ruffles | odetosew

Whenever I have been invited to an occasion, the first thing I think of is “what am I going to wear?”. The next thing I think of is “what can I sew for myself to wear” as I love to make clothing and I love wearing things that are unique and nobody else has in their closet. From there, I pull up my pattern stash archive, pay a visit to my fabric stash (or the fabric store if I really don’t have the appropriate fabric to work with) and get started planning and sewing my outfit.

For this occasion, I was invited to a wedding of a lovely bridal alterations client who had become a friend over our many dress fittings and consultations of her beautiful wedding gown. The major part of her dress that I altered was her complicated and intricate bustle of her train that I she dreamed up and I created for her. Originally, as I fiddled and fussed to get her train bustled just right at one of her fittings, I said to her “I’ll just hide in the bushes at your wedding venue, you give me the signal when you are ready, and I’ll sneak out and help you bustle, then disappear back into the bushes and let you be on your way to the reception”. She would have none of that and insisted that I attend the wedding as her guest, and enjoy the entire ceremony plus be ready to bustle…DEAL!

All of the ruffles and flounces in action!

So, being the alteration seamstress of honor at this wedding, I just had to have something special and handmade to wear! Not having all the time in the world to be sewing for myself with the very busy post-Covid wedding season upon us and other alterations and custom sewing client projects literally piling up in my sewing studio, I decided to make a dress that I have made before (a huge time and energy saver!) and use fabric that I had in my stash from Mill End Store in Portland, OR.

I pulled out this lovely pattern from Butterick that I had already cut out and made fit alterations to the pattern for a dress that I made a couple of years ago:

I made view C, the halter neck, ruffled and flounce dress that wraps and ties to the side.

This time around, I decided to fully line the dress (instead of using the bodice facing from the pattern), meaning I cut out the entire dress, the bodice and the skirt pieces, less the flounces, in both the outer, floral silk georgette fabric and the silk lining that I also had in my fabric stash. Cutting silk, especially sheer, floaty slippery silk, is NOT easy if you’ve ever tried. It slips all over the place and misbehaves in as many ways as it can, just to drive you nuts and practically give up before you even started. But, since it was SO pretty and soft, I did my best to battle it and tackle it into submission, knowing in the end it was going to be incredible and worth it all.

The silk draped so innocently on my dress form

So the sewing begins!

It all went pretty well and the fact that I had made it before, I knew what to expect from the pattern instructions.

The most difficult and time consuming part was making the narrow hem on the long outside edge of the flounce that would be attached at the bottom of the skirt. Check out this pattern piece that is over 110 inches long. Yikes!

After tackling that beast, the dress was nearly done and I could start to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Having a major deadline to hit, and other clients banging down my door and begging me to help them with their last-minute bridal requests, I finished up my dress and just got ‘er done.

One last thing I added to the dress was lightweight foam bra cups sewn into the bodice lining as that sheer stuff certainly wasn’t going to hide my bits. Thank goodness I had some on hand in my supply stash and I was able to swiftly hand sew them into my dress, no problem! Confidence boosters for boobs-horray!

Bra cups sewn in saved any wardrobe malfunctions!

I just have to share the insides of the dress with the lovely silk lining!

Here I cheated and used my serger to attach the waist of the bodice to the skirt and hide the raw edges.

The skirt lining that ends just above the flounce

So off we went to the wedding, leaving enough time to stop at one of our favorite spots in the wine country of the Willamette Valley in Oregon, The Allison Inn and Spa, to snap some photos and have a glass of champagne and a light cheese plate before the wedding. Perfect!

Let’s go up there, that’s where the champagne is served!

The lovely snack we shared over a glass of wine and champagne!

As much as I enjoy the entire process of making a new dress, it feels so good to be done with this one, wear it to a fun wedding (and not have to hide in the bushes!) and hang it up on my wardrobe for another occasion.

Until next time, cheers!

I bought this lovely coral pink silk crepe de chine from NY Fashion Center Fabrics online as I just love the quality of their silks and the color was SO yummy!

coral pink silk crepe de chine

I was not sure what I was going to make with this fabric when I bought it, but I knew that I wanted to make a fun, pretty top for summer.

Once I got my sewing mo-jo going, I decided a good match with this fabric could be this cute ruffled cold shoulder pattern from New Look that I had in my pattern stash since early spring:

NL6490

I know, it’s super trendy, we see this cold shoulder trend everywhere, however, I really like it (in most cases, when it is not super cheap-y looking or just a whimpy little peek a boo shoulder). I don’t want to disappoint anyone, so here are just a few inspirational photos I have gathered of this popular trend:

Pretty, right?

So, I set forth cutting this baby out from this pattern using my lovely fabric.

Things were going along pretty well, cutting out carefully and sewing it in parts in between other projects and life happenings.

Here I am sewing a ruffle to the side seam:

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I didn’t realize that this top was lined when I was looking at the back of the envelope and the fabric yardage and type needed for best results. It is quite nice that it is lined, but added a little more work and time to this project that I was not expecting. Luckily, I had a nice tan light weight silk remnant on hand that was perfect for the lining. Here I am examining the outer layer and lining of this top:

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I added the ruffle incorrectly, sewing it all the way down to the side of the top instead of leaving it free under the arm to form the “cold shoulder” affect, so I had to carefully unpick the seams and re-sew. It actually didn’t look too bad just sewn down to the side as a tank top, but I really wanted the cold shoulder look, so I took a deep breath, took a seat and got comfortable with my seam ripper.

Here, I pinned the top to my dress form with her little arm attachment thing-y to just see how it was laying before adding the shoulder straps: NL6490c

I had some major issues with the shoulder straps. The instructions are not helpful for this part and I think the illustrations are incorrect. I sewed it as best I could, but ended up having to unpick most of it, pin it in place and re-sew it so that it made sense and laid flat against the neck. Not fun.

Making the hem is usually my favorite part of most projects because it means I am almost done! This was an easy one with just a double turned under top stitched hem for both the outer and lining layers:

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I love how the top turned out, although it is quite large and low at the side under the arm (pretty peek-a boo bra opportunity!) and I should have really made some sort of test muslin. Despite all of the hick-ups with this pattern, I’ll be wearing this top very soon as now summer is pretty much over. I hope to post some good photos of me wearing my new top as long as my hair cooperates, and I don’t look like an old lady trying to look young and hip in it. We’ll see…