Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Jungle January dress - self drafted




Over at Pretty Grievances there's a style revolution happening - Jungle January.  Knowing that I had a few animal prints in the stash, I figured it was definately done just for me.

This is just what I came up with in approx. 60 seconds. I know I've also got several snake skin fabrics, assorted birds and who knows what else.
I took a quick look at the stash, yep, even more than I thought. In fact, there's so much animal print that I think I also need a Jungle June and a Jungle July as well. Velosewer would probably make very quick work of it though, including the 12 (yes, TWELVE) metres of blue snakeskin mesh - I think it was 50c a metre for the rest of the roll, ok?

But what about the fabric I've had for ~4 years and finally started to work out (seriously this time) how to make something out of  ....... I didn't want to choke on it again, this time I was ready to bite the bullet and jump in ........................... Oh tiger, stupido, stupido, it'll fit right in.


So here's the fabric.

Jungle January dress fabric
It's a cotton/lycra knit with a very fine rib. The coloured part is just over 150cm wide. One of the reasons I've pulled it out, draped it, pulled it this way and that, then finally returned it to the stash about 100 times is because I just wasn't quite sure how to make something from it. The length of the print is too short for me to get a knee length dress out of and I don't wear dresses shorter than that unless I'm wearing tights which restricts me to colder weather - we don't have a lot of that here in Brisbane. I thought it would look better if the urn was centred on the front and back but then it would really be cutting it fine on the hips where the prints ended. With this print, I didn't want seams messing things up but what about the sway back - how could I deal with that? I didn't want the print finishing across the middle of my bust - that always reminds me of an empire line gone wrong but I also didn't want that tigerlily making me look like Eve in the Garden of Eden using a tigerlily instead of a leaf either. Add to that, the bottom of the urn isn't even perpendicular with the grain, it's at an angle. Well, lots of things that just added up to "too hard basket". Finally I decided that as I had two lengths of it, I'd just do the best I could and still have some left over if I got a better idea at a later date.

I marked out two panels that were perpendicular to the bottom of the urns, sewed straight up the sides and got to work. Due to the angles of the urns and one panel being on the edge of the fabric, one panel had to be wider than the other - it's a design feature. Too hard to work with without shoulders, so I found some black knit that was used years ago to make a few skirts, chopped off some offcut looking bits and sewed them to the top. Unfortunately, the back piece was a bit narrow as you can see below.


At this stage, I had the hem pinned and marked and it was perfect. A lot of time was spent pinning, marking, sewing, cutting (repeat ad infinitum) to get the sides right. More time working out the shoulders (which involved stretching the back up to get rid of the sway back puddle). Now, I could have removed that too narrow back piece and put a wider one on - that would have been the smart thing to do, instead, I added a little panel on each side of the back piece (I'm all about the design features).

My intention was to overlock the whole thing but because I was flying by the seat of my pants the whole time, I started with the sewing machine - with white thread (easier to see and unpick and no loss of fabric). As that seemed to be going ok and my new overlocker which isn't thrilling me was threaded in white, I decided to switch the sewing machine to black thread and carry on winging it. The armholes and hem were twin needled but the necklines have a deep (6 cm) seam allowance that is currently just hanging down inside the neckline - I'll probably tack it down.

Of course, by this stage all but two of the hem pins had fallen out and the chalk marks were long gone. I had to redo the hem marking but things were looking a bit weird, in the end, I decided "it'll do" because I wanted to wear it out that night. I'm sure the hem's not perfect but I don't think there is anything too noticably wonky going on.






I'm glad I finally made something in this fabric, as soon as I saw it in the store I had to have it. My favourite thing is the smoking lion, it appeals to my sense of the absurd and socially not kosher.

Now I'm thinking I might just make a shorter one with sleeves to wear with tights for winter .......... oooh and knee high boots.

And just to prove that I don't mind big cats:

That's me at the Canberra Zoo - 2007

21 comments:

  1. I am fanning myself and my assistant Bruderlein is pawing the monitor- this is wonderful! I can't wait to show you off on thursday!!!

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    1. Why thank you - you sent the call out, I felt obligated to answer it.

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  2. Wow that fabric, how cool is that! Good idea to use black for the top part, it matches nicely with the hem. And petting a cheetah... I hope I can do that someday.

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    1. It's pretty wild isn't it? The closer you look, the more amazing it is because every flower, leaf and piece of fruit is actually an animal. I should take some closeups of it.

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    2. I would love to see close ups!

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  3. Pretty inspired fabric! Maybe the designer shared whatever it is the lion is smoking..a dress of dreams.

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    1. Hah! I didn't even think of that (I just thought it was a cigarette) but I think you might be on to something.

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  4. This is fabulous and you are awesome for drafting it yourself! I made something in a panelled print last year and I fear it was a disaster.. would like to put it up on the blog but I haven't hemmed it yet (gave up).

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    1. Put it up anyway, maybe the disaster is just in your head? (That didn't come out right, you know what I mean.)

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  5. Wow - this is a knock out of a dress! Really like the way you 'framed' the jungle fabric with the black yoke.

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    1. Thanks! I toyed with orange but thought I'd injected enough colour into my wardrobe lately, time to go back to black.

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  6. This is a stunning dress.
    I really love how you've placed this print. Not to mention how nicely balanced it is (colour blocked).
    You're a panel Wiz in my books.

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    1. And it only took me 4+ years to finally bite the bullet .... I was looking at a panel print just the other day but quickly ditched it when I thought of this dress.

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  7. Great dress - I would say I have fabric envy (and I do) but I can't see past the big putty cat from the zoo - now that is real envy. Do love your dress too.

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    1. Go down to Canberra zoo and do the "Meet-a-Cheetah" tour, not far from you BeaJay (and well worth it). On the same day we did the other tour they have where you get to feed all of the animals - including tigers and ligers (or were they tions?) - absolutely awesome.

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  8. LOVE your fabrics and that dress is perfect!

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    1. Thanks Cecili, I am endeavouring to be as productive as you are this year. One of the nurses at the doctor's office asked me where I got the dress and then where I got the fabric, she was a bit disappointed that I got it a long time ago in another city.

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  9. Saw your dress over on PrttynPnk's site. LOVE IT! The fabric is so fabulous and can't believe you drafted the design yourself! You need to go on vacation now in it. Going to follow your blog now and see what else you come up with :)

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    1. Thanks Catja. To say I "drafted the design" makes it sound much more thoughtful than the process I actually went through lol. I'm adding you to my "exotic sewists" list (just to put the pressure on you ha ha ha).

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