Mad Men Dress Challenge

I made it! As mentioned in my previous post, my sewing mojo returned with the Mad Men Dress Challenge, initiated by fabulous Julia Bobbin. Here's my contribution, and I cannot wait to see other peoples creations and Mad Men adaptations. I chose to copy one of my favourite dresses from the TV show, and did some alterations with the neckline and skipped sleeves since I often wear cardigans or boleros with my dresses.

I have used my own pattern as usual, but I have done some alterations with regards to swayback and gaping neckline. I followed the swayback tutorial from Sherry at Pattern Scissors Cloth which in principle is the same as in the book of Winfred Aldrich, Metric pattern cutting for women's wear. However, there's still something wrong with the fit of my pattern. Stephanie from The Naked Seamstress has a nice and easy tutorial on how to cope with gaping necklines, and since some of my dresses sometimes feel loose over the chest, I followed her tutorial. The result of the two alterations I did, was a very tight arm hole. I won't do it over again, though, as it is absolutely wearable.

My next plan is to go back to my first basic block, or even start all over again, and do some fittings and alterations from scratch with the help of Winfred, instead of doing alterations on a already 5-times altered pattern. Better control hopefully gives me better pattern!