This is another pattern that comes from Mr. Lappin’s stash. So, of course, I was already in love with it
before I pulled the tissue out of the envelope.
The rayon daisy print was purchased from fabric.com. It reminded me of the 1930s, and the
turquoise color was lovely, so I grabbed it.
When I saw Hollywood 1647, I thought
they would make a great pair.
And I finally found a use for one of my lace collars. Believe it or not, I picked these up from
JoAnn Fabrics, of all places. Quite a few
years ago, they marked all of their decent trims on clearance and I purchased all that I could find before they disappeared forever. They have been living
in a drawer for years. The lace trimmed
collar on the pattern illustration reminded me of their existence, so I decided
that a surface applied lace collar might work nicely.
The problem was that the collar was extremely bright white
and my fabric was not. To remedy the
problem, I decided to try a bit of tea dying.
I used a couple of Lipton black tea bags and dunked the collar pieces
for a minute or two. It worked quite
nicely! I tacked the lace to the collar
pieces by hand with some silk thread.
The pattern does not call for interfacing, which I suppose
is quite normal for a 1930s pattern. I
ended up using some cotton as a sew-in stabilizer for the collar and
cuffs. But I really was stumped when it
came to the front opening. The rayon
drapes beautifully and is rather lightweight.
I was worried that the buttonholes (mine are bound) and the buttons
needed to be stabilized in some way. But
a sew-in on the entire front piece seemed like it would be too much. I came to the decision that a thin strip of lightweight
fusible, although inauthentic, would work nicely.
I had no desire to re-space all of those buttonholes, so I
did not make my standard adjustment for a long torso. The dress is a bit high-waisted, but it
works.
Finding fourteen buttons that I liked with this fabric was
quite an adventure, and one of the reasons that this dress took so long to
complete.
I also decided to use the 3” hem allowance given to make the
dress a bit more tea-length than knee-length.
I cannot find a reference to this pattern anywhere. Does anyone else have this lovely dress pattern in their
collection?
My button selection was not my first choice and I was
concerned that the dark contrast was going to be distracting, so I decided to
make a fascinator with the leftover shell buttons. I crocheted a triangle shaped border,
expecting to sew two of the patterns together to make a diamond which would have
a sprinkling of buttons applied.
Well,
the flat diamond shape looked terrible, and the button placement did not look
right, so I pulled two corners together to give the piece a bit of shape. And I rather like how it turned out!
Dress & Belt: Made by me, Hollywood 1647
Shoes: Banana Republic
Fascinator: Made by
me
