The edwardian era was a time of big changes – in society, industry and also fashion and it was always a time which I loved. As many of you know I live in vienna, a city which is known for all the beautiful buildings from around 1900. We don’t call this era edwardian here but we call it ‚Gründerzeit‘ which roughly translates to founders-time because – haha – many things were founded.
But well, vienna is a city where fashion was extremely important in this time and this is why I wanted to start on my edwardian wardrobe.
Last year around christmas I started working on an 1898 ball gown because you can never have enough ball gowns. The embroidered velvet is from Textil Müller and I found it at the end of 2020 right before christmas.
The skirt pattern is from an magazine from 1898 which I don’t know the name of right now and the bodice was drafted by me using a basic block pattern I made in the masterclass for stage costumes and the help of a book from Müller & Sohn.
As you can see in the pictures below I had to make the bodice a lot tighter and I also hat to redo the shoulder straps and I had to shorten the waistline. But those changes were no big deal because I expected them. The basic block was for more loose fitting modern fashion and not a very tight and historical one.
I used the mockup to create a new pattern which I always like to do because fabric on fabric is not as slippery as paper on fabric.
The bodice was lined with a thin cotton and I used store bought boning channels to insert german plastic boning to give it more structure. I also wanted to pattern match the back which I’m pretty proud of because it worked out fine.
This was the last fitting before finishing the bodice. I wanted to check if everything fits and if I like the neckline which I did. As you can see, you can’t really see where the bodice meets the skirt because I also pattern matched the front from the bodice and the skirt.
The dress itself is finished now but I‘m still not sure how I want to decorate the bodice. Lace? Pearls? Flowers?
I really don‘t know but since there is no ball in sight I don‘t need to hurry. 🙂
And if you have an idea please let me know in the comments down below!
The next little thing I was working on was a blouse and an edwardian skirt. For the blouse I used a pattern from Making edwardian costumes for women and I used some leftover cotton with a tiny stripe pattern.
The skirt allthough was made with an original pattern from the book Ich kann schneidern from 1909. It’s a german book with all kinds of patterns and sewing techniques.
This skirt only is a fancy mock-up because I used some old fabric with a little bit of stretch. I really really really love the skirt and I’m going to make one or two new ones for my edwardian wardrobe. I think it’s super flattering and will look great with a little blouse and maybe a little bolero jacket to go over.
So. That’s it for now. I also started on edwardian corsets but this is going to be an extra post because I want to talk a bit more about the topic of S-Bend corsets and the struggles I have with them.
