Light Madder GFD

I needed another long-sleeve gothic fitted dress (GFD) to fill out my 14th century capsule wardrobe. After working with a lot of wool recently, I wanted to go back to linen because I live in a swamp. But I was loathe to give up the comfort and flexibility of twill, so I found some beautiful (and expensive) linen twill from Style Maker Fabrics and set to work. 

The Process:

I used the same bust-supportive GFD pattern that's been working for me since 2019 and set to work squeazing a long-sleeve GFD out of 4 yards of fabric (it turns out this is JUST enough). I sewed the body pieces together and faced the front edge with bias cut silk in order to support the lacing eyelets. The only real way to check the fit is to lace the dress, so I measured out my eyelet holes and used an awl to open them. I used a temporary cord for my fittings. 

One fun fact about linen is that is relaxes and stretches out as it warm up to your body temperature. This is part of what makes it so comfortable to wear. I knew twill weaves have more stretch than tabby so I was excited to so how smoothly this linen would stretch over my body. What I didn't anticipate, was just HOW MUCH the twill linen would stretch and relax. I ened up having to take almost 2 inches out of the seams to get it back to form fitting and supportive. 

Next up! The sleeves. I had a sleeve pattern I thought I liked, but after cutting them out and putting one on the dress, I knew something wasn't quite right. 

The original pattern, which you can see in the white tracing paper in the middle image above, had a nearly flat armscye (top edge). I had previously found that the extra material under the arm helped give me more room to lift my arms above my head. However, you can see in the rightmost picture above, that the flatter pattern (in the red linen) pulls the seam off my shoulder. So I went back to the drawing board and redrafted the top edge of my arm pattern to a more traditional "S" shape and tested it out with some scrap linen. You can see in the right picture above how much better that shoulder stays up. 

So I moved ahead with the new sleeve pattern and went about the arm and neck facings. I also began hand finishing seams in the torso of the dress to prevent fraying (the side seams, armscyes, sleeves, etc.) 

Then it was on to the rythmic and repetitive task of finishing the eyelets with whip stitches, cutting and finishing the button holes, and attaching the buttons. 

At this point, I was at Pennsic, a two week SCA camping event, and had to do the final seam finishes and hem on site. But I did finish teh dress in time to wear it at the event!