I can wear evening dresses all day if I want to

As it’s now the season for wearing summer dresses, I thought I would blog about some. I have made a series of dresses from the pattern for a 1929-30 Vionnet evening dress on page 78 in Patterns of Fashion 2. When scaling the pattern I made it slightly more slimline than the original because the original was sheer and worn belted over a petticoat, whereas mine would only be one layer.

It’s a weird dress to make. I’ve found it easiest to describe the skirt as an 8-sided square, although four of the sides are slightly longer than the other four.  The bodice side seams are only about 3.5” long.  This was the first pattern I started hand-hemming, because the satins would look awful otherwise. By the end of it I was very experienced, as each dress has around 10 metres of hem.

I can't decide whether this reminds me more of an octopus or a starfish...

At the beginning it was difficult to work out where all the skirt pieces fitted together and how they fitted onto the bodice. I have now made five versions of this dress.  The first time round I sewed all the skirt pieces together, then made the bodice, and then tried to combine the two. It was a pain to sew all those angles into each other and the resultant seams don’t sit well. In the later versions I started by attaching each skirt piece separately onto its respective bodice piece then sewing the completed dress front to the completed dress back.  This worked much better.

 My first version of this dress was made from a satin fabric with a variegated turquoise and mauve diagonal pattern. I had been looking for a bright print satin but could find  none, so this was a compromise.  I wore it to my friend’s 16th birthday supper.  

The bias-cut bodice is kind of odd to wear – you move your shoulder and the fabric pulls on your opposite hip.

I never quite understood what the pattern intended for the shoulder drapes so I made my own drapes by cutting out spirals of fabric using pinking shears;  I then sewed the spirals on at the shoulders. I also did this for the next two versions of this dress I made. These were gifts for my cousins.  To make their dresses I needed to adjust the original pattern not just for size but also for dimension and body shape. Because the girls live interstate, I made a variety of mock-up bodices that I posted to them so they could each pick the best fit.

My school friends decided to arrange a summer picnic at the end of the year I was making these dresses. The dress code was ‘dresses or button-shirts’.  I could have re-worn the dress from the 16th birthday but, even though it was summer, the Canberra weather was still a bit too cool for that. So, obviously, I needed a new dress.

Spot the camouflaged bolero.

I found some lovely I-have-no-idea-what-it-is fabric at Spotlight. It had a bright and blocky pattern and would be warmer than the satin. On the day before the picnic I made myself a second dress using this pattern and, to go with it, I made a bolero from Style 2302.

Sourced from my mother’s pattern stash.

On the morning of the picnic I machine-hemmed the eight-sided skirt and trimmed a straw hat to match (which has since been untrimmed). I was one of the few at the picnic who had decided to brave the weather in a dress; however I learnt the hard way that this skirt is difficult to control in the wind.

Or, alternatively, that it spins well.

I had wanted a bright print satin for this dress when I had made my first one so I was never entirely happy with the variegated fabric, so when I found some blue and green patterned satin it seemed like a good reason to make another one.  This time I added sleeves.

The sleeves are squares of fabric with the armhole shape cut out diagonally below centre.

All of the dresses have different skirt length and slightly different necklines. When cutting the pattern I initially cut the fabric straight along the shoulder seam line and then chose the neckline afterwards and shaped it while trying it on.

I don’t think I cut this neckline at all.

My first attempt at this dress is now a summer house dress. Because I can wear a satin 1930s Vionnet evening dress around the house during the day if I want to!