mind and crepe de chine is one of the suggested fabrics. Tick and Tick.
I actually didn't even need all of the 3m which was fantastic, I started strong trying to do all the things - bar a mock up because how do you make a mock up for something that literally cost $5 in materials? when the material is like water, so it isn't like calico is going to show you anything. Having made many patterns from the big 4 companies I already knew that the vast majority fit fine if I make a size 16 front and a size 14 back, I just cut and go. But I did baste my curves and corners, follow the pattern instructions (for a little bit anyway) and I piped pockets and collar, I lined up all my notches you know all the things you should do but I rarely do. As photo below yes I always trace my patterns.
So prior to major construction all my pieces looked fantastic. Pockets attached ready to go the first issue - a narrow bias cut strip sewn into a tube turned out and cut into 6 equal peices to form button loops. Once sewn I could not get that thing to turn for love nor money. No worries, take the second one (cause I cut it on the fold) and sew the tube by turning in both sides to the middle then folding down the middle and sewing down the upper edge. Except Crepe de Chine slides more than even satin, its like as slippery as a bathroom floor after a 5 year olds shower. So even ironed the strip was too narrow to keep even no matter how many pins it had.
Ok lets just try and use the best bits, again the slippery nature of the crepe meant I couldn't sew them in the right shape and before full meltdown tantrum could ensue I made the decision that I would create thread loops for the buttons and quietly congratulated myself for such a smart idea. But was it smart ... indeed it was not, as one can not work out how big the loop must be for the buttons when one has not chosen the buttons. More on that later - the button loops were sewn further down the process so we will come back to that.
My next issue, why did I decide to come back from almost a year off sewing and make a dress with a round yoke that calls for not one but two 90 degree turns to create the front seam? oh that's right because I am a masochist. This is I think the pinpoint of where things really started going south for this project and I started giving up on it. I could not get those turns in. Maybe in a cotton but not in crepe de chine. They ended up slightly rounded and not entirely symmetrical but I could not even anymore.
At this point I sewed up my side seams and pinked (as was my chosen method of finishing) and cut through a seam..... because that's something I do. Never mind it's low so that can be an issue for future hef when she works out the hem. I tried it on and pulled together the opening where the zip would go and oh god it looked yuk. Like gab on every single lump and post pregnancy bump possible gross. It just didn't fit. And at this point I stopped caring and my brain wandered further and further to the future projects and my sewing time spent on Bernie.
As February closed I realised I had to get this done. Even if I called it an almost wearable mock up I just had to do it. There could be no more adding to the UFO's and my self imposed February 28 deadline had come and gone. I pulled it back out hung it up and assessed. It needed, zip, hem, button loops, buttons and a good iron.
So in an effort to finish I created the button loops first, yes before I had chosen buttons. And yes that is as stupid as it sounds. Next was zip, I hand basted then hand sewed and then machine sewed this in - overkill perhaps but I wanted to make sure there was no slip on that seam. Once hand sewn in I tried it on again and was pleasantly surprised. It didn't have that loose fit as patterned but it didn't look bad, well not unfixable by the wonders of elastic slips bad anyway. Then it struck me I had given up for dead before the race was run.
Lesson Learned - keep an open mind until all hope is gone.
For all its evil the crepe de chine does have a fantastic drape, a soft floaty feel and almost zero fraying. So it isn't all bad, I think if I use it again I will just have to hand baste the entire seams to ensure less slip.
I am really happy and proud of the way that the piping turned out and the dress is really lovely. Still needs buttons but I am having issues finding the matching lime colour and I am in no rush so I will keep looking. All in all it turned out really nice, like everything it isn't perfect but it is wearable, feels beautiful and has far more right than wrong.
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