Wednesday, July 02, 2008

State of Deconstruction

Instead of continuing my quest to find my garden (which has been hiding in lawn), I was in a deconstructive way yesterday.

State of Deconstruction

The blue blob on the left is a nightgown. The bodice was too big, so I took it off, took in a half inch on each side, regathered the waist and reattached the bodice. Very easy and it looks a little better, but it seems the bodice is also too short, which is not very flattering. Oh well.

The green blob, you may remember from this post. The armholes were very uncomfortable so I took the bias strips off, cut about a quarter of an inch off of the bottom of the hole, and attached new bias strips, gathering the sleeve caps a half inch less than before. I don't know. It's better than it was, but I think the real problem is that the armhole isn't deep enough, and I may go ahead and take the cap off altogether. We'll see.

Since I was on a roll, I added ties and took in the armholes of another blouse. Since I still have a bit of work to do (and there was no deconstruction involved on that one), I don't have a picture of that blouse. And giving credit where it is due, the ties were Stef's idea to solve the problem of too large a bodice.

I suppose this should all be very frustrating, but I figure I am still in the process of learning. If I don't learn what doesn't work and why, I won't learn what does work. I suspect armholes and bodices will be ongoing issues for me, so I might as well learn how to deal with now.
Right? Right.

1 comment:

Sharon said...

I listened to Syne Mitchell interview Daryl Lancaster on her podcast. She talked about the importance of a dress dummy and said she likes hers which is foam, stuffed in a perfect muslin skin on herself. If you go to her website, I think it's www.weavecast.com, there might be information in the show notes. My mother used one for herself but just fitted my clothes on me, with an occasional pin prick.