I have been sewing away (between work and shuttling children) on an 1880s bustle dress that was supposed to be for an event today. Well, the fates did not cooperate so I did not get to go, but I guess that gives me time to tweak a few things I wasn't happy with but was prepared to overlook due to time constraints. So after this post I will be spending the rest of my day in the sewing room but thought I would get up the first group of pictures/construction notes on this project.
I had not intended on making an 1880s bustle dress for this event, I tend to like the more natural form gowns of the mid 1870s because I am very short and fluffy, so I do not need more "pouf." But when the lovely Mara gave me her Imperial Bustle, I figured I would just go with that period that way I did not have to make one.
I spent a lot of time on Pinterest and found a few elements I liked that I thought would work for my frame and lack of height. I do not have them saved so I will have to post the inspiration photos later. Anyway, besides the bustle and corset, I was also gifted some TV patterns and this lovely deep red (garnet) silk. So I decided to use that for my dress as well as to repurpose a lovely plaid silk dress I have been holding onto for years. Both fabrics are much lovelier than these photos depict.
I did not have an appropriate pattern for this era and had lent out my pattern book so I had nothing on hand. I thought about just completely drafting something but because of time, and the fact I just REALLY didn't want to, decided to take one of the patterns I was given and just alter it. A lot. I used the TV mid 1870s Dinner Bodice pattern as my base, cutting the neckline much higher and shorteniing the back peplum pieces, as well as adding width to the peplum from the waistline down to allow it to fit over the robust 1880s bustle.
For the skirts I knew I wanted to incorporate the plaid, but I did not have very much of it. I also knew because of my height and size I cannto handle a lot of drapes and ruffles. I found a fashion plate that had stripes of plaid going verticle on its underskirt so decided this would be a good idea. I took apart the plaid dress and measuring the length I needed for the strips cut out as many as was possible.
The source of my plaid fabric.
I did not have enough fabric to space these evenly all the way around the underskirt, so I placed the first 5, starting with center front, a set space apart, then I placed the remaining ones where needed, pleating the fabric up in between to make them look closer together than they were. The left side of the dress has one more stripe than the right as I planned for the drape to go all the way to the hem on that side.
Here is the finished underskirt pined to the petticoat for placement. It has a yoke like the petticoat to help eliminate bulk at the waist, but I wanted to drape it first and decide how I was doing the overskirts before putting it all together. I also decided that before I could be sure how I wanted to drape the overskirt that I needed to see how the bodice was going to work, so I started on that next.
I love how the 1880s bodices are so fitted and go up to the neck, unfortunately I just cannot pull them off. I am too heavy and I do not have much of a neck anymore as I have two bulging discs at the base which has made it even shorter. I decided that if I went with the faux vest look I could leave it open up at the neck even if this isn't something that would have been done. To keep this from being to Christmassy, I decided to turn this into an 1880s Gryffindor inspired costume. I had been wanting to do a mid 1870s Professor McGonnagal, so now it will just be a different decade.
I had a lovely golden yellow shot silk left over from my corset (yes the one that is still not finished) so decdided to use that as the vest. It is perfect for the color scheme. I used a heavy twill I had for interlining, and as you can see it sewed up very nicely.
