The hat: assembled!

Alright, so I gave some childish whoops of glee when this was done. It was silly, I know. :)

When last we left our intrepid adventurers, all hat pieces had been covered in fabric and were ready for final assembly (you can see that post here). What had to happen next was probably the scariest thing I've ever done to a project.

See, the brim of the hat was a solid piece of buckram, wired and covered in the satin. (In this photo the crown's just sitting on the brim for the sake of the picture.)

The next step was to stitch everything together just inside the wire ring (on the "headhole" side). Then you have to cut out that inner circle. Now, the pattern has lines on it as guides for cutting, but when you draw those on the buckram that you've now covered with fabric, it makes it a touch hard to see. So a little bit of guesswork to add to my total panic at cutting this apart. But, it had to be done, so I took a deep breath and took the scissors to it.





I did have a photo to show of this once it was cut out and looking horribly ragged and scary, but the camera for some reason didn't save it. :( Stupid camera.

Anyway, so you fold the clipped bits from the inner edge up into the crown of the hat, sew through it all to keep it together, add a piece of extra wide bias tape for a hatband, and you end up with this:

BTW, the lower edge of the crown where it meets the brim - total mess. Stitches everywhere! I gave myself permission to do this because I knew I was going to have some fairly full trim around the band.

And then I set to trimming. I'd gotten some green netting to drape the crown with to give a nod towards the headdress the original character wears in the comics....

...and in one image I'd found, she has a green diamond-shaped gem set in the headdress right in the middle of her forehead, so to kinda bring that in, I found these at Fire Mountain Gems (great place, btw :). I'm horrible about judging the size things need to be on hats, and they looked kinda small so I wasn't certain if I would use three in that triangular pattern in the photo or all four in a larger diamond-shaped pattern.


As it turned out, I opted for only one....

Happy sewing!

Episode "I": Update

Way back at the beginning, I talked about how I would one day do an Imperial Officer costume from the Star Wars movies (original trilogy, thank you!) to go with my husband's. With all the work on the Enchantress lately, I haven't really been doing as much on it as I should be (the shame!), but I thought I'd do an update nonetheless. :)

OK, first off, I'd like to point anyone interested in doing one of these to the Imperial Officer forums at the 501st Legion main site. There is a wealth of information to be had there. Go mine it! This is where we started when we were doing my husband's IO, and it's where I got the tip to start here:

This is a McCall's Civil War costume pattern (M4745). It's a good place to start, but it needs modification - more or less modification depending on how accurate to the original you want to be.

As I think I've mentioned, I have a bad tendency to want to do things "right". So, armed with this pattern, some photos from a museum exhibit of the Star Wars costumes, and photos of the inside of one of the original movie IO's (all found on the forums), we set to work.



There are several things that are right with this pattern - the seams on the back, the fact that the panels are seamed at the waist, for example. But there is still mod'ing to be done!

Modifications include: 1) reshaping the panel that overlaps in the front so that it's the same shape as the IO's in the movie, 2) putting in pockets on either side for the code cylinders, 3) tweaking the way the shoulders lay (they kinda kink off towards the back on this pattern), 4) shortening the panels over the legs, and 5) adding a seam to the overpanel on the left side (to match movies). We also ended up adding shoulderpads and sleeveheads to get the sleeves to look right. And because I wanted this to look just like the original, we reseamed the right panel. It's not something you can see in the movies, but in some of the photos we had, it's there, so I had to put it in on mine (unless you really are that worried about being completely accurate, you can skip this step and save yourself a lot of headaches).

Now, I don't have photos of this process because most of it was done with my husband's, but I'll sum up by saying that we ended up tracing the original pattern onto brown paper, taping it all together to do the seamline modifications and cutting it to pieces again, putting together a muslin mockup, pinning fixes there, transferring those to paper patterns, redoing the muslin mockup, etc, etc, until we came up with one that worked. Then we made those same modifications to a paper pattern made off the pattern pieces of a smaller size and created my muslin. (Note: I don't know why the centers of the following photos have a green tinge to them. I apologize.)

I tried to label some of the changes on there for folks who might want to try this at home. This is the mockup of the jacket above the waist (no leg panels), laid out as if it were being worn. Note the added seam on the right side of the picture (left side of the jacket if you had it on). Also note the pocket seams labelled. Let me tell you about those...

There are several theories on doing the pockets. A very popular one is to cut the side pieces longer and then fold it up onto itself to create a pocket. I was worried that the heavier fabric we were using would cause too much bulk there, so I decided to do in-seam pockets out of the lining fabric. We really should have done them out of the main fabric as you can see the color change if the pocket gaps - one of the things I'll change on mine. I'll probably still do them as in-seam, though. Although probably cut-on.

Here's the same shot with the overpanel laid back so you can see the craziness we indulged in. (This is that step you can skip if you want to save yourself the frustration.) Now, it's perfectly allowable to do this side as a long piece folded up on itself for the pocket. However, I had found a photo that showed one of the original movie IOs with the overpanel flipped back, and they'd done this side with this funky square inset piece. The seam for the pocket is at the top of the piece, and then you've got a seam that runs down under the overpanel, but that doesn't go all the way to the shoulder. When you put this piece in, you have to do an inset corner, which has to be one of the most annoyingly finicky techniques ever. *sigh*



And just for all those folks who may want to try this, here are a couple of photos with the muslin turned inside out (it's easier to see where the seams are).

This is the same lay-out as the first mock-up photo, only inside out, so it closes the opposite way.

And here's the second photo, inside out, showing the seams on that funky square inset piece a little better.




There are still several things I need to do to this to make it fit me and look good. The first is to shift the long seam on the overpanel piece in about 1 1/2 inches. I will also probably tweak the long seams a bit to account for the fact that men and women are not shaped the same (in-seam darts? who knows!).






The good news about working in brown paper and muslin is that you're not so worried about staining them should the red wine spill. So indulge in some nice Languedoc or Provencal reds if you're pattern-mod'ing with paper!

Happy sewing!

Project the Third, in which my dreams are crushed.

So, apparently my offerings to the sewing gods were deemed inadequate. While the bodice of the Enchantress costume fit beautifully, something went wrong with the skirt. There were many theories as to what exactly happened:

1) Water retention caused by the sustained crazy heat we've had here lately;

2) Something hinky with the pattern itself (supporting evidence: the skirt was cut from the same pattern and same size as the bodice, so in theory it should have all fit together);

or, my personal belief:

3) I have a big ole butt.

Anyway, there is a photo to prove that I actually did try it on. :)

I apologize for the jeans underneath. I hadn't put the leggings on yet, and trust me, no one wants to see my pudgy legs!

There is about a 1-2" gap at the back of the skirt. In this photo, it's held on by sheer will power. The bustled back part of skirt looked pretty good when we tried it, but there's no photo as it was held on by wishes, dreams and more safety pins than you can shake a stick at.

I'll also note that the room we were doing all this in was west-facing and it was *very* hot. Not too long after we'd tried the full skirt on, I ended up kneeling on the floor trying to stop the world from spinning. My first fit of the vapours. I do declare!




The current idea to fix this is an extra panel across the back to span the gap. However, a good friend of mine suggested (as I was standing there holding back the tears of frustration) that I put this in a corner for a while and work on something else. Think I'll take her up on that. (My first thoughts tended much more towards mad capering around a large bonfire, but we have a burn ban on.)

Needless to say, there was much wine after this little setback. There was a Hook & Ladder Chardonnay that my friends had found. It was pretty tasty - not heavily oaked and some nice fruit. Lighter than a typical Chard and quite good for the really hot afternoon it was. The second wine was a 2011 Charles & Charles Rosé (another tasting bar find). One of the Charles's involved is the Charles Smith who does Kung Fu Girl Riesling, which is a favorite among our friends. The Charles & Charles is a 100% Syrah rosé and it is quite yummy.

Happy sewing!

Project the Third: Skirt!

What I learned this weekend:

1) Those little clips are a godsend for satin. Seriously.
2) The mantra for sewing satin is, as a former roommate of mine in Edinburgh was fond of saying, "softly, softly, catchy monkey."
3) French seams ... I loathe French seams. Whoever dreamed up a system where you sew the seams backwards?! Do. Not. Want.
4) Bustled skirts do not look good in photos if they are laid out flat. (Which is by way of an apology for the photos to come.)

OK, the design concept for the Steampunk Enchantress was a saloon girl look. So the skirt is bustled up short in the front and hangs long in the back. To carry through the fringed skirt she has in some comic book depictions, we decided to fringe both the base of the bodice and the lower hem of the front of the skirt.

[As a side note, I attended a panel once where the conversation turned to how to steampunk non-steampunk characters (like Boba Fett or Princess Leia, for example. The advice given was to determine the defining characteristics of your character (like Princess Leia's buns and white dress), make sure those were in your costume design so folks would have a visual reference, and then have fun with the rest. Best advice ever. :) ]

Alright, so back to this weekend's skirt-making adventures. Got a late start on Saturday due to the prologue of the Tour de France (yes, I'm a cycling fan!), so didn't really start sewing until the afternoon. Over the next 5 hours before I was called away to play WoW (oh! the sacrifice!), I managed to get this done:

I'm afraid I got on a roll and forgot to take "in
progress" photos. So all I've really got are
"done" photos. Sorry! I'll try to do better.


That's the apron, or front of the skirt. Entirely too much handsewing and gathering in this skirt, by the way. And, yes, I totally forgot I had a gathering foot for my machine!

Must. Remember. All. Tools.

The light green at the top is a grosgrain ribbon used for the waistband. It'll be covered by the bodice once the whole thing is sewn together. At least I hope it will, because it's really, really ugly with all the random things stitched to it. Around the back are snaps and skirt hooks and all kinds of rigging. It ended up being a lot more time-consuming than I'd thought. Ah well.

Sunday, I started again on the back of the skirt which is a series of layered, semi-bustled poofs with a straighter train at the bottom.  It was pretty straight-forward apart from the hated and loathed French seams, but those were enough to make me grumpy for most of the morning. Especially when I had to take one out right across the back of the skirt after I'd already trimmed it down. Going all Hulk Smash! on the world became a serious option for several minutes. But anyway, there's the skirt at right with the apron laying on top of the back (yes, for reasons unknown to me, Simplicity opted to make the skirt two separate pieces). The white you can see at the edges are twill tape ties that bustle up the back part of the skirt. Not sure how I'm going to hide those in wearing, but I'll figure something out, I'm sure. :) Time here: 3 1/2 - 4 hours.

And below is the back of the skirt.

Again, sorry about the fact that these just look like piles of material. Apparently one needs a dressform or a live model to make bustled skirts look good!

The plan is to try all this on in the near future, so hopefully there will be "live model" photos to post soon. Yes, I've not actually tried it all on since the initial fitting of the bodice interlining way back at the beginning (my "fitting assistant" has been on vacation :).


Yes, I'm doing a lot of praying to the sewing gods. :) 





This weekend's drink of choice is a bit different and owes something to our family's custom of "drinking the Tour". When the Tour de France is underway, the chosen beverage for the day relates to whatever part of France the Tour is currently passing through. Since they started this year in Belgium (and Belgium really doesn't make a whole lot of wine), we opted for the Belgian beer Saison Du Pont, which is a farmhouse ale and was pretty darn good (and I'm not really a beer drinker). Quite light and worked well for our highs-in-the-upper-90s temps. :)

Happy sewing!

Project the Third: Bodice, Assembled!

Sometimes you find motivation in the strangest of places. I can be terribly lazy at times, thinking to myself, "Hey, I got all those pieces cut out, it won't take me any time at all to sew it together. I can go play WoW (or watch this British mystery marathon, or whatever)." And we all know what happens then. Now, I go to lunch at the same place almost everyday. And there's a woman there I'd been talking to about this Steampunk Avengers project. Last week I find out she's moving away and she'd asked if it might be done so she could see photos before she leaves. And I thought to myself, "Hmm, dunno. I'll see what I can do!" So Tara, thanks for the motivation! :)

This weekend I sat down in my sewing area (which looks like this, by the way):

Yep, no large open areas here! That spot is just big enough for me to sit down in, and I sew with the machine peddle under my thigh. I know, I know ...

... with the piles of fabric I'd cut out a while ago...







 
... and I started sewing. Much, much basting. Much, much hand sewing (I will be a master at slip stitch when this is done). Many moments where the in-progress texts you are sending to your co-conspirators become a little strange (note: even though texts are all about brevity, under no circumstances shorten the update that you are putting all the boning into the bodice of your costume to "boning the Enchantress" ... that's just wrong.)

By Saturday night, I had this:

That gives you a pretty good idea of the size of my sewing area. The bodice is laid out in the "well" where I sit. Yes, really. Anyway, that's the bodice all put together with those fantastic little clips holding the bias tape over the neckline edge that I'd still left to sew. This was about 7 hours work, I think. There are three layers in the bodice and a fair amount of sewn-in structure. You can see a piece of the boning by the small scissors at the top of the picture. By the way, those are titanium scissors that my husband gave me. He'd discovered them while working on his clone trooper. They so rock.

Anyway, so Sunday I got back to work. At this point all of the machine sewing I could do on this was done, and only the hand-work remained. Remember how much I hate hand sewing? Yeah, still hate it. But now I'm better at it! End of day Sunday:

I have it laid open here (ie, the zipper and neck tie at the back aren't closed) because I was working on the fringe. In some of the depictions of the Enchantress, she has this long fringe skirt, so we opted in this costume design to fringe the bottom of the bodice and also to fringe the bottom of the front of the skirt. This was probably another 4 hours of work or so, then my fingers got really mad at me and rather insisted that I stop sewing.

Anyway, on Monday, the gloves I'd ordered showed up. :)
 

Yeah, I know it's not exactly the same shade, but you know what, I'm good with that. They aren't the same shade in most of the drawings of her either!














And that's the update. :) I still hate hand sewing, and I really suck at zippers (yes, I'll admit it), but the bodice is together! And now my co-conspirator (that would be "Scarlet Witch") is back from her vacation, so hopefully I'll soon get an opportunity to make sure it all still fits (luckily, it's worn over a corset, so there's a secondary fitting mechanism that does not involve, hopefully, my taking this thing apart again).

No wine recommendation, I'm afraid. It was terrifically hot here this weekend, and my sewing spot is right by a window, so I was pretty much on ice water and the occasional Diet Dr. Pepper all weekend. Besides, handsewing needles + titanium scissors + alcohol = much blood. :) Safe sewing, people!

The Hat, Con't.

And here's an update on the hat. :) I was horribly lazy and didn't work on it at all over the weekend, so this is really "the hat through Friday", but meh, that's just how it is.

This particular construction method has you leave the brim piece as a complete circle (ie, not cut out like a doughnut) for covering. So here's the fabric stretched across the underside of the brim (with the crown sitting on it for scale) ...

And here's the same shot with the fabric for the upper side clipped on. Nothing's sewn yet here. BTW, a note on those little clips all the way around the edge. I'd seen them in a sewing magazine and thought they might come in handy but hadn't managed to get hold of any until they showed up in my local sewing store just before this project took off. They absolutely paid for themselves with just this hat!

That said, they are a PitA to sew around - they love to grab the thread. But they are otherwise so terribly handy, I can work around that. :)


So here's the hat with the brim all sewn together.

There are spots where I didn't get the stitches quite right (see "well of fail"), but I remind myself that most of it will be covered by the netting and trimmings and brim shaping, and then I don't feel so bad. :)

Note that the pieces aren't actually sewn together in that photo, but that's roughly how it will look before all the aforementioned netting, trimmings and shaping.  I still need to cut the "head hole" out and stitch it up inside the crown piece - a process for which I finally procured some curved milliners' needles (which, btw, I should have recommended way back in the beginning - ah well!).

As a random sidenote, in case you too are comic-book-challenged, here's the Enchantress:

This is the photo I received randomly on my phone during lunch one day with the appended note: "How about her?" From such small things do such mighty projects spring!

(Good Lord, wherever will I find a wig with that much poof!)







Happy sewing!

The hat, day 3.

Well, I've learned a fair few things from this project so far. :) The most important one being that satin, due to that beautiful sheen we covet it for, will "reflect" anything and everything that's underneath it, including the stitches of your frame wiring efforts. Ah well, guess that's why we have trimmings, yes?

So on to the photos.

Here's the frame completely wired and stitched together. Now here's where I kinda messed up. See, I failed to check the diameter of the opening at the top of the crown when I pinned the back seam, so when I went to stitch the top piece in, there was a gap. Not a huge gap, but a gap nonetheless. So, we fall back on the "they won't see it when it's done" doctrine and sew it in with slightly looser stitches, so it holds, but it's tied down like a trampoline. 

Important note here: neither buckram nor wire will stretch, but you can use them as bracing for taut, but open, stitches. :) In the end, it looked like the picture to the right (that's a quarter for scale). Ah well, not perfect, but it will do. The second important note: hats don't usually require the rugged construction of clothing - they just don't get that much stress, so you can get away with things that you can't with clothes.

Remember that, and it will save you much sanity. :)

Next up, start covering with fabric:

Here's the top piece of the satin pinned loosely over the top of the hat. I decided I would just tack it in a few places and then smooth the fabric out as I stitched around the edge.

And here's the top all stitched down. I went around the edge right up close to the top first, figuring that's all that was really needed. But satin is pretty stiff, and it stood away from the frame a bit when I'd finished, so I opted to take some extra time and do a second row of stitching right above the bottom edge of the fabric with the idea that that would keep it from bunching up under the fabric on the crown (it kinda did).

Then I pinned the crown fabric all the way around. You can see just below the top what I meant about satin "reflecting" what lies beneath it - the bumps are from the stitched-down top piece. *sigh* If I were to do this again, I'd probably a) not use satin, and b) line the frame first with something like light flannel to cut down on the framework showing through to the outside (you're really suppose to do that - I'm totally lazy).

And finally, the covered crown (yay!!!). Here's my admission for the day: for all that I love making hats, hand sewing is my personal well of fail. So anything that requires "small, neat stitches" as this does tends to make me giggle nervously and go looking for the nearest bottle of cider (random side note: if there's anything I've learned from hours of dungeon-healing on WoW, it's that cider is the best calming agent ever invented. True story). You're seeing the pretty side of the sewing here. The other side is .... not.

So, the growing list of rules for hatmaking:

1) Patience, grasshopper.

2) The "they won't see it when it's done" doctrine: if it won't show when the hat is done and you need to do it, do it, even if it's ugly. :)

Up next, finishing the bottom edge of the crown, covering and adding the brim. Then ... trimming! :)

(I wonder if there's a cold cider in the fridge.)