Phase 1- Prep Squad

You have the perfect design and you've scoured the internet for your pattern. You've gathered the extras, procured a dress form, and enlisted your helpers. You're officially itching to start stitching (terrible puns are sure to be plentiful throughout this whole blog... You're welcome and I'm sorry...)! 

Before you can start stitching though there are a couple more things to complete in Phase 1. 

Take your Measurements
Nancy recommended measuring me in quarters just in case my body is not perfectly symmetrical. If you assume you are symmetrical and turn out to be delusional then your seams may fall in weird places and you'll get a weird fit.

Here are the measurements you should take:

• Right and Left Breast
• Right and Left Hip
• Top of the Shoulder to the floor
• Hip to floor
• Torso Measurement- back of the neck down to the hipline

To take your measurements, you'll want to measure from the side through to the fullest part of the hip or breast to get the best fit. For the breast measurements, begin at the top of your ribs and measure out to the fullest part of your breast. Repeat for the other side. For the hip, start at the fullest part of your hip and measure out to the fullest part of your belly/pelvis.

NOTE: Do not associate these numbers with your self worth. These numbers are simply tools to help you build your dress. They are NOT a statement of your beauty, self worth, or how you should feel about yourself. If you want a different body to work with, start years in advance and work at it. For me, my weight loss journey started in 2013 and actually taught me a lot about how to love myself and how to be a better partner to the man who stuck by me through all the different phases my body has gone through. He's made me feel beautiful and sexy at all stages and I love him for that. I love him for so much but how he supported me to help me get to my goals was one of the reasons I knew we were going to grow old together.

The design of my dress doesn't have much of a train but it does go all the way to the ground so my measurements reflect that. The "shoulder and hip to the floor" measurements are meant to confirm a ballpark of where the hem should fall. If you're making a shorter dress or a longer train you can alter the floor measurements to where you want the hem to land. I recommend cutting your material longer than you will want the hem to fall just so you have plenty to work with. Once the dress is further along I'll have a better idea of how to explain how the whole bottom comes together. Right now these are my "conceptual" measurements.

Make Friends with Your Dress Form
The form I'm using allows for adjustments so that you can set the form to your size. I have to give Gwen a big thank you again for letting us borrow this form because it really is ideal for this project. She is awesome and an honorary fairy-godmother to this wedding and I am so grateful to her for her willingness to help.

If yours isn't adjustable, you'll have to get a form that is already set to your size. I would assume that it can be done without specific sizing and using the pattern as a guide but I don't recommend this because it introduces a great opportunity for things to go off the rails. This is your wedding dress after all so it is worth the time and effort to get a form that is accurate to your body size.


 
Introduce your Pattern to your Form
I took a day at work and cut out pieces on my lunch break. It was very easy but the paper is super thin and tears easily. Patience is key to this but if you don't feel like scissors have ever been your friend I recommend getting a very very sharp Exacto knife and foam-core board. This is essentially allow you to lay the pattern on the foam board and tracing the pieces to cut out.

Once all the pieces are cut out, I recommend keeping the extra paper so you can sketch out other things you'll add to the dress. In my case I'm using some of the extra to draw out the pattern of how the leafy vines will crawl up the dress. Also, if you make a mistake having all the extra handy to repair it will help keep this project stress-free.

Once the pattern is pinned onto the dress you can make any needed adjustments. For example, the pattern I got had "Petite" on it and we were worried that we were going to have to do some splicing to get it to be the right torso length. This would have been so much easier once the form had the pieces pinned to them. We ended up not needing to do this because the pattern had fold lines on where to adjust if I were petite... I am, in fact, not petite... not even a little.


PHASE 1 COMPLETE! BOOM GOES THE DYNAMITE!

Phase 2 promises to bring some cutting of the material or at least tracing of the pattern onto the material and then SEWING BEGINS!!!! Stay tuned :)

<3 The Future Mrs. Luce
Week 3