How the Irish Dress performed

I went to King Richard's Faire on Saturday. I wore the Irish Dress with the yellow chemise. I was very happy with it's trial run at faire. I do need to do a few things.

1. Find a way to shape the skirts better. Maybe a bum roll and something to stiffen the hem.

2. Find something better for a belt or girdle. I used my tapestry belt and it was OK, but I'm looking for a chain gridle.

3. Make a matching hat. I'm planning a muffin hat.

4. Get my needle book or belt chateline done.

Those were my only tweeks. Here I am in full fig.

My Irish Dress is complete

I finished! I made very simple sleeves. Just rectangles hemmed up with trim sewn on at both ends and the middle. I have to say that I am very proud of this project. It has given me the confidence to tackle more difficult projects.

Here it is, with detail of the sleeves.

Me in my Irish Dress

They are blurry but here I am.

Chemise

Today I made my butter yellow chemise. I used a method my friend Kate calls "20 minute chemise". It doesn't really take 20 minutes. Well, not for me, but it is really easy. I wanted to put the hoop in the hem, but I ran into a bit of a problem with that. It tended to "V" in the back. So now I'm thinking I will make a hoop skirt for underneath.

I put a pocket in the side seam. I'm really hoping this will help with "Belt Clutter". Unfortunately, this pictures don't give you a great idea of the color.

When I went to put the hoop steel in the hem I had a bit of a hoop disaster.

When I went to try on the entire outfit, the cord I was using broke! I didn't have another cord around that would fit through the grommets so that picture will have to wait until tomorrow. By then I'm hoping to get the Hoop issue fixed.

Irish Dress

Day 5



Ok, there has got to be a better way to set grommets. 28 grommets with that hand squeeze thing and I have blisters. The good news is the grommets are done!








I decided to trim the front split. I absolutely LOVE Stitch Witchery. A little hand stitching in a few places and...It's Done!









That's right folks, your Hero, the Intrepid Seamstress did it. I'm pretty proud of it. I do want to make sleeves for it and I'm going to make the chemise, tomorrow. Today I'm just going to bask in my success.

YAY ME!

Irish Dress

Day 4

Lesson - Never try to sew the ends of steel boning. Yes I know, that seems obvious, but your Hero here is in the slow learning group sometimes. It took two broken needles before that one sunk in.

As you might have guessed, the skirt is attached. I'm just waiting for the grommets to arrive and I can finish. Here is the trim I'm thinking of using. It is for a Seamstress Persona for Ren faires.



Cool huh. Trim it out and add some sleeves and I'm done. More to come.

Irish Dress

Day 3

This project would go so much faster if my Fibromyalgia would just stop of a few days. As it is I can only sew for about 45 minutes at a time. It's annoying.

Anyway, sorry about that. I really have to recommend Corsetmaking.com. I wrote them with a question and they got back to me very quickly. I placed an order today for more bones and some grommets and I received a notification from UPS about 1/2 hour later saying it was shipping. That's what I call fast service.

OK, on to sewing. I started with the skirt today. As it is a split skirt I wrapped a length of the green fabric around myself about 1 1/2 times. Cut and hemmed the bottom and sides.

Hmmm, all that needs to fit on that top? Yikes. OK, time to resort to drastic measures. I grabbed a needle and a spool of white thread and did a very long running stitch. That should help me get the gathers right.

Worked like a charm. I love it when a plan comes together. Pinned it on and checked the hem.

It all looks good. It actually looks like a dress.

I'll have to attach the skirt latter, maybe tonight.

My Irish Dress

This was all started by a trip to a wonderful fabric store. I saw this great green fabric that I grabbed. I then found a butter yellow fabric. All I could think was "yellow chemise, green overdress".

That day my friend Kate showed me how to make a quick chemise without a pattern. I tend to be able to look at stuff and figure out how it is made so I dived right in.

I ordered a dozen 1/2" steel stays in the 12" length and a pair of lacing stays in the same length from corsetmakers.com. I got my order in a few days. I grabbed a piece of medium weight cotton and started putting together a mockup/liner for the top of my Irish dress. I used bias tape for boning channels.

This is what came out of the first attempt. There are 4 boning channels on each side. I tried it on and realized that it was way too big. So I chopped 2 inches off each side. Second fitting showed still too big and I needed two more stays on both sides. So more changes and time for the real fitting, lacing up and everything. Out comes the cord that I made and two darning needles and I literally sew myself into it.

It fit, YAY, and it actually held the girls up. Fantastic. Now to take another 1/2 inch off the sides and cut out the outside fabric.

Day 2

First I thought I'd show you where I sew. Yes, it's my dining room and it gets cleaned up when we have people over.

These are the colors I'm using. I really love the green. The colors don't come out quite right in this picture.

Today's adventure started with taking a 1/2 inch off the side of the lining. Then I cut out the green fabric to go over the liner. I cut it out in one piece. Boy I have to tell you it sounded like a great idea, and it looks really good but sewing it on in one piece was...well...interesting. Actually there was a lot of muttered foul and filth. But your intrepid seamstress prevailed, although it was close in some areas.

Now I'm back to sewing myself in with darning needles and cord. But it fits!

Dilemma, the only gold grommets I have are way to big for the holes in the lacing boning and I don't have any silver ones that fit either. I want gold so I'll have to make a trip to the craft store (O Heaven for fend :) ). I'm also thinking that I may have to trim the edges. I have to think about that.

Next step...adding the split skirt.