Princess Project - Girl #3 Finished! Pic heavy

Third girl is complete! I spent all afternoon sewing up the backs and sewing snaps on all the remaining pieces. I'm so excited!

These dresses are for the Lady Ophelia. She is the most practical of the 3, so I went for more lines for her's in the designs to go with her more serious nature. Her color theme is browns and creams. I believe her dresses ended up being my favorites of the 3, although Annmarie's blue Sunday Best vies for that place as well.

First up, we have her Summer Dress. This one is a mix of cream silk and a lovely brown linen. There is ribbon detailing around the square neckline, the front and back of the over skirt, as well as the sleeves.

Up next is her glorious Sunday Best. The brown silk was hand dyed. The sleeves alone on this dress took me a couple of hours to make, and oh was it worth it! I love this dress very much. :D The belt is made of some pretty gold and white trim.

And last but never least is her Ball Gown. I love this one too! The silk is all hand dyed. There is a lot of bead work on the shoulders, and down the front of this dress. The underskirt is has machine sewn stripes down front. 

All done! I'm going to take it to the PO on Monday to get it weighed. I can't wait to get it all boxed up! I have everything neatly bagged up, ready to be packaged. :)

Princess Project - Girl #2 finished!!! PIC HEAVY

Following the world's most frustrating photo shoot, I have gotten pics of the completed Crown Princess's wardrobe. These belong to AnnMarie - the elegant dreamer, who has a love for embroidery. In designing her dresses, I wanted to include one dress that featured embroidery, and go with an airy more fairy tale look. Her colors were pastel blues and mints/greens.

For some reason, while taking these pics, my doll would NOT stand. I think he might be protesting the many hours he has spent playing princess while helping me with this project. I owe him big time, lol, but he needs to hold out just  a little longer! In reality, I need to restring him. He is the kickiest, falling-est little guy. I have to carefully adjust his legs under the dress to get him to stand, and in adjusting the dresses I would either knock him over, or he would just crumple. For that reason, I don't think these pics turned out quite as good as my last ones, but hopefully, they still show the dresses off well.

Okay, enough complaining, lol! On to the pics!


This girl being the crown princess, needed a crown. I sculpted it out of polymer clay, then painted it. I will seal it before I send it. She wears it with a wimple, which was made out of cotton due to the necessity of providing the right hang. Silk would have been pretty, but too stiff. The veil is a panel lace.

First off, the one I am the most proud of I think out of all the dresses, Annmarie's Sunday Best. This one has the embroidery in 2 places. I went with several different colors for the flowers - a very white blue, a purple, and then for a pop of color, a deep red.

 I initially had designed the sleeves to be sewn onto the dress like some of my other ones, but once I started drafting the pattern, I realized it would hide too much of the dress, so I changed it to these detached sleeves that snap close. This dress has a lovely 3 layers that have an elegant train in the back. The dress silk is hand dyed, the corset was a store bought silk.

Next up, we have her Summer Dress. This one is made out of a mint chiffon. I sewed some white trim on the bottom of the skirt which matches the belt, which is attached to the dress in the front.

Last, but never least, is her beautiful Ball Gown. The silks were both hand dyed. The underskirt is in a spearmint, the over dress is a mix of spearmint and pistachio. I love the shade! I cut out pieces of lace to sew on the front center of the skirt and the bodice. Onto that, I sewed some dark mint colored seed beads. These also line the bottom edge of the underskirt. The sides and back of the skirt feature little puffs created by tiny pin tucks. I don't think I captured it very well....

And that finishes up girl #2! Next up, girl number 3! 

Princess Project Update - Girl #1 is finished!! PIC HEAVY

I am so excited to have one third of this completely done sans snaps for the backs. These 3 dresses are for Marianna, a Zuzu Delf Bichon Iron Fan LE. She is the younger princess, much more playful, and would rather be outside playing with her animal friends. My designs were really influenced by this as it has to fit her character. Her dresses are simpler than her sister's for this reason. Her favorite colors are pink, so we went with that for her theme. I did venture out a bit with the ball gown, opting for white and almost an orchid color for a little more variety. Her head dress I just finished today. I just did the final photo shoot for her beautiful dresses before I get them packed up to go to their rightful owner.

First off, the head dress. It is made out of silk and decorated with a lovely ribbon. I was lucky to have already found this in my stash after organizing a couple of weekends ago. I needed something that tied in with all of her dresses. This works perfect!

This next one is her Sunday Best. The silk is hand dyed. It has some little pearly white beads at the neck line.

This is her ball gown. It has quite a few beads. The orchid silk is hand dyed. I had fun mixing my dyes to come up with this gorgeous color.

The final one is her Summer dress. Silk is hand dyed as well.

I will be updated this blog with the other 2 girls finished clothing as soon as I get them photographed. :)

Princess Coiffe finished....

So, one head dress done out of three! Yay! I had gotten all the gold trim sewn on before Christmas, and let it sit until today to figure out exactly how to go about finishing it. It's like that for me when I have never sewn something before. I have to let it sit until a clear direction of going about it crystallizes in my head. The perks of being self taught, I guess. I have to figure things out, and whether or not I am doing it the "right way" as long as it turns out looking good and finished neatly, I just go with it.

I had initially planned to gather the bottom edge like human sized coiffes are finished, but for this size, that did not work. I pleated it with tiny pleats instead, and the hang was much better. I ended up finishing the inside with a facing, which did 2 things: hid the raw edges, and also gave it a better form for fitting the head. The top part of the coiffe I finished with a cream silk. I really am pleased with it. I had planned to add bead detailing, but I think I had better omit that on the white part of it before I make it too busy. I might add it to the cream though as I think it could use a little something more. After I got it finished, I held it up to all three of the dresses it is meant to go with to see how they all look together. They look great!. Its enthralling to see it all come together. :D Later on when the lighting is better I will do a nice photo session with the coiffe with each dress.

Making Medieval Head Dresses for the Princess Project

This has been one LONG and complicated project. 9 dresses, and 3 head dresses. Head dresses should technically be easier than elegant dresses, but this is me we are talking about, and as I am not really used to doing  much head wear, I am struggling just a bit. I just dyed the final 2 pieces of silk for the final ball gown, and while the fabric is soaking (it takes a really long time to wash out the loose pigment when the dye is really dark. I find soaking saves the hands.) I am working on the pattern for the coiffe.

This is the intended look:

http://www.echoppemedievale.com/upload/photos/femmes/coiffes/coiffe_medievale_moyen_age_i.jpg

I love it. I plan to do the end in cream silk, the rest of the fabric will be white cotton (way easier to work with for tiny things than silk.) I have bought some thin gold trim to give it a lattice effect, and some tiny brown seed beads to go where the gold trim crosses. Since the doll has magnetized removable ears, I will need to leave off the beads where the ears stick on.

The pattern should be simple enough. I did my first draft a little earlier today, and we're not quite there yet. I've been looking for some coiffe tutorials, and while I found one, it wasn't very helpful as it was a different style of coiffe than the example above.

Here is my first attempt. The gathering needs to extend further, and the basic shape is off, but it's a start.