Wednesday 27 April 2011

Vintage Revamp #4 - Hot Pink 1950s style dress (Part 1)

Hello there and a happy Wednesday to you all! You may remember from this post that I recently scored a big haul from the Vintage Kilo Sale, all of which needs a good revamping before I can actually wear it. I decided to start with one of the more simple revamps, the Hot Pink 1950s style dress:

Original hot pink 1950s style dress

As you can see this dress is pretty much perfect already, I love the colour and the little embellishments are adorable, the fit however was not so good! The elastic waist band does fit around my waist, but there was much too much fabric in the bodice of the dress to be flattering. I looked like I was wearing a sinched in tent! I also didn't like the length of the sleeves, and when I removed them in order to adjust the bodice I decided to leave them off completely, perfect for the summer!

Sleeves removed, pinned and ready for sewing

I took in about an inch of fabric on each side of the bodice

I also added two darts to the back so the dress would sit better on my waist

As you may be able to see from the pictures above the lining is peeking out from the adjustments I made on the sleeves of the dress. The dress was fully lined but the fabric is really quite thick and not at all clingy, so I decided that most of the lining was just making the dress too heavy and bulky, to I cut it shorter so that now only the bodice is lined. I also trimmed back and serged the sleeve linings so they no longer show. Finally I chopped off about 6 inches from the hem so the skirt now finishes at my knee rather than halfway down my calf!

And here is how the dress looks now:


New look hot pink 1950s style dress

The dress now fits me - hurrah! - and is at a much more flattering length :) And now for some super close ups of details...

Newly hemmed sleeve, no lining in sight!

Newly sewn darts for a better fit on the waist

Freshly hemmed skirt, done by hand of course!


Now, because of the shortened hem, the pleats of the skirt aren't really behaving themselves and lying nicely as they did before the alterations (you can really see this in the full length picture above). To help resolve this I am using a magical method to make those pleats behave - I'm tacking the naughty little things down!

Naughty pleats now behaving, all tacked down :)

You can see that the pleats are now falling perfectly, so happy days :) I'm going to leave the dress hanging like this for a few days and I will also press the pleats to make sure they stay on their best behaviour.

Beautiful pleats!

Now this revamp is only part one as there are still several things that I want to do to this dress before I wear it. For one I think I want to replace the buttons with white ones rather than the pink. I've been searching for some vintage flower buttons online as I think they would be perfect! Also, I do love the matching belt that came with this dress, but now I'm thinking that a thin white belt might look prettier. Or perhaps I could add some white piping around the edge of the collar. What do you think? I would really like some more little highlights of white on the dress, but how much is too much? I love to hear your opinions!

Stay tuned folks, because part 2 of this revamp will be shared with you very soon, I can't wait to get this dress out on the town! Bye for now!

2 comments:

Caroline C. said...

I think buttons and a white belt are a good idea. I REALLY like piping but in this case with the white detailing on the bodice it might be too much. But like I said, I reaaaally like piping so really do what you want and feels good!

Katie said...

Thanks Caroline! I think you're right, I'm worried about over doing it on the white front, but I'll have a play around and we'll see what happens. I'm definitely set on white buttons, so that's certainly happening, but as for the rest who knows!

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...