Ench By Sew-36: Fiona, the Irish Laurel Dress

Dress creation brings out the romantic in me. When I looked ahead to my summer sewing, I thought if I could sew only one garment for the season, it would be a dress. Fiona, the Irish Laurel dress, satisfied my yearning to design and sew the perfect summer frock.

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This dress was a very satisfying project for my arty romantic style. 

In between sewing summer essentials - shorts and tees - I worked off and on to determine what design lines spoke to me about summer, mock up a miniature sloper pattern to test my ideas, draft a pattern from my sloper, and then finally to sew up Fiona, while summer was still on!

* Pensamientos Primeros - Thinking through my idea for this summer dress
     - Part 1 - Planning Fiona
        - Part 2 - Farewell to Summer Romancing Fiona, the Irish Laurel Dress  

*Technicos - Pattern Drafting and Kissing Zipper using a Prick Stitch

*Pensamientos Finales - Fiona's Design Lines have roots in my own history

Finians Rainbow was a modern American fairy tale. It expressed late 1960's dreams for racial harmony and folks coming together. Fred Astaire (Finian McLonigan) and Petula Clark(his daughter Sharon) added in the romance of America seen, and idealized, fresh from Irish eyes. The story of Finian's determination to plant himself a crop of Irish gold, intertwined with romance of countryside and a new happpily-ever-after love for Sharon draws me in as well today as it did when I was a kid who'd only recently arrived in a new place myself. Any wonder that the movie's costumes inspire my pattern work and sewing today?

Visit Me Encanta Coster/Enchanted by Sewing - my regular sewing blog for other summer sewing I enjoyed along the way... in between time spent bringing Fiona to life

Cinderella's Blue Sky Sewing

If I were Cinderella....
I'd be sewing this

I'm still spending  my allotted sewing time on my French Pattern Drafting Class tasks, but I got a little distracted going to see the new Disney Cinderella (twice now, and I'm tempted to go again soon).

This Luggage Tag prints up great
on postcard stock
I'll use it for my next
dress pattern tracing

Of course my favorite scene is the one when Ella sits down to stitch, converting her mother's old dress into her own ball gown. It inspired me to do a little blue sky sewing/virtual stitch up of my own, creating my own vision of Ella and her dress. I'm sharing the results here. You can print the luggage tag version (it works great on postcard stock) to use for your own labeling purposes. I'm planning to use it to tag the next dress pattern I trace. 

Blue Sky day dream sewing is pretty satisfying. Don't you wonder if I'll ever actually make a dress along these lines? 

Oh yes, in addition to the sewing scene, I love the Cinderella music (which comes mostly during the credits). Lily James sings the classic, "A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes..." with very resonating soprano sound. She has a gorgeous lyrical voice. And, Helena Bonham Careter is a scream in "Bibbidi Bobbidi Boo". Oh look, we can buy the Cinderella: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack !

  Not only did I love the costumes, the great British actors, and the highly fairy-taleish scene in this movie, I also thought the theme was fantastic - "Be kind and have courage". Doesn't that just say it all?

Good job to the Disney story tellers on reworking the Charles Perrault fairytale for this generation. Have you read his book The Glass Slipper? I bet your pubic library has it. Mine does. I always liked the way the animated movie focused on having faith and believing in your dreams - that Cinderella was very much of her times, a late 1950's girl. She believed in her fate coming along, sweeping her up, and carrying her along to a better life. Today's Cinders is more in charge of her own future- a good modern redo. She choses to stay in the house and deal with her stinky mother-in-law. And she's realistic about her other career options in her fairy tale world - non existent! Both ladies mirror fantasy romance novel heroines from the two different eras nicely. 

I can imagine people looking back on both young women in a distant future. I wonder how Ella will be reinvented then. Don't you?

Antique Threads:My Life in Costume Drama (Poldark)

Demelza Poldark, in one of her beautiful
Empire Style Day Gowns,
Shown here giving husband Ross a piece of her mind
in the BBC series "Poldark",
Inspired by the novels of Winston Graham

In college and high school I sewed a goodly number of frocks along the lines of Demelza's in the BBC television series Poldark. The high waistlines of Empire dresses spoke not only to the style of the English Regency era, they were how we imagined we would live our lives. Did you live your life as though you were part of some kind of drama when you were that age too?

Nowadays I look to Demelza's dresses more for sewing inspiration as to color, pattern and  details then as clothing I might wear for a walk in the park. As I mentioned in the Enchanted By Sewing December podcast (Ench-004: Good Night My Someone), this kind of gown still inspires my nightgown sewing. I've been mulling over creating a romantically styled spring/summer nightgown inspired by this sort of dress and the Folkwear "Beautiful Dreamer" nightgown pattern I've got tucked away.

It's the men's clothing from that era that inspire my daytime, for-public-view garment sewing. I love the buttons, lapels and fabrics of men's vests and they way they combined with what we might now call a poet shirt.

Imagine what a Buck like Demelza's husband Ross Poldark would have said if he had met a time traveller from today and learned that one day, women would wear trousers as tight as his own!

Vintage Threads: Plaids in Doctor Takes a Wife

Loretta Young in
The Doctor Takes a Wife

Like most other American women at the time, Loretta Young didn't have a extensive wardrobe in the 1940 movie "The Doctor Takes a Wife". Her film clothes were, however, well cut and well sewn.

I'm partial to this beautifully styled jacket and skirt that make such great use of this large plaid. What might I substitute for Miss Young's bias cut skirt? Or, how might I include contrasting plaids into something I would get regular use out of like a coat, shirt or shirt jacket?