Dear Stitchers’ Guild Friends:I saw that Medea posted a SWAP 2019 discussion thread and as a warm up to 2019 SWAP sewing, I’d like to sponsor a Dress challenge – and follow Mudcat’s lovely idea of awarding the winner(s) a little $25 gift certificate at an appropriate fabric store/site. I would supply the gift certificates; the same caveat that Mudcat provided applies, it has to be website or store to which I can set up the gift certificate for the winners.
There are two separate categories –
Beginner to Intermediate and
Intermediate to Advanced. More thoughts about how you might decide which category you want to enter into are listed at the end of this message. The important thing is that there’d be two “winners.”
The Challenge:Make a dress (or a two piece ensemble that looks like a dress) between October 1st and December 15th 2018. The dress can be for anyone above age 14 years – so it can be for yourself, a friend, your sister, a daughter. I am thinking garments similar to dresses posted in Sizun’s Dress a Month thread are eligible. Garments such as IndigoTiger’s pinafores are definitely eligible. And, I am totally inspired to do this by Lisa’s dress a couple of years ago for her daughter. I will try to dig out links for all of these. Shirtdresses, coatdresses, etc. all are eligible. No formal full length dresses, however, as their glamor gives them an unfair advantage. No pants or jackets.
The dress must incorporate one thing new to you. This could be a new type of fabric – if you have never sewn velvet and you want to make a dress out of velvet, that could be the new “thing.” It could be a pattern you’ve never made before or a technique that you haven’t attempted – such as welt pockets, underlining, invisible zipper installation – the idea is really to grow your skills – so whatever the new thing is, it will probably involve some practice or a muslin.
The Timeframe:This is a pre-SWAP sew, so the start date is TODAY (Oct. 1st 2018) and the final date for sewing is December 15th, 2018. We can vote while munching on holiday cookies. Final details of voting still to be worked out.
Submitting your entry.Three photos (Front, Back, and Side) of the finished garment on the intended recipient (this may cause some difficulties if one is sewing for someone at considerable distance). DragonLady will be helping set this up – but ideally we could vote the same way as we do for SWAP. Stay tuned for the details.
More about The Categories:I have looked at a lot of skill level determinations and don’t like any of them that are based on years. I was thinking of something like this…the idea being that if you can check off all five of the major bullets below, then you can self-define as
Intermediate to Advanced and enter in that category. If you cannot check off all five, then you can self-define as
Beginner to Intermediate. It would be up to each entrant to decide, so this list is offered as a guideline.
- Made over 50 garments
- Made more than 3 of the following types of garments:
- Jacket
- Shirt with stand and front band
- Coat
- Fitted dress
- Pants with fly front zipper
- Lined garment
- Sewn garments out of more than 3 of the following:
- Lace
- Leather or faux suede
- Chiffon
- Silk Duponi
- Boucle
- Wool coating
- Fake or real fur
- Taffeta
- Satin
- Successfully used more than 4 of the following techniques:
- Invisible zipper
- Hong Kong seams
- Welt pockets
- Underlining
- Bias binding for neck or armhole finish
- Set in sleeves
- Bound or hand made buttonholes
- Calculated for turn of the cloth
- Used at least 3 of the following hand stitches
- Slip stitch
- Back stitch
- Catch stitch
- Pad stitch
- Whip stitch
- Blanket stitch
Questions? Please post them here… I would like this to be fun for folks and give us an excuse to develop our skills – and also to encourage the newer sewers by having the two categories.
Finally, MODs, if I didn't do this correctly, please move my post to where is more appropriate or make other corrections as necessary.
