Need tips on sewing a formal garment

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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Wasn’t quite sure what subject line to use, but the gist is, I’ve volunteered my services to make two flower girl dresses for my brother’s June wedding. I’ve been sewing since 2004 and have made a few things here and there; curtains, several dresses for MiniWhatsit, and a pair of cargo jeans for Whatsit Jr. I do not consider myself anywhere near an expert seamstress, though. Not even intermediate, really. I can follow a pattern and make extremely minor adjustments, but that’s it.

I sent a list of available patterns to my soon-to-be-SIL for her to choose from; none of them have smocking or pleats or anything that would be outside my ability. But I could use advice or tips on how to create a garment that looks at least semi-professional and doesn’t have rough edges, so to speak. I don’t want people to look at these things and immediately think, “Oh, homemade.”

Advice, pointers to books I should read, or whatever else, all welcome.

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I am an experienced sewer.

(Eww, “sewer” looks the same in print as that tube the drain water goes down. . . .)

I was initially at a loss as to how to give advice in this medium. The one thing I have thought of is to recommend you use a fabric with a print, the larger the print the better. Solid color fabrics will show every little mistake. I also would not recommend using a stretch fabric. Keep the lines of the dresses very simple.

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Be very, very persnickety with your finishing. Iron seams immediately; clip curves; do all the little finishing touches that make the difference. Even a very, very simply constructed garment can look fabulous if it’s properly finished.

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What Mama T said. Invest in a good steam iron and a tailor’s ham. Finish your seam edges. Allow yourself more time than you think you will need and fit at every possible opportunity. If you finish well in advance of the wedding, fit again a few days before - my daughter put on about five pounds two weeks before her wedding and shoehorning her into a very tight bodice was an adventure. She was warned NOT to sneeze or risk the consequences :smiley: .

Keep it simple.

das Glas’

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My suggestion–make a practice dress. I’ve never sewn a formal garment, but my mother has made me two bridesmaid’s dresses, and one mother of the groom dress for herself. I believe she made one too small practice dress, one slightly too large practice dress, and one incomplete practice dress (that one was for herself).

Buy enough fabric in whatever satin-y shine-y fabric for your flower girl dresses to do some practice seams, etc., but also buy an appropriate amount of fabric to make a dress out of a cotton or other relatively inexpensive (but hopefully pretty), non-stretchy fabric. Then measure the future wearer, make the dress from the practice fabric. Check for fit problems or general weirdnesses, then make the dress again. If the practice dress is suitable, give it to the model for use as a dress. If not, keep it or give it to someone less picky.

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The #1 rule that has been drilled into me since I first sat at a sewing machine by my mother (who sewed my wedding gown, as well as countless other formal dresses for me and others) is that if you want the outside to look nice, make the inside look just as nice. This is where **Mama Tiger’s ** advice comes in handy. Take your time to cut pieces properly. Seam them carefully and accurately. Finish seams inside properly, or learn how to make french seams where applicable. Iron everything smoothly so that the dresses fall smoothly. Pay attention to the directions - use recommended fabrics, add interfacing where directed. Don’t take shortcuts.

Less experienced sewers would be wise to avoid fabrics that are difficult to work with such as organza, gabardine, and velvet (for example). Flower girl dresses should be pretty forgiving in terms of fit. For adult dresses where the fit of a bodice can make or break a garment, it’s not uncommon to make a practice bodice out of muslin first before slicing into the $22/yd special occasion fabric.

Size the dress to the wearer’s measurements - not to their usual clothing size. For some reason there is frequently a disconnect. I made a size 18 dress (that is the dress size that corresponded best with her measurements) for a woman who normally wore a 12 and it fit like a glove. (although I’m not seeing a lot of measurements listed in the children’s dresses - I’m starting my daughters’ Easter dresses - so in that case I just went by size)

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In my experience it’s the way that random lines of stitching show that announces, “…and the groom’s sister made the flower girls’ dresses…”

For example, when you’re required to do stay-stitching, say on a collar facing and the neckline, and then when you attach the collar, you don’t get the collar and neckline seams matched precisely, so you have bits of the stay-stitching peeking out. The way around this is to pin, and sew, the collar assembly together with insane patience.

Same thing for sewing the sleeve in the dress–do it very, very slowly, to make sure there’s no line of basting stitches or stay-stitching showing.

And the zipper of course has to be put in with the speed of glaciers flowing. I found that it helps not to sew over pins that are holding the zipper in place, because it leads to wiggly detours in the line of stitching–do like the books tell ya, and baste that sucker in there with obsessive attention to detail, and then sew it in there likewise, with all pins removed.

Any buttonholes need to be done with a buttonholer, not with the old zigzag-and-reverse-stitch technique. Borrow a buttonholer if your machine doesn’t have one.

Reverse stitching to lock in the stitching needs to be done with parsimony. If you’re in the habit of running the machine backwards and forwards “a whole bunch”, like 10 or 20 stitches for that, it’s going to create bulges in the line of stitching when you try to iron the seams. Be sparing with the backstitch, and just use a couple stitches and then stop. The dress won’t come unsewed.

Iron all seams as you go according to the pattern’s instructions (if you didn’t already know that). Flattening a sewed-together component makes it easier to handle for the next step, it’s less poofy, and makes the pieces fall into place the way they’re designed to.

Sashes. Sashes are EVIL. There’s a federal mandate that flower girl dresses must have sashes, however, so I think you’re for it. When you turn them right side out, after having sewed the right sides together, and you press them flat, if your line of stitching wasn’t absolutely ramrod straight, you’ll have a sash with weird wiggly bits where the line of stitching curved slightly. The way to avoid this, again, is to sew with maniacal patience.

Hems. Hems are second only to sashes in terms of evilness. You MUST pin the ENTIRE hem before you try to sew it. Don’t even think about pinning it every couple inches or so, and then trying to ease in the fullness as you hem it. Pin, pin, pin. You’ll need to buy more pins, trust me.

And measure, measure, measure. Get yourself a hem gauge. This little puppy will be worth its weight in gold by the time you’re done. Use it ruthlessly, don’t rely on dead reckoning or guessing as to where to put the next pin. Measure obsessively.

And: have her try it on, AFTER it’s pinned and BEFORE it’s hemmed, so you can be 100% sure it’s going to look right. Generally flower girl dresses need to be hemmed on the long side rather than on the “above the knee” short side, so before you undertake the immense task of hemming, not one but two flower girl dresses with those full skirts, you’ll need to be sure you didn’t measure wrong on a wiggly little girl so her dress ends up looking like Shirley Temple’s with her knobby little knees hangin’ out.

Sew lace hem tape on the hem before you pin it. It keeps the rough edge of the fabric from unraveling, makes the hem edge easier to handle while you’re patiently working your way around those miles of hem fabric with the hem gauge, and it looks pretty, too.

Do NOT assume, “Well, I cut the fabric exactly according to the pattern, so I don’t have to actually measure the hem all the way around, I can just assume that at the side seams it’s 4” of hem allowed", and then just pin it up 4" all the way around. Trust me, you didn’t cut the fabric exactly according to the pattern, and you do have extra fabric in some parts of hem, and less in other parts. This is a good way to get that touchingly homemade droopy-skirt look.

Use embroidery floss in a complementary color to make sash holders at each side of the girl’s waist.

Finally, allow plenty of time for this project. It’s not going to be something you’re going to be able to whip up in a weekend, or even in a week. I’d allow at least two weeks per dress. Seriously. The wedding’s in June? Start now. Prevail upon that future SIL to make her selection by March 1 at the latest.

And remember the girls may have increased a half-dress size between the time the SIL picks out the pattern and the time they actually have to wear the dress, so when you’re choosing a size to sew in March, go with “tiny bit too big right now” rather than “fits perfectly right now”, because what fits perfectly in March may be a tiny bit too small in June.

I’m assuming you don’t have to worry about the possibility of one of the flower girls coming up preg the week before the wedding? :smiley:

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And I wanted to add that there has been a trend lately towards patterns not requiring you to mark the stitching lines; supposedly if you cut the fabric carefully enough, then you can simply sew 5/8" from all fabric edges and have perfect seams.

This is a crock.

Nobody in the world, except perhaps my girlhood chum Donna’s mother, who was famous on our block for her apparently instinctive ability to bypass the whole “marking” stage, can cut fabric that carefully.

Mark all stitching lines.
Then match them up with pins; don’t rely on the fabric edges to give you a true 5/8" seam.

You’ll be glad you did.

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Wow, excellent advice here. I’ll only add that it’s a good idea to learn French seams; they’re a snap to do and they look really nice. The way you do a French seam is that you sew it the wrong way first, with right sides out. If you are doing a 5/8" seam, sew it 1/4". Then, press and clip that seam to 1/8" and sew the seam the right way 'round. You will end up with a pretty finished seam on the inside. This works with side seams and so on, not with sleeves.

You might want to get a book on fine sewing by machine from the library. I like Fine Machine Sewing by Carol Ahles, but about 80% of it is things like attaching lace and so on, so you only have to read some of it. A basic sewing book will be good to make sure you know what you’re doing and aren’t missing any good tricks.

I third the advice about getting a simple fabric. Nothing slippery or velvety or difficult! For a summer wedding a nice cotton is quite pretty and much easier to deal with.

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I second the advice about French seams. Also, just plain avoid zippers if you can. Some day, you’ll want to put zippers into something presentable, but practice for several years on bolster covers and dog coats and such before attempting to put them into something like a flower girl dress – where the back is seen more than the front, and in a formal setting.

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Make sure that the needle you use is a good one, maybe new, and that it’s the right size for the fabric. Otherwise you’ll have small pulls in the seams. And maybe you’ve done this before, but one easy way to ease in a sleeve or take up the excess in a hem is to run a long gathering stitch just inside the seam line, on the single layer. Pull the gathering up just a bit and then straighten it out. It will make it easier to make the seam flat and straight, while easing in the extra material in one side of the seam. It’ll make a full skirt easier to hem.

I agree with pin, pin, pin. And baste where necessary. It’ll take a little extra time, but it’s worth it. Also, muslin is cheap. Make a prototype if you’ll feel more comfortable that way. Then you can be more sure of the fit, and you can work out any bugs along the way.

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Huh? I haven’t marked stitching lines for years. It is entirely possible to cut that carefully, and it’s also quite possible to follow the machine guide to have perfect 5/8" stitches. I haven’t marked stitching lines for 40 years.

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Er… I’m not sure I would even know how to mark stitching lines if I wanted to.

I have a Reader’s Digest guide to sewing around here somewhere and I bet it has an illustrated guide to doing french seams, so I’ll look that up. I also think the advice to do a prototype dress out of muslin or cheap cotton first is an excellent one. I have a sundress pattern that I’ve made four or five dresses out of for MiniWhatsit, and the first one had a lot of weird little problems that I figured out how to fix in later copies.

I really appreciate all of the advice so far. I’m looking forward to this project but am also very nervous, as this is the first time I’ve made something for public display, so to speak.

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Don’t bother with marking stitching lines. Consider substituting purchased wide ribbon for a fabric sash. Be sure to do the final fittings with the girls wearing the same shoes they will wear for the wedding. What kind of fabric are you thinking about using?

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Okay, the bride has picked out the pattern she likes.

http://simplicity.com/dv1_v4.cfm?design=4647 (the version in pink with the green sash, except she wants white with a pink sash).

I’ll be taking her along with me when it’s time to buy fabric, but I’m thinking it will probably be satin or a satin facsimile.

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Oh, I think a friend of mine gave me that pattern a little while ago. I think I kept it–I got rid of some of them. I’ll look at it if you like. I’d be quite nervous about sewing satin; slippery stuff is difficult to work with. Pin a lot, and then pin some more!

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I am nervous, actually, but I did okay with MiniWhatsit’s costume satin this year for Halloween, so maybe I’ll be okay. (Obligatory photo of MiniWhatsit in fairy princess regalia. The underdress was satin, the shiny jacket thingie was … well, I don’t know what it was, but it was slippery as hell, and the turtleneck was for warmth and not technically part of the costume.)

And yes, any specific advice you have about this particular pattern would be appreciated!

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Oh, what a mercy, that’s a reasonably easy dress. [heaves sigh of relief] I was envisioning something with shirring, or multiple layers of skirts.

Sleeveless is good, because it’s a whole lot easier to sew facings on a sleeveless dress than to insert sleeves. Tack the facings to the underarm seam discreetly with only a couple of stitches.

Your biggest challenge will be gathering the skirt and fitting it to the bodice. Follow the instructions and sew two, count ‘em, two lines of gathering stitches, because if you try to save time and only sew one line, sure as shootin’ you’ll pop one of them and have to lay the whole thing out and re-sew them, which is a major PITA.

And after you have the whole thing pinned (use lots of pins, and take your time so the gathering is exactly spaced out), baste it together very slowly and carefully, then take the pins out and sew it together even more slowly and carefully, making sure you’re keeping those gathering lines on the INSIDE of the seam, so when you turn the dress right-side-out, you don’t have the gathering stitching peeking out at the join between the bodice and the skirt at random intervals. Make SURE it’s pinned and basted so those are on the inside of the seam. I cannot stress this enough. Otherwise might as well give her a stack of business cards to hand out to people, “Hi! My auntie made my dress! Ain’t it purdy?”

It looks to me like there’s top-stitching around the neckline and arm openings on the sleeveless version. If so, that will be your second biggest challenge–in order to avoid the homemade look, those lines of top-stitching will have to be immaculate. Go slow.

Satin actually isn’t that hard to work with. It tends to be fairly stiff, if a bit slippery, but the stiffness makes it manageable. Ya wanna avoid silk, and those “silky prints”, which IMHO are a bastard to work with. Slide right out of your fingers.

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How we marked patterns, back in the day:

You had your tracing wheel. And you had your tracing paper. And the trick was to select a color that complemented your fabric and was fairly unobtrusive, in case it didn’t wash out (especially if you’re going to be using fabric that may not be machine-washable). For a white dress, I’d use yellow tracing paper–NOT the dark blue, red, or green; it may be easier to see, but it’ll show up badly if it doesn’t wash out. And it can take several launderings for tracing paper to wash out–all depends on the brand and whether it has wax in it or not. Be safe and use as close a shade to your fabric as possible and still be visible.

And the pattern pieces had two sets of lines printed on them–you had your solid line, for cutting, and a dotted line, for marking.

And you laid out your pattern pieces on the fabric, and got it “just so”, and you pinned it, and you cut it out on the solid cutting line.

Then you took your stack of cut-out pieces, leaving the pattern pieces still pinned to the fabric, and you started marking. You inserted the tracing paper in between the layers of fabric and pattern so the markings went on the WRONG side of the fabric (very important point). And you put the paper so that when you ran your tracing wheel down the dotted line, it would transfer the color from the tracing paper to the wrong side of the fabric. This is one of those things that it takes me a whole paragraph to describe, but that if you were here in my dining room, I’d show you, “Put the tracing paper like this”, and you’d immediately go, “Oh. Yeah.” Because it would be immediately obvious how it’s supposed to go.

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If you’re going to make practice dresses out of muslin, give them to the girls after you’re done with them, along along with a handful of fabric paint pens, let 'em decorate.