Let's call this a victory anyway

It doesn't rain but it pours on this blog. I don't sew for months and suddenly I have five things to show you. (Yes, five. I finally finished the Let's Go Ride a Dottie Bike #sewDollyClackett dress and have put not terribly good pictures of it on the original post.) This is a story of a fail that has turned into a win, and a cautionary tale about rushing to meet self-imposed deadlines.

I have often remarked that I would be the first cut from the Great British Sewing Bee because there is no way I would have a finished garment in the time they give. And yet, I keep not giving myself enough time to actually finish garments in time. Last September, I had hoped to make V8728, a lovely repro 40s dress, in time for Jaymz Bee's swing dance at the Palais Royale. I've been wanting a blue swing dress for a while, and I planned to use this blue polka-dot from the sari store. A burn test indicated it was probably rayon. I should have had about two weeks to finish it. It seemed like a good plan.



Naturally, I waited until a few days before to start. Unfortunately, when I opened the fabric up, I discovered that the bolt must have been stored in a window; the fold line had faded massively, and there was another huge faded patch in one corner. I would have to be very clever about cutting it out.

In true make-do-and-mend style, I avoided the faded line by cutting the front and back pieces along the fold line (with added seam allowance) and sewing them up. The skirt is full enough and the print busy enough that I don't think you can tell. I couldn't avoid faded patches on the bodice and sleeves, but I tried to place them so that the worst of it would be at the back or swallowed up by seams.

Pattern placement and cutting out took even longer than usual^*, so I had to fly through the construction if I wanted it to be ready for the dance. Which meant that I skipped fitting it to myself before topstitching. Naturally, this being a Big 4 pattern, that meant that it didn't fit at all. Too loose at the sides and the gathers were too blousy. I just don't have the necessary equipment to fill that out. I also wound up cutting the bias binding for the neckline too narrow the first time, so had to make new stuff out of considerably more faded fabric. The neckline was too droopy, made worse by the fact that I ran out of time to secure the binding properly. I also ran out of the thread I used for topstitching. The hem was a quick turn-up job, I didn't hem the sleeves, and the (white) zipper install was a slapdash attempt at lapped. In short, complete failure.



I was hoping to fix it for Swing Out to Victory in November, but wound up not going, and so it's been hanging in my living room for months, taunting me. I raided the zipper to use in my Definite Probability of Macaron dress at the end of October and featured it as a fail in my end-of-year round up. I finally decided to make it work in time for a fund-raising swing dance at the Great Hall, as well as using it for Sew for Victory, and actually went out and bought a matching zipper. Unfortunately, the dance fell right before marks were due and as a result of burning the midnight oil one too many nights in a row, the night of the dance I took a wee nap that lasted until the following morning. Which meant I missed both the dance and finishing the dress. So. New deadline: the DC's brother's birthday dinner.

I solved the poofy problem by flattening the bust piece: I unpicked the bodice seam, sewing a new line of gathers about 7 cm up from the bust edge, and reattached the waist piece. Much better!

I used the extra fabric cut from the hem to make a new neck binding, somehow cutting exactly the right length. It was too wide to pass through my bias tape maker, because I grabbed the wrong size (and why don't they have the sizes marked on them instead of oh-so-helpful numbers like 25?), so I quickly pressed it and attached it. I had a dinner to attend, and I wanted a dress to wear for it.

And this time, I made it. Sort of. It was wearable, but again I was sewing up until the last minute (with the DC calling out "Sewers, you have 15 minutes left!") and while it fit much better at the waist and bust, the neckline was still droopy. I threw a sweater over it and called it good for the moment. Over the course of the next few days, I unpicked the new binding, sewed a new gather line, and tightened that baby up. More thread for the thread gollum. The second time, I used the 1" binding tool, which worked a treat. I finally had a non-droopy neckline, barely in time for the extended Sew for Victory deadline. Because, you know, me.

I had enough of the leftover hem fabric to make a 1 1/4 inch self-belt. I chose not to add the shoulder pads. The neckline is a bit wider and lower than the pattern thanks to my regathering and trimming for the neck binding. You can really see the fading on the back bodice compared to the skirt. And the shoulder caps. Alas.

So, all the things I did in April (to qualify this for a Sew For Victory entry in make-do-and-mend style): unpicked the bodice and waist seams, the neck binding (twice!), and the hem; sewed new gathers along bodice and neck; reattach bodice and neck binding; tightened up waist gathers at one side and resew the side seams; attached new invisible zipper; hem sleeves and skirt with previously-made self binding; made self-belt.


I've been wondering: what is it with me and polka-dots lately?

^*On the GBSB, I'd still be cutting out the fabric when they say "one minute left!" I don't know how they do it.