Purple Velvet Cocktail Dress

I had just over 1m of purple velvet left over from my Vintage Not-So-Fancy ball gown from a few months ago and decided it was time to put it to use. Originally, I'd planned to just do a pencil skirt, which I made using a vintage pattern I'd found in a charity shop a while back, New Look 6158.

The skirt needed a bit of taking in at the sides, but other than that there wasn't much to report in the construction process. Forgive the terrible photo - my room does not get great light, but you get the general idea.

Once it was completely finished, I decided that actually, I did have enough leftover fabric to make a bodice, and I'd be more likely to wear the dress than a skirt. Which was slightly annoying timing as I'd spent a fair while on getting the waistband and zip just right, and now they needed to be unpicked...but never mind.

I then played around with my fabric scraps, trying to get a general concept of how I wanted the bodice.

I was too scared to cut anything out, in case I ruined it irreparably, so my finished drape product requires a little imagination to see how that could become a dress. It did give me sufficient inspiration to work off though, and after a bit of sketching, this was my finished design:

As you can see in the draped version, I had originally liked the idea of an over the shoulder sash type thing, but I thought that might over-complicate it. So the final design was to have sweetheart neckline, pleated cummerbund style belt wrapping around 3/4 of the waist, with one half of the bodice being pleated and the other half being simpler, with a dart making way for a drape that continues below the belt.

I made up the lining of the bodice first, using leftover purple satin lining and a self drafted pattern that was used for a project yet to be written up, and attached plastic boning to the seams.

Then I started round 2 of draping - now I knew where I wanted the design lines to go, it was time to work out all the pleats etc.

That done, I sewed the dart, measured out the pleats precisely and tacked them down, then sewed all the bodice together. I forgot to mention, the back was just plain, so cut in the same style as the lining back. I attached the outer to the lining, then attached the bodice to the skirt, skipping out the draped section, which was then hand sewn into place over-top afterwards.

Then I pinned the belt in place, stretching it slightly as I went, so that it wouldn't end up making the waist look bigger. I blind stitched this on by hand, attached the zip, and boom, I had a new dress! Photos to come soon :)