Next project... Shirt dress

Today I was given my next pattern cutting project and this time its to manufacture a shirt dress with a few main features, sweat heart sleeve, collar, slightly fitted and button holes. However I have chosen to add a few more features, I've added two different length hem lines on the front and the back that curve under and also piping to go around the sweat heart sleeve and also the hem. My idea for this dress is to style it with a 'biker chick' look so with the leather jacket, therefore i'm going to have to go fabric shopping this weekend, looking for a black fabric and leather piping to help give it that 'biker' look. 

But this is where i'm up to so far... 

 Okay so to start with I traced around my front and back dress block and removed the back shoulder dart, by taking away 1cm from the arm hole.

I then extended the back traced dress peice by 20cm.

The next was to give the hem line a curved edge, so I lined up the front and back dress piece from the hip line  and chose a point to start the curved hem from, on both the back and front dress piece, I then created a curved edge.

Removing the ugly dart- so I moved the ugly breast dart to under the arm whole, to do this I drew a straight line from 5cm under the arm hole to the end point of the ugly dart.

So to move the new dart, I had to cut up the line that I had just created under the arm hole, and then close up the old dart by folding it over and sticking it down, this created the new dart to open and the old dart to close up and disappear.

I also dropped the front and back neckline by 1cm.

The next part was to create the button panel, so what I wanted to do is to create a 3cm button panel so the buttons would go exactly in the middle of that 3cm panel on the 1.5cm mark. So I added 1.5cm onto the CF line, as the CF line would be the 1.5cm mark. I then added 3cm onto that line this would be the facing of the button panel.

I then traced around that 2 adaption piece including the button panel and facing for the panel, I also added a 1cm seam allowance around the whole of the front dress pattern and cut it out.

 I also added a 1cm allowance around the back dress pattern, except the cut on the fold side.

The next step was the sleeves, so I first of all traced around a sleeve block.

I then measure up the front and back dress patterns with the sleeve to see if the arm hole would first the sleeve into it. The sleeve was to big for the arm hole and there was to much for gathering so I made the sleeve smaller by loosing 1cm off each side of the centre line and folding the paper over into the middle to create a new centre line. I then had to create the sweat heart sleeves, to do the I choose to start the new curved line from the 1 and 2 notches on the front and the back sleeve pattern, I then curved the sweat heart lines to 5cm under the arm hole.

I then traced them both out separately to create two sweet heart sleeves, then I added a 1cm seam allowance around both sleeves and added a grain line.


All I have left to do for the patterning of the shirt dress is the collar and the collar stand, which I will hopefully finish tomorrow then I can start to get my fabric!

My crush

Its finally happened.. I have fallen in love with a bag! YES a bag! The new 'Mulberry Willow Tote - Mint Classic Calf' I can not describe my love for this colour and the bag and the best thing about it is that its basically two bags in one! the front section zips of to create a clutch bag, what could be better? AND the colour wow i'm in love! its summery bright and would be perfect for my summer bag this year... the only problem.. the price! I would gladly be over the moon if some one could buy me this as my first mulberry. Any offers out there?

The new Briefs..

So strange but its true, we have been given the last two briefs of our first year at college (wow time has gone fast, still can't believe it.) The last two briefs are all to do with designing and manufacturing our final garment for our end of year Catwalk show. Following the last two briefs I felt that designing wasn't my strongest area however it grew on me and I am slowly starting to feel more confident with designing but only time will tell... At this moment we have only broken down the brief, created a task list and time management plan (my two favourite things when breaking down the brief, as it makes me feel organised) a group discussion on the critical path and what we did today which was understanding creative thinking, which is basically learning to think outside the box really. Part of these briefs are to start researching into designers (contemporary and historical) and there concept of there collection, so to help me carry out this task I have taken out 'Alexander McQueens: Savage Beauty' from our college library. I did have a quick flick through the book before taken it out and my eye was drawn straight to the fabulous garments and his quotes behind his collection, so i'm so excited to get my head stuck in that book and get researching on his collections.

My Giles Deacon Dress

So I finally finished my own Giles Deacon dress after modelling two! It was a difficult pattern but I managed it! and i'm so pleased with the outcome and can't wait to send in my final photos and enter the competition! ooo its exciting stuff. But basically I had the shoot today, it went well and i've hopefully come out with some strong images. I styled the dress with a simple 'Vamp' style heel, to give it that elegant touch. The images are still being edited but I should have them by the end of the week but in the mean time I do have a couple of edited pictures that I think look so strong and really bring out the colour of the dress, so here you go... hope you like them

Another day of being a model

I thought my time had come of being a model... but no, I had to model another Giles Decans dress (same style but different material) this time it was for my college friend megs photoshoot, however meg went for a trendy young theme with the white kitten heels and bright yellow socks (which I got to keep as a souvenir). This shoot was good fun as we did mess around a bit but after we got the correct shots... don't worry 

Me being a model for the day

 Ok so I've mentioned before about this Giles Decan competition dress that our whole college class are taken part in, well my tutor also has taken part in it and I was the model for her dress. My tutors theme for her dress was futuristic and robotic so everything I wore was SILVER! However I think the photos were a great outcome and showed the dress off so well. Here I am being a model for the day...

Improvements

I decided to improve my A4 textile sample for the sin Gluttony as I felt it wasn't very strong and had a lot of room for improvements. So to improve it I decided to create the flesh affect of the tissues that covers the liver, therefore I stitched white netting over the top of a pink textured fabric and placed my original sample of the top. For me this has made my textile sample a lot stronger and more appealing, and also giving it that 'what is that?' Way of thinking which to me that's a good thing! So here's the before and then the after...