Self Drafted Julia dress

Hola!

Due to the character of my work, I am working on different projects at the same time and it takes a bit time from start to the finish. Right now I am working on 9 different garments. There's a huge paper attached to all of them with a list of what changes I have to make after fittings and when is the next fitting, which notions I have to use/get, etc because otherwise I would just go nuts, mix something up and it all would be just an epic fail.

So until I finish my current projects, I would like to show you one of my old projects. Drumroll please.

This is what I call the Julia dress. It's made of black crepe chiffon.I made it for my SO's sister when she discovered that she had to go to a gala/New Year's party and had nothing to wear. I had 5 days to draft the pattern, sew the dress, make a fitting and decorate the dress with the lace that has pearls and sequins on(which I had to sew on the lace by hand.)

As you can see the bodice is inspired by wrap dresses, but I topstitched  it together to avoid any "peeking" accidents, if you know what I mean. I steamed the pleats in to the fabric and it was quite tedious. I understand why people buy pre-pleated fabrics. But for this dress I used fabric from my stash and as the pleats gradually disappear and the bottom of the dress has more flowing than draping feel to it.

See all those sequins and pears? I spent about three days on those pesky little things. I kept changing my mind on what goes where. I had a ton of different options. And I tried out them all. But I liked this the best. It's not too bling-bling but it's still beautiful and adds that extra *ZING* to the whole garment.

The back is quite open, but covers enough that it's possible to wear a bra with straps under it and having no problems with the straps showing.
For fastening I used invisible zipper(which is my favorite zipper when it comes to dresses.)

My unofficial sister-in-law is super skinny(even though she has given birth to two kids) so I knew that almost anything would look good on her. I did have to take in quite a bit after first fitting, because when I was drafting and cutting it, I was sure that I must have taken some measurements wrong and it would be too small for her. Nope *doh*

I should also mention a lot of thanks to the girl who was willing to model for me so I could take the pictures at the school studio(no, this is not me nor the sister-in-law)

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Fooniks
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