1870s blue and white bustle ensemble
A friend of mine contacted me this spring gushing over a new made to order dress she ordered via etsy. Black velvet bustle era gown. Expensive but really nice. She doesn’t really do much costuming but she wanted that kind of dress.
A couple of months later she contacted me and asked if I wanted to join her on a costuming event so that she could use her new dress in a proper setting. It coincided with my summer holidays so I jumped at the opportunity. The event was a picnic with the society Viktoriansk piknik Christiania, or Victorian picnic Christiania(the old name for Oslo). It was a steampicnic where we traveled on a museum railway with a train from late 19th early 20th century.
I could have just worn one of my other dresses since the theme was as broad as the Victorian era, I have several 1860s dresses for instance, but I decided I wanted to match my friends dress’ time period and make a new dress.
Also,the larp I was going to in August was cancelled and I needed a summer sewing project- so a picnic dress instead of a steampunk outfit it was.
I first made a lobster tail bustle following American Duchess’ excellent tutorial. Probably not really correct for the dress, but I wanted one that I could use for both eras of bustle.
I found a nice print at home pattern on etsy and rooted in my stash for fabric and got to it. The pattern was very nice and comprehensive, made by indie designer Black snail patterns. They have more patterns and I am going to try their Edwardian straight front corset pattern next.
I was a bit apprehensive since I only had eight metres of my fabric and the pattern gave 11 metres as what I needed. But the original pattern had the flounces cut on the bias, which eats up a lot of yardage. I decided to cut on the grain and hope for the best. It was just about enough. If I had my way i would have put a little more fabric into the flounces, but that was purely for my own aestethics. It wasn’t needed.
The dress came together beautifully. I am especially proud of the fit in the back. I didn’t have time to bone the bodice before I had to pack and leave for my holidays, but with a corset under it wasn’t really necessary. I will bone it later, after the autumn of crazy sewing(own post later)when I have the time.
I also reworked an old H&M strawhat for the outfit. I looked at fashion plates of hats from the era, reshaped the hat with hot water and decorated it with blue ribbon, a bit of lace and fake blue roses.
I thought it could fit into the HSM challenge for travel, and will probably enter it, way too late :P
