Roped Petticoat

With my pink petticoat shell assembled, I trekked out during the beginning of today's snowstorm in search of cotton cord. My previous choice, a sisal rope, was a bit too thick after washing, plus I was worried it was the wrong material and besides, it kinda smelled funny. Cotton cord sounded like a good choice. The problem is that my deficient Jo-anns carries nothing of the sort (at least that I could find). Neither did Home Depot. So I decided to check out the camping section of Walmart for ropes. No luck. But as I happened by the hampers and clotheshangers, I thought....clotheslines...And behold, 100 ft of 3/16 inch cotton clothesline for under 3 bucks. Yay! So I got home and got to washing it for the preshrink, and unlike my previous rope it stayed just the right size....

Cord washed and dried, I decided to incorporate some rope right into the hem of the skirt (hemming and cording all in one? sounds like less work, and I'm a fan of that!). I decided to go with a wide hem, and I sewed 4 lines of the cord right into the hemline. I think it looks kinda space age-y, but cute, and it does add that extra stiffness that I think the bottom should have.

After the hem was complete, I started in on making the ribbon channels of cording to spiral up the skirt. I made the front of the skirt have evenly spaced ribbons going straight across, and did the spiraling-up-to-a-new-level on the back half of the skirt. This is so that the crookedness is not visible from the front. Why you ask? Well, I figured the skirt is pink, the ribbon is mauve, and the whole combo is kinda cute. So if its a nasty hot day I can cut out the decorative underskirt and just expose my underwear. Petticoat=less formal underskirt for hot days (if it comes out nice enough). Aren't I just clever? ;-)
In the ribbon channels, I decided to do two cords instead of just one cuz it fit nice and snug and the single cord was a bit roomy. Also, extra stiffness with 2.


assembly--bottom 4 channels in hem and double rope in the ribbon channels.

Here's the "finished" product. I may go further up with the channels, but for now I'm outta rope. I can't decide whether to add more or not. Thoughts?

complete? ( still need to make the waistband, even if i don't add more channels)

And I wanted to test its effectiveness, so here's a sidebyside of with and without the petticoat for one of my old skirts. Its somewhat subtle, But it does make a discernable difference:

without

with petticoat

I'm a Good Girl, I am

Its been just over a week since my last post. tsktsk. And I started out so strongly....

This week's project is the corded petticoat. Today I have been ironing and cutting my fabric. For the skirt itself, I am using pink cotton shirting material, and have decided to go with a gored skirt that's waist is slightly bigger than me so I can have it on a drawstring (for the unexpected weight gains/losses--hopefully losses).

As for measurements: I decided to make the waist 40 inches around (mine is 32, but my hips are 44, so i figured that was a good compromise and would allow drawstring action). My skirt will be two rectangles for front and back (so 21 inches each--2x20 is the 40, and 1/2 inch seam allowance on each side) and 2 traingles on the sides to create the gored skirt effect. I decided to go with 100 inch circumfrence at the bottom of the petticoat based purely on a piece of ribbon i put on the floor and stood inside til I thought it was a good sized "halo" around my feet. Since the waist will be 40 inches, i need to add 60 by the bottom, so my gored triangles will have a 30 inch bottom each. I folded my fabric on itself selvage to selvage, and cut 2 rectangles of 21 inches and two rectangles of 16 inches wide. The 16 inch ones I cut in half diagonally to make 4 right angle triangles, which i will sew together.

Here are the pieces all cut--there are two layers, so 2 rectangles, and 4 triangles:


I sewed the trangles together into 2 larger gores, with the right angle sides together:


And, all assembled it looks like this:

I am actually worried that the 100 inch circumfrence isn't enough, but i'm gonna keep trucking and see how it comes out. If I don't like it I won't use it. ;-) or I can add in some extra panels, if it comes to that... It will be easier to tell once I have some cording in it to see how much it actually flares out

Tomorrow I will hopefully get out to find new rope/cording to provide the "body" of the skirt.
That's all for now.

Languishing Diaries

I am still alive, I swear. My dress making has been languishing, taking a back burner to my obsessive gyming and weight loss regimen. And reading. I've been a literary crazy for the past week and a half--finished 4 books.

Anyway, I wanted to let everyone know that I attempted to start my roped petticoat, but when I washed the rope it swelled and would no longer have fit in the channels the size of the ribbon I bought. I will either have to purchase new rope or new ribbon. Rope is probably cheaper.

In the meantime, I think that my dress making will pick up again quite soon, as I spend part of this weekend perusing venetian portraiture in the National Gallery of Art. Seeing some of my researched paintings close up was certainly inspirational. The detail you can see in the real paintings is phenomenal. I am very much looking forward to starting up again. ;-) It was also amusing to my hostess (and myself) that I could identify different methods of lacing and blackwork and partlets on the portraits, while she was obviously looking more at the artistic value of them. hehe

Boring Eyelet Update

My eyelets are finished. It took me god-knows-how-many-movies to get them all done. But they are adorable. I shall not bore with pics, as all the eyelets look much like the ones shown 2 posts ago. So, just picture that with thread covered eyelets on both sides... ;-) For reference, I used button thread at the wondrous suggestion of an accomplice--it is thicker and takes less stitching to completely cover the metal eyelet.

Also, if anyone endeavors to cover eyelets with thread like I just have, remember that if you watch movies during, you SHOULD NOT rent foreign subtitled flicks. Even if they are set in the period of the Italian Renaissance. I thought the costumes would inspire me. The major problem with my thought process is that its extremely difficult to sew around eyelets AND read subtitles at the same time. Unless you can manage to have your two eyes looking two different directions. Then it just might work....

This weekend I promise to start, if not finish, my roped petticoat. I'm gonna use some pink cotton shirting I already have, some sisal rope (hope this works) and a grossgrain ribbon in mauve for the rope channels. My plan is a gored skirt, and I need to sit down to figure out the circumfrence that I'm interested in. Don't want it too poofed/tudorish, as that's not really the style, but I do want some skirt support and not have the skirts constantly wrapping round my legs....