Author: kendra

If it wouldn’t make too much of a mess, I think I’d be working on about 10 projects right now…

I did start embroidering the corset cover this morning on the train — all went well, very nice and relaxing.

But on Monday I decided to stop putting off (and start getting excited about) making a new version of my 1910s corset. It’s time to admit defeat on the first version, which was fit over my friend Bridget’s corset which we had laced WAY down, plus I thought I’d be optimistic and make it a bit smaller in case (ha!) I lost some weight. Well, it ain’t happening.

So I stuck my old corset on my dress form and started draping a new one — I’ve basically widened all the pieces through the bust and waist on all of the pieces except the side front. Then last night, in a fit of awakeness (maybe all that laziness has paid off and I’m fully rested? It could happen!) I cut out my coutil and cover fabric. The cover fabric is just fabulous, a white cotton satin with a narrow black stripe (stripedy! yay!) which was so generously donated by my friend Heather, who saved me the scraps from a wedding outfit she worked on at Dark Garden. I was originally worried there wouldn’t be enough fabric, but it turned out there some large enough pieces that I got the whole thing cut out with no problem. Yay!

Here’s some pics, just so you can see the fabric:

Thanks so much to everyone for your embroidery input (below)! Okay, two strands, and mark the pattern shape but don’t cut until after I embroider (since none of the embroidery will be near the edge, I’m going with this plan — I like the idea of having extra fabric to fit in my hoop).

But, of course, I need a fitted pattern first so off I went! The pattern went together easily, except of course I had to sew all those tucks for the mockup as they’d affect the fit. No problem, I listened to most of the commentaries on Titanic (very little costume stuff — there’s a few comments by Deborah Scott on at the cast & crew commentary, and a brief behind-the-scenes where you get to see lots of extras’ costumes in one of the easter eggs [when Jack and Rose are going in to dinner]).

The big problem with mocking this up is that lace insertion and edging make up part of the body of this garment, including all of the armholes. So I had to draw in their widths, cut holes, and loop a ribbon through in order to see the fit. Here it is on my dress form:

All I could tell was that it was too wide, so I took it in a bit at the side seams and tried it on my real body:

The only real issue was some bunching up around the armholes, so I had to redraw a lower, wider armhole.

Then, suffering from Costume ADD as I did, I was feeling too lazy to redo the pattern or mark the pattern on my fashion fabric, so instead I started on a mockup of a new 1910s corset… but more on that soon!