Tag: folkwear

Folkwear Croatian Shirt

Folkwear 117 - Croatian Shirt

This is Folkwear 117, the Croatian Shirt.

I bought the pattern intending to make it in the dress length, but I didn’t have anything like enough of this cotton lawn, so I made a rather short shirt instead. I started this project about eight months ago, and then it was put to one side while I was working on sewing for other people. At long last, I’m really pleased to have it finished.

The fabric is a lightweight cotton lawn and the buttons are vintage, from one of my many inherited button tins. The close-up of the buttons and tucks is the most accurate for colour, but that still doesn’t show how bright this shirt is!

Folkwear 117 - Croatian Shirt

The construction is a mixture of ancient and modern. All of the long seams and the hem have been serged, for speed and strength. The pin tucks were all stitched down by machine as well. The yoke, collar and cuffs are all finished by hand. All of the fasteners (there are poppers underneath the buttons) have been hand sewn too.

I think this is the approach I’m going to take when I put together my prototype dressing-up smock for the museum. Serged seams, especially under the arms, will make a smock far more resistant to tearing when it’s being taken on and off in a hurry by a class full of enthusiastic children. But the finishing will all be done by hand, as will the smocking and embroidery, so they’ll get an idea of what an authentic period garment would have been like.

Paris Promenade Dress

I was invited to a 1920s Tea Dance, so of course I took the opportunity to make a 1920s dress!

Tea Dance, Rising Sun Tea Dance, Rising Sun

It’s Folkwear 261, the “Paris Promenade Dress”.
That’s front and back – you can tell the back by the tassels on the ends of the sash. (Look closely – they’re camouflaged, but they are there.)

Folkwear are apparently very accurate with their period sewing patterns, and this one assumed that you weren’t going to be using a sewing machine for anything but the long, straight seams. This meant that it was constructed in such a way that you couldn’t use a sewing machine for anything but the long, straight seams, and so I spent a Very Long Time doing a heck of a lot of hand sewing.

I’m very, very pleased with the work that’s gone into this dress. There was a lot of hand sewing, and the construction was like origami, but I’m (mostly) happy with the results.

Tea Dance, Rising Sun

I also made a last-minute hat which apparently made me look like some kind of demented floral sous-chef, which wasn’t quite the look I’d been going for. Pretend you didn’t see that, if you like. 😉

Tea Dance, Rising Sun

Here’s the dress, complete with bad hair moment after I’d decided that I couldn’t tolerate the stupid hat any longer.

That front apron part actually works as one truly ENORMOUS pocket, by the way. (Not all the way down to the point, there’s a seam about half way across the wide part, on the inside. That I sewed by hand. Aargh.)

That poofy bit at the hem is REALLY ANNOYING. Doesn’t do it on the dress form. Doesn’t do it on the coathanger. Doesn’t do it on the ironing board. Put the dress on? Poof. Grrrrr.
The hem is actually on a very deep fold of the fabric, so even though it’s been pressed into place, it’s draping differently because I’m not the same shape as my dress form. I think the best way to fix this is going to be to have someone else pin the hem into place while I’m wearing it, and then I can press the fold in the same place that it’s going to fall when the dress is being worn.

I have to say that the dress was absolutely FABULOUS to wear. I’m not usually a fan of synthetic fabrics, but the main body of the dress is a polyester crepe lightweight suiting, and it flows and drapes absolutely beautifully. Because the sash is also slippery (polyester georgette), you can lift your arms up very easily, and the dress just slides around. So floaty, so comfortable, and very glamorous-feeling.

Possibly also very comfortable because the narrowest part of the dress measures 68″ around, with the widest part clocking in at 84″. (That’s roughly twice as big as me.) I’d been a bit worried that all that fabric might make it look as though I’d gone to a party in a big beige sack, but thankfully that wasn’t the case at all!

I’m half considering making another one, perhaps in black. And without the silly hat.