Chapter Two- Arwen Blood Red dress, part 2: the under dress

So, the underdress. This process took quite a bit longer than the overdress, understandably because of all the extra add-ons and the hand sewing that I did on parts of it, including ripping and resewing seams that just weren't working for me. It was a fun experience, though, and I learned quite a bit from it. So here's what I did.

I was missing one important part for the undergarment- the bodice fabric! I had originally thought I was going to use the navy china silk I ended up using to line the top dress- however after thinking through the process, I came to the realization that lightweight of a fabric would not hold up the heavy lined velvet sleeves I was going to add on later. So I found this lovely crushed velvet panne at JoAnns- on sale, even! It had a side to side stretch, which was my only concern, but since the velvet backed neckline and upper sleeves would be the main support for the dress, I didn't worry too much. My only other concern was that panne is a pain in the neck to sew, pin, or anything. It crawls like none other. Lucky for me, sewing a little more slowly and taking extra time on it paid off, and I didn't have to deal with too much grief while making this part of it.

Kitty approves of this project, as long as she gets to keep the plastic bags.

So, after cutting and sewing the bodice according to the pattern, I toyed around with ideas for the sleeves.

Looking at this picture of the pattern (It's not very high res), you can sort of see that the sleeves aren't nearly as full as the original dress (refer to the photo in chapter 1 of my progress!). I wanted the full, deep sleeves that would fall to darn near ankle length if I had my hands at my sides. So, I checked around and scouted for other BR dress tutorials to see what others did. The best suggestion that I ended up using came from www.alleycatscratch.com (which is an AMAZING costuming reference site- these people know pretty much everything about sewing!), where they basically used two quarter circles sewn together top and bottom for the sleeve (It's rumored, apparently, that the sleeve could possibly be a full circle, but I didn't do this because 1)with as thick as my velvet was, my sleeves wouldn't hang right, and 2) I only had just enough fabric to do the two sleeves and the neckline and upper sleeves). So, I got my muslin out, made a makeshift drafting compass, and created my own mock-up pattern.

Mock up of my sleeve on the velvet. It's a perfect quarter circle.

After I cut the sleeves, neckline, and upper sleeves out of the velvet, I set my sleeves aside for later, since I didn't have my lining material yet. I cut interfacing, fused it to the velvet, and then I got out my used sari.

Sorry, sari! You're going to be reincarnated as a costume!

I tried to be super careful in cutting the sari fabric, since it's absolutely stunning, and there's so much of it. I'm sure at some point I can cut that beautiful gold border off and use it in another project... and there's even enough of the patterned area left over that it might come in handy for something small as well. Sari overlay then got basted to the neckline, and three layers of velvet (gulp!) and a layer of panne got sewn together. Honestly, I debated going back and using a different fabric for at least the outer part of the neckline. When I first tried the dress on after I got the neck edging sewn on, it honestly felt like I was wearing shoulder pads because of the thick fabric. I may still go back and change it someday, but for now, I've come to terms with it. After I hand-stitched the neck outside and in to the panne, it didn't look half bad, either. 

Hand sewing neck overlays down

I ended up spending quite a bit of time, actually, tearing out and redoing the zipper edges of the neckline. I think with three layers of velvet, fabric started sliding. All I know for sure is, when I went to put the zipper in, the edges didn't match up. I think I spent the better part of a day tearing out the zipper and reinstalling before I thought of pulling the neckline edges out and sewing them in again (believe me- if you can avoid ripping stitches out of panne, I'd recommend it. It's a nightmare, especially if you've done a good job at color-matching your thread. Also, panne rips VERY easily.). Finally, I got it right, and finished hand-sewing the entire neckline down. Whew. 

I went ahead and attached the upper sleeves to the dress, since I didn't have the lining for the lower sleeves yet. 

Almost too pretty to cut! Almost!

For the sleeves, I'd been eyeing this really lovely garnet colored Dupioni silk that had the same blackish undertones as the blood-red velvet for the outer sleeves. So, I made another trip to JoAnn's (I think I must be their favorite customer this month), coupon in hand, and got four yards of my lovely lining for a steal.

Four cut-outs of my mock up later, I had my sleeve lining. I did a basic bag lining with the velvet, and attached the whole thing to the upper sleeves. 

Just can't get over this fabric! Too bad it almost never gets seen! :(

After attaching the sleeves, I hand sewed the trim to some leftover silk as a backing, which, unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures of :( I spent the better part of a day hand-sewing the trim to the backing, and then several hours more hand-sewing the trim to the sleeves of the dress, at the seam where the upper and lower sleeves met. I had toyed with the idea of sewing the beaded trim at the neckline of the dress as well, since the original dress had the same trim around the neck as the upper sleeves, but I wasn't entirely sure how I was going to do that at the time. Perhaps, later on, when I change out the velvet for a lighter fabric, I'll put the trim in, instead of the sari overlay. 

The finished trim, hand-sewn to silk, and then hand-sewn to the dress itself. It adds a nice finishing feel, does it not?

It felt like MILES of hem on both dresses- 6.5+ yards used for each bodice!

So really, all that was left to do as far as major things go, was to hem the under and overdress, and to put the overlay binding around the neckline of the overdress. 

For the trim on the overdress, I made about an inch border around the entire thing. Looking at the official photos, I'm guessing that the velvet on the underdress tapers off completely just before the shoulders, and the trim is the only fabric holding the dress up. However, that's only my opinion, and not even a professional one at that. However, I knew my sheer net wasn't going to hold up that much heavy velvet, so I pulled the trim as close to the edge as I could as I got closer to the top of the shoulders. 

Once I finished the trim on the overdress, I had one last major thing planned. I put some snaps on the underside of the train on the overdress, and put the other half on the inside of the dress, as sort of a lazy-man's bustle. It's not super fancy, but if I don't want to drag my dress in the dirt, I can just snap it up real fast, and not have to worry about it. 

So, that's really about it, as far as the dress goes! I still haven't 100% decided about the pocket on the overdress (I'll have to change out the zipper if I do- cream doesn't exactly hide well in the deep blue of the velvet!), but I'm quite happy with the results!

Spoiler alert!! Finished photos ahead!

So... do you want to see the final product??

My wonderful photographer hubby decided to play around with a little longer exposure to accurately show the colors of all the fabrics.

Latex ear tips- no elves were harmed in
the making of this product!

So, there it is! The final outcome of several months of planning, and about four weeks of work! I'm extremely satisfied with how everything came out, with only minimal changes to the original patterns. Now all that's left to find is a good pair of shoes to wear with the outfit!

An elvish princess isn't complete without her circlet!

So, in closing, it's probably a good thing that I don't do sewing projects of this caliber often, because I'll tell you what- once I got started on the overdress piece of this outfit, I literally couldn't stop thinking about finishing this dress until I finally put the last stitch in. It's kind of good in that way, because you're always on track with what you're doing, as opposed to tossing the project in the closet for a couple months, then pulling it out later on and wondering where on earth you left off. It's been a very rewarding experience for me, and I've enjoyed every minute of it.

Dress and cape, ready for The Hobbit!

Thank you so much for following me on my mini-adventure! It's one of hopefully many more to come! If you really enjoyed this, please feel free to subscribe, or leave me a comment!

Chapter One- Arwen Blood Red dress, part 1: the overdress

So finally, after a couple crazy non-stop weeks of being busy, I've had some free afternoons to start on the Arwen Blood Red dress I've been promising to work on. My plan is to recreate the dress for the upcoming LOTR movie in December: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. The idea being, to gather a large group of friends and fellow "LOTR-ers" and descend upon the theatre at the midnight premiere, costumed in the style of Middle Earth. Hence this project:

Lovely, isn't it? This was my favorite dress by far of Arwen's from the trilogy. Elegant style, striking colors and contrasts, and altogether feminine. I fell in love with the dress instantly, and it made its way quickly to the top of my "Make Someday" list. And with the perfect timing of the next three movies coming out, now was the time.

The materials:

Pattern:

 So there were two patterns I was torn between using for this dress. Simplicity #4940 has the entire dress made into one whole piece- jumper, sleeves, and all. But McCalls #4491 (Which, coincidentally, I originally picked up for the lower sleeve pattern) has this lovely jumper that could easily be made into the overdress, while using a modified version of the Simplicity pattern as the underdress, and crafting my own sleeves (Neither pattern had the mid-calf length sleeves that I wanted for my dress). So, I'll be using both patterns, and making both the underdress- full length minus the train- with the sleeves, and the jumper with the trim over all. If you aren't sure what I'm talking about, see the below picture.

You can kind of see here (hopefully!) that there's a sort of overdress (the blue dress with the vivid red trim) over all, with an underdress that has the sleeves, and a wide trim beaded border underneath. If you decided you didn't want to go through the hassle of making both items, Simplicity #4940 is the pattern for you. However if you, like me, are a glutton for punishment, and you like the way the two layers look, then you've come to the right place. Hopefully my experience through making this will help give you a better idea on how to go about that (or at the very least, what to avoid!)

Fabric:

This was the hardest part for me. I'm so picky when it comes to fabrics. I wanted it to be EXACTLY like the movie. Unfortunately, limited by money, availability, and time, I wasn't able to go exact. But I am quite happy with what I did end up with!

This red velvet I found at Denver Fabrics while shopping for my cloak material. I've had it sitting around in my closet for a few months now, waiting for the right fabrics for the rest of it. I think, honestly, this fabric is what finally inspired me to start on this dress. It was absolutely perfect. It's hard to tell in this photo, but from one angle, it's a deep shade of crimson, but from the other angle, it hints of black undertones. It's a lot darker than the official dress, but I loved the colors.

If you noticed in the official photos above, you'll notice that the upper sleeves (and the trim for the overdress) are made from a different material than the lower sleeves. After hunting around unsuccessfully for a red/gold paisley print to use, my wonderful sewing friend Chris (who, incidentally, is also making this dress for her daughter), suggested that I check on ebay for used sarees. Less than an hour later, I'd found both my contrast fabric AND my trim. Speaking of:

The trim especially, I was quite proud of. It's very intricate, with beads that resemble miniature spring coils. 

Sarees! Whooda thunk?

The only thing left to find was my main dress velvet! I was at a loss until I visited one of the larger JoAnn's in the area. They had 10 yards of this beautiful velvet. It wasn't quite as dark as I had originally planned for, but since I was going for a darker color on the lower sleeve, this color set it off quite well. With the flash, it looks much lighter than it is.

I also picked up several yards of a lovely dark blue china silk that was on sale for the lining on the overdress.

So, with all my materials in hand, all I needed was time to start my project!

The Overdress:

So for the overdress, I pretty well followed the pattern exactly (Using McCalls 4491, view A), all the way up to putting the lining in the dress. Here's where I deviated a little. 

The jumper pattern came out with a really high neckline, whereas the BR dress has a low neckline on the jumper, to better show the trim on the dress underneath. Also, the straps were a little too wide to add on a bias strip of my contrasting fabric later on. So, here's what I did. 

What I'm pointing to in the picture is the original seam. Standard distance, 5/8" in from the edge of the fabric. Now, what I'm about to tell you, I do not recommend doing. I took a risk, and gambled on my fabric, because I was being lazy. Lucky for me, it came out the way I wanted, but I would definitely do a mock-up next time instead and cut the fabric right the first time. I slid the fabric in under the foot and sewed another 5/8" in further, shrinking the straps quite a bit, and lowering the neckline. I did this all the way around the upper neckline, through the shoulders (the BR dress seems to have large loops for the arms- probably for moving all that fabric that's underneath around!), and on the upper back. I did not sew again over the back edge, since I was planning something different there.

The results?

Lucky me, it came out exactly how I wanted! It's still a bit higher on the neckline, but the straps are much more slim, and adding on the contrast fabric will make quite a difference.

Once I had determined that my gamble had paid off, I finished the straps according to the pattern, but instead of adding in a lace up back, I put in an invisible zipper. According to rumors, the original dress just slipped over the top of the underdress, with no way to open it up. Invisible zipper for me insured that it would look official, with the ability to get in and out of the dress more easily. I also added in a short invisible zipper in one of the side seams for the possibility of a pocket added in later (I haven't completely decided if I'm going to go that direction or not, but it would be nice to have a place to put money/tickets/credit cards and I.D. in, eyy?). 

So all that's left for the overdress is a hem, and then adding on a long bias strip of the contrasting fabric. I'm feeling a lot more confident about the rest of the dress, seeing as how easily this part of it came along! 

Will post more as I finish this part of the dress up. Meanwhile, here's a look at the elvish cape I'll be adding on top of the finished outfit!

Thanks for reading!