1918 Dress Wrap Up

So many things have been going on in RL but most of all, I finished the 1918 dress and to be honest I feel a little let down. I finished 2 projects in one week….the 1931 dress and the 1918 dress. My motivation is gone out the door and I am not sure why. Has this happened to anyone else?


I wanted to get pictures of me in the 1918 dress over the weekend. Alas, it was not to be.

So…..I am not yet sharing the completed dress…..well maybe a peek at an almost complete stage.

Some info: I couldn’t decide how to attach the “waist” to the skirt. My 1917 dressmaking book came in handy and gave me a couple of ideas. I went with a double waistband knowing that I would be covering the waist band with a sash. I also discovered that the skirt was a tad too long. So I hacked off a couple of inches from the top of the skirt….couldnt take it from the bottom! I then used these pieces as the waistband. It worked out fine. I am glad I did not go with the casing for elastic: I really do not like elastic waistbands.

A snafu arose when it came time to do the button holes. I have never made button holes on my machine before and to say I was underwhelmed by the results would not be exaggerating. The automatic buttonhole foot made ½ of a great button hole. One side was fine, the other was spotty, no real thread coverage if that makes sense.

So….what to do? I tried the machine in a variety of ways but could not find my manual buttonhole foot…so that was out. I tried a corded buttonhole with the automatic foot….not great. I could do the buttonholes by hand, but after approximately 28 hours of hand sewing on this dress….not going to happen!

Finally, I gave in and used the automatic foot. To fill in the blank spaces, I did a hand satin stitch on the side with the holes. It was quick, down and dirty but will fine results. All in all, it took less than an hour with the handsewing. The buttons then went on with no problem. The top 2 buttons are fakes though…I didn’t want to make a button hole through the trim so I used a snap beneath the button. I like it!

The sash uses snaps to keep it closed. Again, really simple to construct.