We all make choices, but in the end our choices make us make clothes

With sewing lessons booked, I decided to put all sewing projects on hold until I had completed the lessons but halfway through the course I couldn’t bear it any more. So on a Friday night, after having handed in a uni assignment during the day, I decided I must have a new dress now and started scouring the pattern boxes and the stash.

I wanted something 1940s style, particularly in the vein of this dress:

Source

My sudden interest in 1940s dresses came about because for the last few months I have been playing through the Bioshock series of video games. The first two games are set in the 60s but in a city that isolated itself from the rest of the world in the 40s, so the styling of the place is more reminiscent of the earlier time. Fiction I consume tends to make it to my wardrobe almost as fast as it gets to my brain, so after a few hours of starting at a computer game full of 40s clothes I began staring at my cupboard wondering why there weren’t any there. I wanted some 40s-style dresses of an everyday, utilitarian kind, which is bizarre because I am usually all about the extravagant.

My pattern search turned up very little that was useful but I did find a 1970s bias cut 4-gore skirt pattern that was nice and picked one of the blouse patterns fairly arbitrarily – probably for the sake of the sleeves. The drawings on the front make it look alright but it really is horribly sack-like.

I spent the evening making a mock-up and adapting the pattern. In the bodice, I added pleats to the waist, gathers to the shoulder seams, changed the neckline and swapped the button up front for a zip in the back. I also made the back more fitted by tracing from this tunic which fits me very nicely.

This meant adding fabric in the shoulder area and losing a fair bit in the waist. The changes were all done by draping the mock-up which I then took apart and traced back onto the pattern. I have since been assured that this is very much The Wrong Way to do things and that centre back seams should be straight. This is why I’m having lessons. That said, it still worked although perhaps doesn’t sit as nicely as it could. The skirt I left as it was except that for the waistband I just cut a strip of fabric to my measurements and gathered the back skirts and bodice to fit it (they didn’t need to be gathered much). By 1.30am I had a mock-up I was happy with.

On Saturday, after spending the morning doing assignments, I bought fabric, washed fabric and cut fabric. The fabric I got is a printed homespun. It has a much nicer texture than other ‘homespun’ fabric I have used – I think it might be brushed. It also didn’t crinkle after washing which is very pleasing.

I sewed Saturday night and Sunday Morning but was foiled in my attempts to finish the dress on the weekend by lack of an invisible zipper foot for my new machine. I bought one on Monday and finished the dress. I had a false start with the hem because I decided to be different and actually look at the pattern instructions which recommended a 1¼" turn up finished with bias. I did this and it looked awful. So I have redone it with my usual method of a small double fold hemmed by hand.

I like this dress. So do other people, apparently – it’s done fairly well in the random compliment stakes. And someone took one look at me and said "40s dress" so I think I succeeded stylistically. Another time I would put side seams in the waistband to give it shape but otherwise I would leave it largely as is. Of course, when I make this style of dress again I will probably adjust other things for variety but I am very happy with this dress.