The most beautiful frocks are to be found at Boutique Renata

I’ve been adding to my Bioshock-inspired 1940s wardrobe: this time a mauve dress with a Peter Pan collar. The fabric is nice and light, not overly crushable and stable enough to sew easily. I didn’t notice until I got to the shop counter that the swirly pattern actually had a defined stripe so I added a bit of length to allow for stripe-matching in construction.

Sewing with stripes isn’t something I do a lot so my first point of call was the internet to see how stripes were used in the 40s. The consensus was straight across the bodice and meeting to an angle pointing either up or down at the seams. I found examples with the centre front angle pointing up and down so I picked the one I liked best.

I went antique-pattern shopping before making this dress and decided to start incorporating some genuine features.

I used the neckline and collar from Home Journal 9323 but it was uncomfortably tight so I sort of ended up in between the vintage one and my original. I didn’t quite extend the collar pieces enough so there’s a bit of a gap at the back. I’m not sure I attached the collar properly either as it's come out a bit uneven.

I also used the vintage short puffed sleeves which have a quite different shape to the repurposed 80s ones I used previously. The contrast fabric is leftover from my regency mourning gown which matched my main fabric absolutely perfectly.

While I like my previous dress in this style a lot, it has a few issues with the bodice. The arm movement is not great and the shoulder points are not really wide enough for me. It is also a bit baggy from neck to armscye. To solve these problems I did a small bust adjustment; a broad shoulder adjustment and my magic armscye adjustment.

Now, in my new dress, this bodice is actually comfortable and I don’t have to keep focusing on how much I want to be wearing it to override the discomfort!