Sleeping Beauty Part Three – Getting the dress ready to dye

Since the next step for the dress itself is to get dyed, I had some definite work cut out to get the dress ready.

First of all, it wasn’t even a dress yet; there was a shirt and a skirt.

I needed to first shape the shirt so that I could attach it to the skirt. There were some steps involved in this.

First I laid out both the skirt and the shirt. Then I overlaid the shirt over the skirt so I could see exactly how much I needed to cut off. I marked the shape of the skirt opening on the shirt with my blue marking pencil. I felt that was a bit difficult to see, so I pinned along the line.

Then I took some measurements just to see how long the shirt would be if I cut it at that point. I decided to add one inch from the line of pins and cut it there. The bottom of the shirt was then a “v” shape and I could begin attaching it to the skirt.

I turned the shirt inside out and pinned the edge of the shirt to the edge of the skirt all the way around. I started pinning at both “v” shape junctions just to ensure those would be lined up.

Then I stitched along the line, attaching the skirt to the shirt and making a dress.

I tried it on and it’s definitely a bit long and a little bit big, but that’s absolutely fine for two reasons: 1) I haven’t put the zipper in yet, which will draw the bodice together a bit tighter and 2) I’m going to be wearing heels with the dress so it will have the appropriate length.

The next thing I did was prep the bottom of the skirt for hemming. I still hadn’t trimmed the uneven gored edges, so I had to do that first. I marked a cut line with my blue pencil, I’m not sure if you can see the line in the above picture.

I did that on each panel and then cut the excess off, leaving a nice and even edge.

Then I folded the edge 1/4″ over and then folded that over and measured out a 5/8″ hem. Then I sewed the hem and backstitched the beginning and end of my stitches.

I decided not to do anything to the raw edges of the neckline or the wrists. The neckline is going to have trim attached to it which I’ll be using the raw edge for, so I wanted to leave that alone. I have not yet trimmed the arms to be the proper length for my arms yet also because of the trims I’m going to be adding.

Because I also have to dye some other aspects of the dress, I’m going to work on those tomorrow, and maybe dye things on the weekend.