Hello all! I've finally managed to get some pictures of my Summer Ball dress so let me tell you its story. I'll paint a picture for you: It's the end of the university year. Money has trickled out of the bank account until mere drops remain. There is no budget for fabric. There is no budget for alcohol. In these sad times one must make do and mend. I had two options. Option 1 was to make some kind of dress with the
floral scuba I made my bikini from. Option 2 was to whack a bodice onto my
gathered silver circle skirt, made a few months ago. I decided that now was the time to go big and have some fun.
I was told in no uncertain terms that top-to-toe silver would be too much, and turn me into the tin man from Wizard of Oz. In fact, this turned out to be quite a popular opinion. But, I had a vision and I was determined to see it through.
In terms of construction for the midriff panel I used the pattern piece from
Wearing History's Dahlia top pattern and I started off with 2 long triangles for the bust covering pieces. I first slipstitched the bottom of the midriff panel to the bottom of the existing skirt waistband. Then I put on the skirt, pinned the tops of the 2 triangles together to form a halterneck and tucked the ends of the 2 triangles into the skirt. My dear friend Bethan then plonked in the safety pins to determine the neckline, sidelines and attaching the bust bits to the midriff panel. Next I detached the bust bits, made the adjustments, lined them with some black chiffon I had lying around and sewed them onto the midriff panel.
Since the skirt was already finished, the bodice part really didn't take very long, although I would have really struggled with the fit without Bethan's help (Thank you Bethan!) It's certainly not a quiet piece of clothing, but then I'm not a very quiet person so perhaps we match each other quite well. The full skirt in particular was very good for the pimms induced dancing.
