Making a 1950s Evening Gown - Vogue 191

hello everyone and welcome to another video in my mad dash to post all the Christmas videos I promised before Christmas is over I'm getting progressively more sleep-deprived but have been successful so far today I'm making a 1950s evening gown made for the vogue pattern 191 I'm pretty sure this pattern is worth its weight in gold literally it was so expensive but I think it was worth it this is by far my favorite pattern I've ever followed and I love the dress I ended up with it's just you know something casual to keep in my closet for the black-tie Christmas party I'm sure I'll get invited to someday speaking of that I love the idea of a woman who glamorous enough to be invited somewhere that requires a dress like this but thrifty enough to make it themselves especially since this dress requires almost 20 yards of material to mate along with owning horsehair braids grosgrain ribbon elastic hooks and a zipper so with a commitment for sure but the end result sure is lovely the patterned tissue is unprinted as was common in the 1950s seam allowance grain lines waist lines darts and any other relevant information is indicated by perforations on the pattern instead of ink here you can see me pinning at the first two of nine pieces onto my fabric which is a red silk shotting I actually had some issues with this material being damaged and ended up running it through my washing machine to get rid of the marks after hand washing it and every other method I could think that failed the aggressive washing left it with a dimpled crepe like texture it required a lot of ironing to get rid of so I owned the pieces after cutting them out to save my wrists and neck from ironing eleven yards of raw material I know that is a huge no-no but I trimmed them after ironing so hopefully it is forgivable also since patterns tend to run short of me I'm adding three inches the hemline and I probably should have added closer to five or six but it wasn't sure how much material I would have but that was the only addition that I made despite this pattern being a size 34 which is intended for a 34 inch bust and 26 inch waist where I usually suit a size 36 better it ran pretty large so I didn't have to let it out at all in fact I ended up taking it in a little bit which sure made me feel good about myself the dress is also fully lined and relining I bought 9 yards chloral cotton sheeting this fabric was 2 or 3 dollars a yard on sale and matches the color of the outer fabric quite well though the print is a little bit older also here a brief sighting of Guinevere my sewing buddy can be seen it's rare to see her outside of her natural habitat which is sleeping curled up in a blankets once everything was cut I removed the pattern and thoroughly ironed the silk fabric like each panel took 8 minutes or so of pressing it to remove all of the wrinkles it still doesn't quite have the crisp texture that it should but the sheen returned now on to step one which is basting me pieces over lining so I label lining out the wrong side facing upward then I laid the freshly ironed silk layer on top so the wrong sides were facing each other I pinned the layers together to make sure everything was smooth and trimmed any silks that hung beyond the edges of the lining since the ironing did work the piece is a bit as expected now I'm going around with a contrasting thread and beasting the layers together about an inch from the edge I was honestly dreading this step but it wasn't nearly as time consuming as I expected and obviously this was repeated on all the panels though most of them I did off-camera now I'm laying the pieces out once again and draping me pattern on top I trimmed any material that extended beyond the edges at the tissue and klint notches and transferred important perforations onto the lining I had a lot of footage of this step so well past me is edit I just want to mention that this idea for a 1950's evening gown was picked by my patrons as a bonus project I was supposed to make it six months ago or so but ran in just so many problems that I got put off I'm so sorry that I didn't get to it earlier but I plan on taking on more bonus projects to try and make up for it so if you're a $10 or patron then keep an eye out for that and honestly even though I feel bad about it I think this was kind of a happy accident since this dress is perfect for the holiday season at least in my eyes alright now on to step two or three four and five I'm pinning then sewing all of the front pieces together and all of the back pieces together leaving the side and shoulder seams open it also says seams are illustrated unfinished to show notches always clip seams occurs or indentations before you press so seams will lie flat always clip as little as possible press seams and darts as illustrated in regards to finishing they recommend pink seams or overcast seams which is done by slip stitching you raw edges to the lining I opted for pink edges just because I knew alterations would be likely and those are a lot more difficult to do when the seam allowance is sewn down so all the edges wear pink clipped then ironed until I had four pieces stitched together to form a front panel and four stitched together to form a back panel you the next step is gathering the edges of thought is section five across top and between notches and this is one of two pieces I didn't cut from self it forms a ruched insert and II bodice so I cut it from gold glitter mesh because it isn't a proper evening gown unless it leaves glitter everywhere right I gathered this piece down by machine then it is to be sewn to the insects which is the second piece I didn't cut from self it serves as a lining for the gathered Keats and a slightly visible through the sheer mesh so I picked a metallic brocade after it was cut out I marked and sewed four darts into it I'm not sure why they opted for four darts that come within a half inch of touching each other instead of making it separate pieces but I guess this works too now step eight stitch wrong side of inset to right side of bodice Section five at top adjusting gathers trim seam turn and pressed a straw edges together I actually opted not face the edges instead I sewed them by machine then covered them with finding thinking might be enough to control silk shunting and cotton but it cannot contain brocade the true god of frame not to be confused with Freya now I me to you machine stitch front 1/16 of an inch inside seam line as day then turn in seam allowance on front between notches and pin over bodice section slip baste stitch front inside press seams away from bodice section this was the one instruction I found puzzling so I ended up turning the edge inward as instructed then matching the seam allowance and pinning the inset in place however I'm not sure how this is sewn from the inside while properly securing it and why slip basting would be used in that circumstance instead of normal basting and the diagrams really don't make it clear either so I decide to hand stitch it in place instead using slip stitches that go through the fold of the silk making it invisible from the outside then step 11 is stitching at the dress at sides clipping at waistline but before doing that I sewed a zipper into the top 15 inches of the center back seam I originally thought they didn't have any instructions relating to it which is why I didn't film the process but they do have an annotation telling you to between step 2 and 3 so oops in step 12 is adding boning they say cut two pieces of boning to fit side between armhole and waistline pullback casing and round off corners of boning so casing back over boning and they specifying the instructions to use feather-light boning which is actually still produced under that name today I've got mine to be an inch too long then trimmed back the boning so I had a half-inch of access casing on each side then I folded that inward to help cushion the ends of the boning the boning is pinned to the side seams and stitched to both sides of the seam allowance not catching through the outside and I used whip stitches for this again I was sort of dreading it this step because I thought every seam was phoned and that it was going to take forever but it was just the side seams and took all of ten minutes now onto the facings these are seamed together at the sides I'm not sure where the footage of that went then the bottom quarter-inch is turned inward and sewn down and that part I did film the facings are stitched around the remaining portion of the neckline and armholes but it's very important to leave the top three-quarter inches of these straps free the phasing is turned inward at that point after the shoulder seam is sewn through the outer layer of fabric this technique is very similar to one on evoke rerelease pattern that he followed somewhat recently so I was already pretty familiar with it but I still accidentally sewed past those points and had to rip out a good bit the seam allowance was notched then the facing was turned inward at this point they wanted me to do up the shoulder seam but I thought that would be better to do after inserting the waist tape so I just ignored that and instead I moved on to sewing in the facing there instructions are hem facing to inset and tack to side scenes turn in and hem facing it to zipper tape on slant I personally prefer facings that are fully sewn down and since this dress is lined it could be sewn completely down without any stitching showing through the right side of the fabric so I did just to that now for the best part of every project the bow the bow was cut twice from the silk then the layers were sewn together with the right sides facing each other and I left several inches open at the centermost point so I could turn it outward easily once it was turned I earned it then transferred the perforations from the pattern tissue onto the fabric these markings are matched up then the bow is gathered at this point I did this by hand with running stitches also this was no small feat Shawn ting is a pretty dense fabric and sewing through four layers of it plus seam allowance by hand kind of sucked then I pinned to the center point of the bow piece to the portion feathered and I actually gathered the center front of the bow to it didn't tell me to however it it's being the pattern they tell me if you cut a straight piece of fabric 2 and 3/4 inch long by 3 inches wide to form knot this is folded lengthwise and stitched 1/2 inch away from raw edges then it's trimmed and turned and pressed over the center seam they also say to make a pleat at center of not so not as 1 inch wide but 3 inches folded in half - 1 inch of seam allowance is 1 inch wide so I'm not sure how you plead it and maintain that width but I tried my best to now the knot is pinned over bow and one end is turned inward and hand over the other I was at a frame for most of this step because there was no ease it was a freaking worked out getting this to fit and I'm pretty sure it's off center but it's done now the bow is tacked to the center front I actually sewed it from the underside first to make sure it was really secure then tacked on the ends from the front now into the guts of the dress and adding belting and elastic for belting I used grosgrain ribbon and they said to turn in ends of belting to fit your waistline snugly so ends just meet its then supposed to be faced with ribbon seam binding so I guess they weren't kidding when they say belting however I had better luck using ribbon than belting so I just turned the edges inward and would stitch them down the nice out hooks and eyes into the ends now they say so belting to lining at waistline at stopping one inch from zipper at centre-back tacks securely to scenes and I missed the first half of that and only saw a tack securely two seams so that was all he did it still does the job of breehn forcing the high stress point at the dress so I think it's fine it's very elastic they say cut to pieces quarter-inch wide elastic to 14 inches long and turn in fraught edges on elastic and sew two front facing at corners and two belting 1/2 inch from Center back ends this will hold front and neck in position close to body I did this but my belting doesn't extend all the way to the center back so I secured it to the underside of the zipper tape instead and this literally did nothing the last thing needs to be way shorter or positioned in a completely different spot to have any effect but it was interesting seeing this technique and now I finally sewed the shoulder seam and hemmed the lining on the underside and now it is time for the 250 inch long hem which is hand with horsehair braids their instructions are pin horsehair to inside of hem so lower edge touches we're finished hem will e catch stitch both edges easing upper edge of horsehair so I marked a line four and a half inches away from the edge of the skirt all the way around the skirt then I pinched my horse area so the top edge was in line with that line and it was catch stitched down now I only did that on the top edge just to save time but still took a good two hours for this part alone then the hem is folded up and turned over their horsehair and sewn by hand and this took another two hours despite a time commitment I love this method since the dress is fully lined and that the stitching is visible and it all goes through the horsehair and the lining and nothing else plus sewing the horsehair first means it won't warp or pucker and it's really brilliant definitely a technique that I will use again also I'm just happy that after messy hems from copis to have one done in a way that I'm proud of it was probably a little bit too short that just makes it better for spinning in and that is it for this project and video if you enjoyed this then check out my sewing through the back feuds playlist where I follow more vintage patterns I'm actually viewing this project as a bit of a mid-season finale to that series and past the halfway point now and I just want to get a couple months off from it to focus on the promised patreon bonus projects along with some historical things and some paid work but I'll get back to it in February I promise also here are a bunch of photos of me in this dress because I love it it makes me feel like I should be an extra in an episode of the crown I could be in a corner just spinning in circles hit me up Netflix and for anyone wondering this was worn with a homemade petticoat a vintage hat and earrings which you might recognize from my Lancaster haul and royal vintage shoes I do have one historical holiday project coming up so stay tuned for that and if you enjoyed this video then give me an a like and a comment really helps me out thank you so much for watching and I will talk to all of you very soon

Channel: Angela Clayton

Views: 533,495

Rating: 4.9742475 out of 5

Keywords: sewing, costumery, diy, 1950s, christmas, holiday, dress, evening gown, tutorial, how to, review, vintage, retro, the crown, historical, midcentury, fashion, angela clayton, vogue, 191

Id: 8pk_WugfFmU

Length: 15min 19sec (919 seconds)

Published: Sun Dec 23 2018