Robe de style: some construction details

I still have to get myself used to taking pictures during construction. I only have a few in-progress-pictures, but I took some of the details of the finished dress.

For the pattern, at first I tried to adapt some of the freely available ones (to be exact, this one and this one) but couldn't quite figure out how to get rid of the darts. So I made my own pattern. Usually I try to avoid this, but it turned out fine. After weeks of fiddling with the muslin I came up with this:

I also had a pattern piece for the little triangle that belongs in the neckline, but it went missing.
I uploaded the pattern in maximum size, so if you'd like to use it just click the picture and a large version should appear. The cutting mat has an inch grid.

This is the dress on my dress form. I only included these pictures for the sake of completeness, it really looks a lot nicer when on a person.

The fastening. I totally copied this from Katherine from The Fashionable Past. She mentioned that the snaps tend to come undone, so I added some hooks and eyes. However, my snaps still came undone, but I blame the cheap snaps I used. I will eventually change them to black ones anyway, and make sure they are top quality.

Detail of the neckline inset and the sari border. There are small pencil marks on the outside of the inset, because I sewed it in the wrong way around and then was in too much of a hurry to change it. Whoops. :P

The dress inside out. This picture illustrates quite well how I assembled the whole thing. I cut the bodice pieces from dress fabric and lining fabric, basted them together, then finished the edges with facings. Then I sewed in the neckline triangle by hand, and then sewed on the trim, also by hand. The stitches of the trim show on the inside, which I could have avoided but I had to do it quickly. Well. I don't mind that much, there are so many extant dresses around that look terrible on the inside. I will just classify it as period. :)
After I finished the bodice, I attached the ruffled skirt. I sewed it only to the dress fabric of the bodice, and then folded the lining over the seam and sewed it down with whipstitches.
By the way, I used four widths of fabric for the skirt. My fabric was 110cm wide.
After the skirt was done,  I added the pocket hoops. I sewed them only on the seam allowances of the skirt seam, so the stitches don't show outside.

Different views of the pocket hoops. They could probably be a bit bigger. They only make a subtle difference, but I guess that's enough. In case you are planning a robe de style and brooding over the size of the hoops as I did: I made mine exactly after the pocket hoops in Corsets & Crinolines by Nora Waugh, but only half wide. The length is the same as in the book.

I tried to take detailed pictures of the embroidered trim, but I obviously lack the necessary photographing skills. I hope you can at least make out some details. There is bullion embroidery on it, which I love. It makes it look antique and precious, doesn't it?

A Robe de Style inspired by Jeanne Lanvin (HSF '14 Challenge #2: Innovation)

After months of contemplating and cluelessly staring at the muslin I finally finished my robe de style in three days of frantic sewing, because I wanted to wear it to a special event. Of course I already knew about the event when I started the dress in November last year (!), but you know how these things go.
However, I learned that the simplest solutions are often the best, and that it would have been really smart to make the muslin out of a fabric that has a similar stand as the dress fabric. I tried numerous variations of the bodice with the muslin and wasn't satisfied with any of them, until I was forced to make a decision because my time was running out.
So I chose the easiest version. No hidden darts or any other gimmicks, no special seam placement, just a more or less fitted front and back piece that somehow resembled my inspiration dress. In the end the simple pattern turned out to work perfectly with the silk I was using, and I am very happy with the outcome.

Here you can see the inevitable fitted-but-without-darts-puckering in the back. I hated it on the muslin, but it looks a lot better with the dress fabric. I like the diamond shape :)

Yes, I should have used black snap fasteners. ;)

Where is my second foot? o.O

I like my neighbours garden gate. :)

Originally, back in November '13 when I started to work on this dress, I planned to finish it for the HSF '14 Challenge #2: Innovation. That didn't work out, but I like the HSF "fact sheet" so I'm including it here:

The Challenge: Innovation

Fabric: 4,50m black Shantung silk for the dress, a piece of cream colored silk taffeta for the neckline, fine light pink silk twill for the bodice lining

Pattern: my own

Year: 1926

Notions: black thread, hooks and eyes, snap fasteners, embroidered vintage sari border

How I historically accurate is it? Good question. I'm not sure if I already know enough about the 1920s to evaluate it correctly. I think the pattern is fairly correct. There are no darts in the bodice, and I have seen similar puckering in the back of extant pieces. The silk fabric is probably correct, although it maybe should have been silk taffeta instead of shantung. I finished the neckline and armholes with facings, no idea if that was done in the 1920s. Also no idea if anyone used vintage sari borders to embellish a dress then. The dress closes with a combination of hooks/eyes and snap fasteners, which I have seen on several extant dresses. All invisible seams are done by machine, the visible ones are done by hand (which is never wrong, I guess)
In my opinion, the overall look is coherent with the 1920s, the materials are more or less accurate, and the only thing I'm not really sure about is the general construction and the facings. I give it 70 %.

Hours to complete: ~ 35, including the patternmaking and the muslin

First worn: Boheme Sauvage Vienne, April 26th 2014

Total cost: The fabric came from stash, but I vaguely recall that I paid € 10/m, so € 45 for the black silk. I don't remember the price of the other two silks, but let's just round it up to € 50 for the whole fabric. The sari border was € 12, the fastening materials and thread came from stash. So in total I paid around € 65 for the whole dress.

By the way, Laurie from Teacups Among The Fabric had the same idea for Challenge #2, and she did get it done. I like her dress very much, especially that it is shorter in front and has a differently coloured visible lining. Also, the light pink she used is lovely on her and emphasizes the playful nature of this type of dress.

1920s slip

Before I started to work on the robe de style, I decided to warm up with the slip that I planned to wear underneath. A slip is a necessary undergarment that protects the skin from the material of the outer dress, e.g. scratchy wool, and also protects the outer garment from sweat or skin oils. Furthermore it smoothes the line and helps the dress to hang correctly. Plus, it's the perfect excuse to use all that whimsical lace. ;)

1920's Cream Lace Chemise with Hand Embroidery from wearitagainsamvintage.com

French silk/lace slip, 1920s. Can't find the original source, sorry :(

A beautiful vintage slip from wildrosevintage.blogspot.com

A more conservative slip from the Metropolitan Museum

A black 1920s silk slip from the Metropolitan Museum

So I went trough my stash, actually in hope of finding some suitable silk, but then I came across a rather firm but smooth black and completely opaque rayon which I deemed perfect for the task. It has little spades woven into it and feels wonderful on the skin. I guess it's the stuff that is normally used for the backs of modern waistcoats.

front view

I used this pattern (or rather, these instructions) from realhistoricalpatterns.tumblr.com (which is a great blog by the way, thank you so much whoever you are!)

The pattern/instructions worked really well. The fact that my slip has a seam at the waist which isn't supposed to be there is just because I'm an idiot who can't accept that cutting fabric after midnight is not a good idea. I had no more fabric to cut it again, but then it's not that terrible a mistake. The slip is still doing what it's supposed to, and nobody is going to see it anyway.

side view

I admit, the lace I sewed on the hem looks a bit forced. I could probably have used it in a more graceful manner, but I didn't have an awful lot of time to finish the slip. Moreover, I was angry at the lace and wanted it to be gone quickly. I ordered it as stretchy lace on ebay for a totally different project and received this one, which is about as stretchy as hemp rope and for which I absolutely didn't have any other use, so it ended up on the slip.

back view

All in all, I am very happy with this garment. Stupid mistakes aside, it was easy to sew and I made the right fabric choice - smooth against the skin and against the dress fabric.

I made something!

First of all:

Sorry for the radio silence, life got in the way of sewing (again!). However, I'm fiercely determined not to let this blog die. I'm still here!

Now for the good news:

The robe de style is finished!

As always, after I was pondering for months over how to construct a perfectly fitting bodice without the use of darts, it came down to three days of frantic sewing before the event I wanted to wear it to. I'm just terrible at time management, and apparently didn't learn anything over the last 10 years.
Anyway, it's finished now and I love it. I'm afraid there are no pictures yet - I forgot to get it photographed at the event, and since then something always got in the way.

I promise to post pictures as soon as possible, as well as a detailed description of the whole process!

Robe de Style - onwards!

There has been progress with the Robe de Style! May I present, the Mighty Muslin:

Compared with my model: 

Hm. I wonder if I should take it in even more at the waist, or if the more defined waist of the model is the effect of the undergarment. I guess I'll try both (I still haven't decided if I want small hoops to go under it or just tulle fluff.)

I'll also have to alter the shoulders and the curve of the skirt edge, and the neckline should be lower, but at least I generally like where the skirt is sitting. 

Lanvin Robe de style - A bit of Research

Sorry for the recent radio silence! My last weeks were completely dominated by studying for a very hard exam, in fact the hardest one you have to pass when studying pharmacy in Vienna. And I did pass, at first try!! This is a huge milestone in my student career, and while I still have several exams to master before I finish, everything from now on will be easier as this. Yay! :)

Anyway. A few weeks before the exam (when I wrote the last blog post), I still thought I could go to the 3rd Boheme Sauvage (a 20s event) which was taking place 3 days before the exam. I really should have known better by now.
I ALWAYS need every second of the last days before a big exam for crazy studying, to feel reasonably prepared, and, more important, to keep my nerves under control. So, no Boheme Sauvage for me this time.
Thus, there's also no finished Robe de style or even good pictures of my sparkly 30s ballgown to show you.

I'm already studying for the next exam, but this one is not nearly as much of a problem as the last one, so I did have some time to do some necessary research on my RDS plans.

I'll just leave out the paragraph about what makes a RDS special, there are already more than enough blogposts about this out there. You can also read about the basics in the RDS wikipedia article.

I chose this Lanvin dress from the collection of the MET as main inspiration for my RDS.

By now I have a working muslin of the upper part, but the skirt turned out to be a bit of a problem. I'm still not entirely sure where it should sit. I started out with the typical 20s dropped waist, which was waaaaaay too low and just looked silly and wrong. Right now it's about the height where low rise jeans would sit. I think I'll try attaching the skirt even higher, roughly at the height of the upper edge of my hipbone, and then decide which looks best. I promise, my next post will at least contain pictures of the muslin.

Next question: what's under this skirt?
RDSs were often supported by panniers or pocket hoops, much like 18th century dresses.

The MET provides us with this:

MET link

  I don't know what's going on here. Okay, there are lots of (probably) silk organza ruffles, but what are the white thingies on the left and the right side? The left one looks like the upper part of attached pocked hoops, but what's with the right one? I'm quite sure there should be a firmer support than just organza ruffles to achieve the typical bell like shape of a RDS.

Interestingly, it seems the MET owns two black versions of this dress, the one above with the smaller skirt and one with pocket hoops:

MET link

I was confused at first, because from afar they look exactly the same (apart from the skirt shape and visible part of the slip at the neckline), but using the zoom function you can clearly see differences at the shoulders and in the beading. Also the front skirt of the second dress isn't as heavily gathered as in the first one.

There are even more extant versions of this dress:

In midnight blue from the Kent State University Museum

And a lovely dusky pink one! This one was apparently sold by Christies. 

All of them apart from the first one seem to achieve their shape with pocket hoops or a small pannier. The hoops could apparently be attached directly to the dress, or to the slip, but I need to put some more research into this topic (there's going to be another post).

I think with my dress I'll go with small pocket hoops, but I still have to meditate about whether I want them sewed to the dress or to the slip.

What do football, the pope and a Robe de Style have in common?

For some reason, I am totally susceptible to mass phenomena (only the non-violent kind, of course!).

E.g., apart from attending the odd or two football games as there is a field round the corner from where I live and it's a nice excuse for having 2-3 beers and potato chips, I'm not interested in football at all. I'm not interested in watching most sports, but I'm particularly not interested in watching football.
And yet, when there's a European or even world championship happening, with public viewing and everyone talking about it, I really enjoy being right there in the middle, watching (and commenting on) as many games as possible, celebrating with others on the streets and becoming an all-knowing expert.

Similarly, though I'm christened I don't care much for the church, it's protagonists or it's followers. I don't think I ever voluntarily visited a church to attend mass. I have no idea at all about what the sacral decision-makers are currently up to, and I honestly couldn't care less. BUT when I found out that there's going to be a new pope and suddenly the newspapers as well as the internet where full of it, I couldn't get enough of it. I spent hours learning about the history of the papal conclave, and when the day finally arrived, I meticulously followed every newsticker, news feed or livestream I could find, to be the first one to find out who will be the new pope.

When I started out with sewing and costuming, I found my favourite eras as quickly as I found my least favourite eras - and the 1920s definitly ranked very high with the latter category. The low waist, the rectangular shapes, the silly hats... nope. Not mine. Do not want.
Then, some time ago, the Twenties craze started and eventually reached Austria. Electroswing came up. "Speakeasy"-parties everywhere, even here in Vienna! Boardwalk Empire, The Great Gatsby, Downton Abbey.  Suddenly, the costume blogs I was reading were filled with adventures in flapper fashion, and the more I saw of it, the more I started to like it.
Anyway, here's my first attempt at flapper clothing:

Some day there will be better pictures! :)

I made it after this excellent tutorial. As always with my first tries, it's not authentic, although I'm actually not sure with this one (the fabric is cotton crepe and the cut isn't too far off, I think... but then I don't know enough about twenties dresses yet).
I've already worn it 3 or 4 times on various occasions, and I just love it. It's so comfortable, and the skirt is great for swirling. :)

So for the next event, the 3rd Bohème Sauvage in Vienna on November 23rd, I'm planning to make a new dress, which, as you can already guess if you haven't fallen asleep yet and still remember the title of this post, will be a Robe de Style.
As inspiration, I chose this one from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art:

Robe de Style, House of Lanvin, fall-winter 1926/27

I found a beautiful black shantung silk with very few knobs in my stash, and ordered a vintage sari border on ebay as trim.

I'm not sure if I will really finish this until the 23rd, as I'm currently studying for a very big exam and can only sew for an hour or so in the evenings. If I don't finish it, I luckily have a nice backup plan, which I'm not telling you about yet :P Only that it's sparkling and pink. :D