1970s Summer Dresses

Hasn't the weather been awful lately?  We have had so much rain and wind this February - I just want it to stop now!  I feel cooped up indoors, only venturing out to get wet and muddy along with the dog on our walks.  Then I have all the palaver of hosing him down and drying him!

So I thought for a little light relief, how about some summer dresses from the 1970s?  I have several summer dress patterns from the 1970s in my Etsy shop.  I really love the pattern covers from this era.  They are beautifully drawn and the colours are bright and fresh.  They are generally in good condition, as are the pattern pieces inside the envelope.  One thing that was different about the older patterns was that you only got one size in the envelope!  You might need to be handy at pattern alterations to get it to fit. 

All these patterns are available in my Etsy shop: https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/SewLindyLou.  They are all in great condition and are complete - all the pattern pieces are present.

Style 2673 is for size 34 inch bust and is from 1975.  All views have a zipper in the back.  The fashion for extended shoulders is just beginning to appear, 2 of the designs have extended shoulders and the third has wide shoulder straps.

I love this tea dress style of Vogue 9156!  It is for size 38 inch bust.  It is basically a tent dress with an elastic waist.  How comfortable!  I love the front button closing, and the pretty fabric used here.

Style 4195 is a junior petite size to fit a 33inch bust.  Just the sort of thing I wore when I was a teenager in the 1970s!  This one is from 1973.  Look at that gorgeous sweetheart neckline!

I really love the yellow sundress on Style 4613 from 1974.  I love the square neckline and the band across the neckline.  This one is a very small size, bust 32.5inches.

The 'safari' style was very popular in the 1970s.  Remember safari jackets?  This short sleeved dress with its front breast pockets, epaulettes and rolled cuffs really fits the bill.  This one is from 1977 and is size 34 inch bust.

Finally, here is another sundress from Style from 1975.  This one is size 36 inch bust.  I really like the fitted bodice and flared skirt.  The sweetheart neckline on the green version is lovely.  

Which one is your favourite?  Any of these dresses could be made for today.  The shops are full of midi length flared and full-skirted dresses in ditzy prints for the spring.  Very 1970s!  

12 quilts in 2019

I have decided to set myself a challenge to use up some of  my copious stash of quilting fabric and make 12 quilt tops this year.  Then I intend to do a 'free-motion machine quilting' class and learn how to do it properly before I set about quilting them.

I used to go to quilt shows and fabric sales and buy lots of stuff!  The fabric has been languishing in my stash for up to 10 years, so it is definitely time to do something with it.  Some of my purchases have been kits to make a quilt, and some have been odd fat quarters that I have liked.  For example, here's a picture I took of some fat quarter bundles I bought at a quilt show in 2012.  I used the Christmas fat quarters for Christmas bunting as gits for my friends a few years ago, but I still had the blue, pink and white fabrics!

The blue and pink fabric have become baby quilt tops.  I love these 2 quilts!  I found the triangle pattern online and it was so easy, I completed it in an afternoon.  I love that the large triangles make it look so modern despite the prints being a little old-fashioned.  I bought the sashing fabric sometime later to go with this set of fat quarters.  I have enough to do the backing too.  The blue one is a windmill pattern, again found online (Pinterest has been my friend here!).  The dotty fabric used as sashing was bought separately.

 

This next quilt is the first one I made this year, and it was during sewing this that I decided to challenge myself to at least 1 quilt per month.  I bought this kit at a class I went to at a local quilt shop.  The owner held the classes in her own home, and it was a lovely atmosphere.  She has sadly closed down now.  I made this 'disappearing 9-patch' quilt in the class, and bought this fabric to make another one exactly the same.  (Not sure why I wanted another one exactly the same but heho!)    I have to say that I am not in love with this one.  I don't really like the orange 'background'.  The patterned fabric has little cartoony dogs on it, which was why I was attracted to it.  It is by Basic Grey, and I had a charm pack (precut 5 inch squares).  I still have enough of the border print to do the backing.

Another quilt that I had wanted to make for a few years is made with some of my vintage embroidered linens.  I collected some vintage embroidered tablecloths sourced from eBay and local charity shops.  I sold some of the perfect linens on my Etsy shop, but kept back anything with holes or stains.  I managed to cut out some pretty embroideries to use in my quilt.  A friend had answered an advert for some vintage cotton lawn scraps, which she shared with me, and I also used up a few ditsy prints of my own.  Originally I was going to sew the blocks together without sashing in between, but decided to use up the scraps of linen.  I am really pleased with the final quilt, it is so pretty!  I bought a green ditsy flowery duvet cover from a charity shop that I will use for the backing.  So pleased to have made this quilt almost entirely from second- hand fabrics.

I am now working on a 'wonky star' quilt using some gorgeous plaids.  This pattern comes from a really old quilting magazine, Popular Patchwork, February 2003.  Each block is hand sewn, but I expect that I will machine sew the blocks together.  I am about half way through making the blocks at the moment, but may make the quilt bigger.  I have loads of plaid fabric!

Vintage sewing notions - Bias Binding

I have just uploaded some more Vintage Sewing Kits to my Etsy shop.  They are small collections of vintage sewing notions in a variety of colours.  It has inspired me to do some research!

I came across these lovely packets of bias binding complete with their original labels:

Rayon Bias Binding

Rayon itself is a fabric manufactured from cellulose.  Cellulose comes from wood pulp and goes through several stages of manufacture to become rayon.  First it is purified, then dissolved and forced through a spinaret to produce filaments.  The filaments are then chemically solidified, resulting in synthetic fibres of nearly pure celloulose. 

Rayon can be tricky to sew, as it is very light, drapey and slippery!   

Here's a blog post on the Colette blog about sewing with rayon challis, a luxurious, silky form of rayon.

Nowadays, Hug Snug make a rayon seam binding.  Here it is on Amazon

Laura Mae uses rayon seam binding here. It is very light and makes a lovely finish for inside your garment.

Nainsook Bias Binding

I had never heard of Nainsook before!  Wikipedia tells me that 'it is a soft, fine, lightweight form of muslin.  The word 'Nainsook' was first documented in 1790, and derives from the Hindu and Urdu 'nainsukh' which literally means 'eye's delight!'  Nainsook was often used to make lingerie items and babies' clothing up until the 1920s.  It was often used to make bias binding in the 1950s and 60s.  

Thus, it would be another lovely light binding for the inside seams of your garment.  

Here's a blog post with more information about Nainsook.

You can find the yellow rayon and the yellow nainsook bias binding in this kit for sale here.

And the green nainsook binding is in this kit available here.

Inspiration for Christmas party frocks

Do you need some inspiration for your Christmas party frock?  How about sewing one of these gorgeous evening dresses from the 1960s?

Or maybe 1970s is more your thing?

 

There is even the possibility of machine knitting your evening dress:

 

All these patterns are available in my Etsy shop: https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/SewLindyLou

I am offering a 10% discount for the rest of the month.  Please use the code NOVE10.

Happy sewing!  And happy partying!

Coats!

Are you thinking of sewing a coat this autumn?  Well, if you are, here’s some inspiration from my stock of vintage patterns:

Here’s a closer look at 3 patterns,1950s, 1960s and 1970s.

See them all on my Etsy shop   www.etsy.com/uk/shop/SewLindyLou

Pattern Friday–an occasional series

As you know, I have been collecting vintage dressmaking patterns and thought I would highlight one or two of my favourites in an occasional series.

First is the ‘Greet the Spring’ dress, a 1950s/60sdress pattern produced by Woman’s Realm. 

Woman’s Realm was a UK magazine launched in 1958 aimed at post war women who were used to ‘running a house on a ration book’.  Goods of any kind were scarce and many women would make their own clothes.  Sadly this magazine closed in 2001, and was merged with Woman’s Weekly.  It was said that mature women were more interested in celebrity lifestyle magazines than cooking, baking, crotchet and dressmaking.  I feel that this tide may be turning back to craft magazines now, judging by the number of sewing, knitting and crotchet magazines on the shelves!

Imagine my delight when checking this pattern for completeness that I came across the original magazine article about this dress!  I love it when I find someone’s notes or a clipping in an old pattern or book!  It is the ‘Greet the Spring’ Dress, and the article suggests that ‘all the gay delights of spring are blended in this dress that cannot fail to flatter you’! 

All for the bargain price of 9d (about 4p in today’s money), incidentally that is the cost of a can of baked beans in 1965.  How times have changed!  You can’t buy a dressmaking pattern for the price of a can of baked beans now can you?

I think this dress looks very 1950s, but as the magazine only launched in 1958, it could be early 1960s.  I guess if the magazine was aimed at the mature woman, they wouldn’t be selling mini skirt dress patterns!  I love the gathers into the bodice at the neckline, very pretty.  The full skirt is created from soft gathers, but is flat between the bodice darts to hide a full tummy!  The article says that it has been made from the ‘new drip-dry cotton’, to avoid creases and the need for much ironing.  It is pretty much fabric-hungry as it takes 4 3/4 to 5 yards of 36” wide fabric!

This pattern is for sale in my Etsy shop   along with lots of other vintage patterns from other decades.  Do pop over and have a look.

A New Adventure

Welcome to my new sewing blog!  It's my place to show my me-made items, and hopefully get to know other sewing bloggers.

I have always loved sewing!  I learned how to make clothes when I was a teenager with my mother, who in turn learned from her mother-in-law, my grandmother.  My grandmother worked in Rackhams, a big department store in the centre of Birmingham as a seamstress.  She altered all the lovely gowns to fit the rather upmarket clientele.  It was said that she only had to look at a person and she could cut a dress to fit!  She made me several dresses, including my christening gown.  I'll come back to this in a future post.

Through the years I have revisited dressmaking several times, attending various evening classes, making clothes for myself in my 20s, and for my daughter when she was a little girl. I have again returned to dressmaking, and am attending a drop-in sewing class at More Sewing, a local fabric store.  When I rekindled my love of dressmaking one of the first things I did was read the sewing blogs!  I discovered a whole world of independent designers of dress patterns, and gained lots of extra information from tutorials and sew-alongs.  Not only that, but I love looking at the photos of the items made up in all sorts of colours and textures of fabric, and the pattern hacks.

I became aware that there is quite an interest in vintage patterns.  See Marie from 'A Stitching Odyssey' and Kerry from 'Kestrel Makes' Vintage Pattern Pledge.  I began to search in local charity shops and on eBay, and have amassed quite a collection in a very short time.  I adore the vintage illustrations, they are so cute!  The glamour of the 1960s is my favourite at the moment!  Although I love a good 1970s sundress, or a 1980s ‘Lady Di’ haircut! 

So I have opened an Etsy shop selling vintage patterns, and some vintage sewing notions and haberdashery.  I love the cards of buttons, and the old wooden cotton reels!  And the little cards of press studs and hooks and eyes!  Please do pop over and have a look.  I would love to know what you think!