1946 Wool Dress

Remember my plans for a Winter Wool Wardrobe?  Well, I never blogged about it, but I did finish one dress!

I don't have any good in-progress photos, since for some reason the only things I felt worth photographing were the way I graded up one size from the largest one on the pattern, and the different methods I used to mark all the various dots for darts and pleats and such.  Oh, and this:

I was amused that a typo (that pattern piece is supposed to be for a belt) got translated into four other languages.  :p

Anyway, without further ado, here is the finished dress!

Oh yeah.  I've got mad mirror-selfie skills.

This look is one way the dress can be accessorized - with a navy velvet ribbon belt (I haven't actually made the self-fabric belt yet, though it is cut out), brown tights and my navy blue heels with the fun sparkly shoe clips.  

I wore it this way once or twice in February and March, and then it got too warm in Virginia to wear it much anymore.  It's a nice transition dress, but not great for Virginia summers.

However, I did have my cousin Jason's wedding to attend in June in Colorado.  It was an outdoor wedding, and since the mountains get cool very quickly once the sun goes down, I thought it was time to bring it out again!

I tried to get some shots of me and the mountains, but either I was backlit or the mountains got washed out in most of the photos.  C'est la vie.

I wore my blue straw hat (also seen here), my gorgeous aquamarine necklace and earrings from Dames a la Mode, the same velvet ribbon belt, navy tights this time, and my brown Claremonts:

They may be my favorite shoes of all time.  

I am very pleased with the dress, and will likely make another from this pattern someday.  I would have liked to have given this one long sleeves, but I used nearly every square inch of my fabric and these were the longest sleeves I could get.  Still classy, though.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention that, thanks to this dress, I now have a favorite lining fabric!  It's the Ambiance Bemberg rayon lining found at JoAnn's, and it is fantastic!  Not only does it feel nice against the skin, but it does not get static cling!  If anything, it clings to the dress fabric.  I even tested it out when I washed it before cutting out the dress, sending it through the dryer, and no static!  I was amazed.  I'm going to buy it for all of my wool dresses from now on.