dressing the part

The exhibition catalogue from Chic Chicago sits to the left of my keyboard. I leave it there to remind me how enamoured I was with all those delightful dresses in the exhibit, the feeling I had when I walked through, marvelling at the creations that sprung from people's heads. Throughout, my internal dialogue suggested it should be a dress summer and I should practice my lacking sewing skills by sewing a multitude of dresses.

There is a suggestion that anyone can be an expert at something with 10,000 hours of practice. I am afraid of that sort of commitment and am instead willing to trudge through pre-made patterns, tweaking, rather than work on my pattern making skills, which I was never really awesome at anyway. Adequate, that's my life goal. I pledged to myself that I'd make dresses and started looking for inspiration by reading the blog of a woman in Chicago who sews herself a lot of dresses and a mother in Portland who seems to have a lot of children but still time to sew Simplicity patterns.

Last week I found some pixely bargain bin fabric and imagined both a dress and skirt out of it. (I think I can get both out of the yardage I bought.) It was $2 a metre, which means, in theory, I can have a dress for about $8 when I count in the zipper and thread. I think of bargain fabric as tester fabric, since it's cheaper yet more interesting than muslin. Yesterday I went wild, picking up three fabrics, about 10 metres total. Two I picked up in the bargain section at Fabricland in Park Royal, the closest place to buy patterns (that I've found, anyway), along with two dress patterns. One pattern I'm trying based on recommendations from the blogger in Portland; the other is a 1960 retro reprint, seemingly the same as one my mother had that is about 6 sizes too small for me (I told you my pattern making skills are lacking. I'm not ready to practice grading right now. I'm easing back into this process). One fabric is absolutely hideous flowery fabric that looks like something a blind quilter would use, but that I think will make an interesting dress (in a Von Trapp sort of way). The other fabric is a slightly stylised version of (to my eyes) CRM's roses in rust and white on a black background. What I'm most excited about, though, is the fabric I picked up earlier in the day from Dressew's bargain basement section.

One of the dresses I loved most in the Chic Chicago exhibit was a Dior dress from 1953, made of silk velour in a rosy print. In person I stared at it for about 10 minutes, then the Marshall Fields knockoff version that was equally lovely. I realise it's the fabric that makes the dress, the print and the fall of the skirt. The Dior cost $2500 with three fittings, the Marshall Fields version a mere $25 (back in the '50s, remember) bought off the rack. It was the Dior dress that planted the need to sew dresses into my head. This picture doesn't do it justice; the surplice top, the ruched band around the natural waist, the simple tuck pleats on the front, and pockets! I love dresses with pockets.

Here's the fabric I bought at Dressew, singularly because I had the image of that Dior dress in my head when I saw it. It's incredibly gaudy, yes, and has only passing resemblance to the Dior print and is a cotton twill rather than silk velour, but still I had to get it to test it out. It will be a $10 dress if it works out. It's the closest I'll ever be to that Dior dress again. I'm quite sure that, whatever winds up happening with the pattern/sewing, I'll still wear this thing. I lack a full-length mirror and will rely on how it makes me feel rather than how it looks. And, right now, the fabric makes me giggle.

Must go iron the hell out of the fabric and, if I'm feeling really anal, the pattern pieces. (I think we all know I won't be ironing the pattern pieces.) I'm cutting two dresses today, for sure.