Creating a dress

Today in pattern cutting we had to continue to manufacture our dress patterns so that we could create our final dress patterns ready for constructing the dress from fabric.
The first thing that I had to do was trace off the front dress from the first draft.
I then added in my new dart line to the centre shoulder and cut down my new dart.
I then had to close the existing bust dart as this was no longer needed.


I drew on design lines to show where my panels were to be created.

At this point we were then able to change the neck line by drawing a new one on. However, this was not relevant to my pattern as I wanted to keep the neck of my dress higher.

I then had to trace both panels off.



Once I had traced all of my pattern off I then had to check that the shoulder matched on both sides. Unfortunately, mine didn't quite match up so I had to alter it slightly by cutting away the excess so that it was equal.

I had to trace off the arm hole and neck hole.




Interfacing on the armhole of the dress.

 

After I had traced off my final pattern pieces and all of the adaptions that I had made to my dress, I then had to pin it to my fabric and cut it out.

I had to make sure that I had added in my notches as these were important when constructing my dress.





Problem solving like a jigsaw.

I then had to add my interfacing to the arm and neck. As I was doing this I did encounter a problem when cutting out my interfacing. At first I cut it out the wrong way round and it didn't fit to my fabric. Therefore I had to cut it out again. After I had added interfacing to my arm hole I then faced another challenge with my neck hole as there was not much interfacing left and the neck hole had to be cut on the fold. I then got around this problem by cutting out interfacing and piecing it together like a jigsaw so that it fit.





I had to get my centre front panel and my front side panel and pin them together ensuring that the notches matched. I then had to sew 1.5cm all the way down ensuring that my stitch was curved.

I then had to iron the seam flat and then overlock down the side to create a closed seam. I then repeated this for the other side.


Overlocking.

After I had finished my front half of my dress, I then had to sew the back side panels to the centre back piece. I had to piece them together like a jigsaw to see where they fitted before I began to sew them.


Firstly I had to pin the side panel to the centre back making sure that my notches matched up. I then sewed 1.5cm all the way down and then I repeated this again for the other side. Once I had done that I then had to iron both seams open. I then overlocked down both sides to create a closed seam.





Front dress.



Overlocking down the panels.