Finished Project: Another 'Georgia' Maxi Dress.

I hope you don't mind that I have a habit making the same dresses over and over. 

In 2011/2012 I was obsessed with full gathered skirt; 2013/2014 I'm in love with maxi dresses.

If I have to make a billion adjustments to a pattern to accommodate my small bust, erect back, hollow chest, swayback, forward shoulders, long torso, short legs, narrow underbust, long upper torso "unique" body, why not sew it to death.

With Georgia, I didn't encounter many fitting issues as I did with Anna (fitting posts here), so only one 'fitting post' was blogged... however, now that I've made my fourth Georgia, I'm picking up on things that are bugging me...

1) The bodice cups: I think this was discussed in the comments of one of my previous Georgia posts, or on Twitter; but the cups don't sit correctly over my boob/bra cup. It sits about 3cm above the underwire of my bra (refer to pic below). Even when I am bra-less, the cups don't 'cup' my boobs. 

Does anyone else have the same issue with the bodice cups?

There was a discussion on an old blog post, and another sewist said I may have a 'narrow underbust' and 'long upper torso' so simply lengthening the straps probably won't fix the issue, because it will then expose more skin up top, which I hate.

I will be lengthening the bodice (cups and back piece) on my next Georgia. Fingers crossed.

My finger is sitting just under my bra underwire. Cups are so not in the correct spot! 

2) The lower back: I had to "pinch" out some excess fabric in the lower back of this skirt. This adjustment was made last minute on my Georgia mini but not on my rayon maxi or Valentines Day mini.

I thought the problem was with my buns; but I think it could be due to my long torso extending into the area where my buns should be. I got validation from a lovely follower on Twitter that my buns are sufficient and anacondas want. Haha, Nicki Minaj, you kill me with that song.

Lengthening the bodice will "drop" the skirt 3cm lower and may solve all my issues, so I'll start with lengthening the bodice. 

How much fabric I "pinched" out of my lower back. 

Before and after.
Any thoughts on why this happens to me? It happens on RTW and all patterns that skim my back.

3) The straps: Might add some length back into them, and reassess their position at the back, particularly the left (my RHS) strap, did I put it in wrong spot??? WTHHHHH! 

I swear both straps are in the same position and when I hold up the dress, it looks fine; when I wear it, it looks odd. GAHHH. The photo below annoys me so much!!!! 

The strap on right (my LHS) is the shortened one.

There is something NQR with the strap on the left (my RHS).

Apart from the three issues above, I absolutely LOVE this version!!!!
I love it so much that I wore the dress to dinner with Ling on Saturday, then again on Sunday out to lunch with Libby (The Very Very Hungry Caterpillar).

I also took a nap in it and Georgia was very comfy to sleep in, just like my floral Anna.

Thanks Libby for taking pics... ignore the wrinkles on the back, that's just from sitting down for a 2 hour American food feast at Le Bon Ton; I couldn't be more happy with the fit. Best so far, I think.

The sweetheart-style neckline is very flattering, gives the appearance of a fuller bust. The dress as a whole makes me feel womanly cos it hugs in all the right places, and the fabric is just so pretty.

I kinda regret not putting in the side split; although it is walk-able, I tend to run late to everything and am power walking most of the time.

Front bodice.

Side view.

Inside/back bodice.

Sorry for selfies, still camera-less... but like that I can blog straight from my iphone. No need to hook camera up to laptop.

Project details -

Pattern: BHL 'Georgia' + 53cm!

Size: 2/6 bust, 6/10 waist, 2/6 hips

Fabric:  2.5m cotton voile

Notions: 16" invisible zipper, thread, cotton tape

Cost: The fabric was in my stash reserved for a Flora wearable muslin, bought it months ago. My guess is $25 for cotton voile and $5 for zipper. $30 maxi dress. Bargain, if you ask me.

Pattern Modification/Adjustments: 

• The usual adjustments I made for previous Georgia dresses:
• hollow chest adjustment
• small bust adjustment
• shortening the strap on my right shoulder
• wider straps (smaller SA)
• moving the position of the straps to sit more to the side of front bodice, just next to the outside of cup seams
• took a chunk out of my lower back skirt
• Added 53cm to skirt, for maxi length

Hours: I know for sure that cutting and construction of entire dress took 5hrs. The zipper, hemming and hand-sewing took another 2 hours or so, plus another hour for final adjustments on lower back. Lets say, 8 hours total.

Completed on: Thursday 2nd October 2014.

First worn: Saturday 5th October 2014, to Ling's (Six Inch Heel) birthday dinner.

Happy Birthday Ling!!

Ling and I have been friends for almost 4 years... she was the first person I met from Twitter.
We bonded quickly in real life over blogging and food, I'm a frequent guest at her family BBQs and her boys call me 'Aunty Nee'.

Ling's birthday dinner was at Teppanyaki Inn. It was delicious, best wagyu steak I have had, ever. Her boys made me laugh constantly, they are so smart and funny, well behaved too. Yep, am kinda clucky! I spent most of the night saying "awwwwwwww, he's sooo cute, awww!!" Was a wonderful night out. Thanks for the invite, Ling!!!!

Next up on my sewing table will be a dress for the 'GYFOMelbourne 2014 Charity Frocktails' hosted by Team Get Your Frock On. Their mission is to raise awareness and funds for Ovarian Cancer Research Foundation.

The event is on Thursday 16th October 2014, so still plenty of time for you to get yourself a ticket (here).

I have a couple of ideas for my GYFO dress; maybe a houndstooth maxi (I hear you groaning, haha) or a floral strapless mini. I am being so predictable and boring, but I can't move on till I have nailed the pattern (typical Virgo - perfectionist, fussy, borderline OCD).

I need to ace the bodice cups; does anyone else have the same issue as me with the bodice cups?
How did you fix it?

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FITTING: Reducing neckline gaping - hollow/shallow chest adjustment.

Diagnosing a hollow/shallow chest: On my bodice I noticed there was excess fabric on my front bodice between my 'apex' (nipple?!??!!) and the neckline. It looked like the top half of my bodice was "collapsing" on to my chest, because my chest was too shallow to hold up the bodice. Make sense? 

This year I have become obsessed with achieving the perfect fit. I've spent way too many hours and dollars on making up dresses that don't fit well. 

I'm no expert when it comes to pattern adjustments or fitting but these are techniques that have worked for me. 

I basically make up the bodice muslin/toile, try it on, pinch and pin out the excess fabric.

The example above is my 'Anna' dress. I didn't do an SBA for my Anna (I did every other adjustment under the sun for it though, haha). The bodice fit well, but the neck line was wrinkly and gaping. 

This is how it looked before I pinched out a 4cm wedge on each side of the bodice. 

I transferred the 4cm wedge on to the pattern piece, like below (drawings not to scale). Once the 'wedge' is taken out, the neck line will need to be smoothed out. 

The next example is my 'Georgia' dress. The small bust adjustment (SBA) solved the fitting issue in the 'cup' area of my bust, but the top half of my bust (nipple and above) didn't fit well into my bodice. 

The (centre front) neck line was not sitting against my chest. I pinched out a 3cm wedge on each side of the (front centre) bodice. I transferred the 3cm wedge on to the pattern piece, like below (drawings are not to scale). Once the 'wedge' is taken out, the neck line will need to be smoothed out. 

NOTE: Ignore the "SA 15"" on the drawing - I meant 15mm - not inches for the seam allowance!! 

Call it neck darts, call it wedges, call it a shallow/hollow/caramello chest adjustment, whatever!! 

At the end of the day, if there is excess fabric on the bodice, pinch it, pin it, then take that wedge out of the pattern piece. 

I used to be caught up in 'defining' every adjustment that needed to be made, thinking that if it didn't have a 'name' or appear on Google search then the adjustment wasn't legit or correct, but ultimately, if there's excess fabric and if it's bugging you, get rid of it. 

On both the Anna and Georgia, I have made a dart all the way to the seam allowance (SA) but every body will be different, so just transfer the adjustments to your pattern piece as per amount of fabric pinched out from your muslin/toile.

I hope this helps you if you are experiencing bodice fitting issues. 

My advice is always make a muslin/toile and keep persisting, the end result will be worth it :)

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FITTING: By Hand London 'Anna' muslin/toile with sway back adjustment, neck darts & repositioned side seam (part 4).

By now I am sure you are sick to death of my posts and tweets on this topic. I am a woman possessed!! Just make the fucking thing already, right?

Well, now I can!!! I finally got the fit right on my muslin.

After making what felt like two hundred adjustments, the Anna dress is ready to be made up in my beautiful floral cotton voile.

After I did the erect back/short back and shoulder seam adjustments the waistline was still dipping and there was some gaping at the front neck.

I ended up doing a 2.5cm sway back adjustment and took 4cm wedges out of the neck.

As you can see, the neck fit better, the waist was level, but the side seams were still swinging forward. 

I was going to ignore the swinging side seam, but I realised that it would probably affect the way the front of skirt sits on my body, forcing the skirt side seam to swing forward, creating some weird bump... so off to Google I went and I found this:

SOURCE

I think instructions "add/subtract twice (abc)" mean you add/subtract on both left and right (ie twice) because they were repositioning the side seams on a sloper whereas I repositioned the side seams on my pattern piece so I didn't add/subtract (abc) amount twice.

I also repositioned the skirt side seams so the bodice and skirt side seams will match up.

The erect back adjustment of 3cm lowered my back neckline, so I added 2cm back into the CB and neckline. Maybe the erect back adjustment wasn't needed?

 So now, I present to you the muslin that has consumed the last fortnight of my life...

Side seam: before and after. I've have since added 2cm to the front bodice length.

Bodice caving in at the top

No more gaping.

There are also some wrinkles on the back and under the arms, but I can't be fucked making another muslin take on another issue right now so I'll turn a blind eye. The wrinkles don't bother me that much.

I have already cut out my floral cotton voile and plan on sewing it this Saturday to wear to a 30th birthday party and a housewarming (both on Sunday). If the wrinkles on this floral version bother me, then I will make more adjustments so that the rayon version I plan to make for my friend's wedding will be perfect. 

Even though it was a frustrating and long winded process, I have to say I enjoyed the challenge. I have learnt a lot of things about my body. Hopefully the next pattern I make (probably Georgia, for the sewalong) won't be as difficult, as I now now what my body issues are and how to fix them.

Speaking of the Georgia Sewalong, I believe that is happening this weekend! Yayyyyy! Who's in???

So now that my fitting dramas with Anna are over, what will I tweet about now? Hahahhaha. 

Thank you every one for your advice, for emailing and linking me to tutorials, for diagnosing my 'issues', for encouraging me and for putting up with the hundreds of #annadress #fittingwoes tweets (especially those followers that DGAF about sewing... who would never read this blog to see this, anyway).

I leave you with a pretty picture of my floral cotton voile, a 22" American Beauty invisible zipper and thread #733.

Happy Australia Day long weekend :)

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FITTING: By Hand London 'Anna' muslin/toile with shoulder & erect/short back adjustments (part 3).

Good morning, happy hump day!

Last night I made a bunch of adjustments to Anna muslin number three (muslin number 2 was a complete fail, I stuffed up the shoulder adjustment - inadvertently added 3cm to CB when I was adjusting the shoulder, lets not talk about it).

Reading through all the tweets and comments on my last two posts (part 1, part two), everyone pointed out that I had erect shoulders/posture, a short back, forward shoulders.

CheekyChaCha kindly emailed me info on forward shoulder fitting problems - THANK YOU, THANK YOU THANK YOU, I need to get a copy of that fitting book that you own!! 

I've ticked the problems I am definitely experiencing, the rest of them I am unsure...

• shoulders seams lie behind the shoulder tip ✓
• loose wrinkles form along front armhole
• tighter stress wrinkles form between the back armhole and shoulder blade
• sleeve cap is tight around front of shoulder ✓
• sleeve cap is loose, puffy, over the back of shoulder
• shoulder seam needs to be moved forward ✓
• bodice front needs less fabric width at armhole
• bodice back needs more width at armhole
• front sleeve cap needs to be more rounded
• back sleeve cap needs to be flatter

It was evident from the photos I posted online that my shoulder seams were sitting about 3cms back from centre of my shoulder. Yet to determine if the forward shoulders is causing the waist seam to dip backwards.

My first adjustment was redistributing 3cm from the front shoulder to the back shoulder so the shoulder seam will sit on the centre of my shoulder.

• I drew a line at the seam allowance (SA) of FRONT shoulder, slashed it and removed 3cms. 
• I drew a line at the seam allowance (SA) of BACK shoulder, slashed it and added 3cms. 

Removed 3cms from front bodice shoulder.

Before and after.

Redistributed the 3cms taken from front bodice to back bodice shoulder.

It worked! The should seam now sits centered on my shoulder (blade??). Looks and feels way better than before!

Forward shoulder problem fixed *pops champagne* shoulder seam sitting comfortably, woo hoo!! 

Now for my erect back/posture/short back issue.

I'm not sure if erect shoulders, erect posture, short back are three difference issues; or if they are the same issue with different descriptions.

A lot of people suggested my erect back/posture was the cause of my waist seam dipping back, because my overly erect posture made my centre back length (CBL) decrease between the neck and mid-back... or something. I still don't get this one!!

CheekyChaCha also sent info on erect back fitting problems, again I've ticked the problems I am experiencing, the rest of them I am unsure...

• excess fabric sags into loose horizontal wrinkles across upper back
• flatter contour of the back needs less dart shaping
• bodice back needs less length  ✓ 
• bodice back needs narrower darts 

My next adjustment was to take a wedge out of the centre back (CB) following this tutorial for erect back adjustment.

The waist seam was dipping about 3cm towards the back, so I took a wedge of 3cms out of the centre back. 

I'm not really sure if this was the right fix for me, as I didn't notice much of the fabric riding up my neck to begin with (as per tutorial, fabric riding up is one of the fitting problems). I gave the adjustment a shot anyway.

• I drew a line perpendicular to the grainline, in the upper back
• I cut into the back bodice piece from centre back, stopping before the seam allowance (cut along the line I drew)
• I pivoted the top piece of pattern down to "remove" 3cms from the centre back
• I straightened up the CB and grainline 

Before and after shoulder seam and erect back adjustment.

Here is the result...

Front and back waist seam still not level.
Waist is dipping back/front rising up.

I will do the 'elastic test' tonight as suggested by some ladies on Twitter, however I do prefer my waist seam sitting just above my natural waist.

Should I need to take another wedge out of the lower back at the waist, and then lengthen the front bodice so that the seam will be level?

Bust/neck looks a little gapey in this photo taken last night...  but in the photo below taken this morning, it looks fine.

No more gaping...? I will do the 'bending over test' tonight.

Photo taken last night: I noticed wrinkles in the back, but this morning they disappeared! 

Photo taken this morning, no wrinkles..?
Is the back meant to be this low? Should I make the back neckline higher?

This dress has been on my mind 24/7 since last Thursday, I'm exhausted but I really want to get the fit perfect. Even though I'm super frustrated that I haven't cut into my beautiful fabric yet, I'm enjoying the challenge. 

Thank you guys soooooooo sooooo much for helping me with the shoulder seams. I'm so happy that I've at least knocked out one fitting problem.

Now I need your helpful suggestions on the next lot of fitting problems:

• how do level the waist seam?
• should be concerned about those wrinkles on the back bodice that come and go?
• shoulder I make the back neckline higher?

Please comment below, tweet me @sewmelove or email me :)

Thanking you in advance!!

PS. After posting this, I found this document on the internet which I found helpful.
It describes my problem - "Too much fabric at the back waist causing a puff at the centre back, 
wrinkles under the waistband, pants seat is stretched, side seams swing forward and hemlines are longer in the back" - their diagnosis is "swayback or down sloping waistline".

My side seams definitely swing forward! Down sloping waistline, that's a new one! Thoughts?

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FITTING: By Hand London 'Anna' muslin/toile, adjustments for my erect shoulders (part 2).

Huh??? What is an erect shoulder??? I googled to find out more in order to accurately diagnose my sewing issue, and the results page was mortifying to view.
Advice: don't google the words "erect" and "back" in the same sentence.

Thank you to every one on Twitter and those that commented on my last blog post with advice. Without you guys I'd either throw out the Anna and give up on sewing completely or I'd hem the dress shorter at the back and live with the dipping waist seam. Every one has said that my shoulder seam sits too far back therefore causing the front bodice to ride up.

So it seems I have erect shoulders. Not sure if this is a good thing or not?? I always try to stand tall with my shoulders back. The trainers at my gym have drilled into my head the importance of standing tall ("chest out, butt out, sternum *something-something*") so I guess this is proof that I have alright posture?

I don't understand, if erect posture is a good thing, why don't RTW clothes and pattern companies design patterns to accommodate this? I feel like I'm being punished for having "good" posture.

I tried on a RTW dress and noticed that the shoulder seams also sit back (about 1.5cm). I pulled the seam forward to straighten the waist seam and marked on my shoulders where the seam should sit to achieve a straight waist seam.

I've taken some more photos to explain the issue. The waist seam is sitting above the yellow measuring tape. The markings on my door strongly confirm that the issue is my front bodice is riding up.

LEFT PIC: How the waist seam/dress sits naturally on my body.
RIGHT PIC: How the waist seam/dress sits after I pull the shoulder seams forward.

Hopefully you can see the shoulder seam clearly in this photo.
Pen mark on my shoulder is where seam should sit to achieve a straight waist seam.
Left shoulder seams sits 3cm back from mark.
Right shoulder sits 2cm back from mark (could be due to my right boob being the smaller one).

I should point point out that I have had this issue ever since I started sewing so I don't think it is the design of Anna. I used to assume it was because I drafted my own skirts or because I didn't have a Kim Kardashian butt. I also suspected I had a sway back.

Fitting issue:

• Shoulder seams sitting too far back - 3cm back on left shoulder, 2cm on right shoulder. Difference could be due to my right boob being smaller than the left?)

Which has resulted in:

• Waist seam/front bodice is riding up at the front
• The waist seam appearing like it's dipping/tilting towards the back (but in actual fact it's just riding up at the front, as per photos)
• Dress hem is longer at the back

How to fix:
I've been told that I simply add the 3cm on to the back shoulder seam.
But I also saw somewhere on the internet that I need to then subtract 3cm from the front shoulder seam.
There was also an "erect back tutorial" that advised to take a wedge out. Thanks for linking me to the tutorial Sew Little Time!

I'm still trying to get my head around there being such thing as "erect shoulders" so may keep pondering (aka tweeting about it, googling 'erect back', sighing every time I walk pass my sewing room). When I fully understand the logistics behind the fix I will cut out another bodice muslin.

How do I make the add length to the shoulder seams without affecting the neckline and armholes, as they fit well right now.

If anyone knows how to fix this issue, please comment :)
I'm sure after I fix this erect shoulder issue, I'll run into some more fitting issues. Oh the joys of sewing, always keeping me on my toes!

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