Making a Victorian Blouse for a Movie

I recently had the opportunity to make a Victorian blouse for my husband's film.  The film is titled "In His Steps" and is a modern day adaptation of the classic of the same name by Charles Sheldon.  Even though the film takes place in the modern day, one of the characters, Jasper Chase,  is an author and in the middle of writing a book that takes place in the 1890's.  My husband, Zack thought that showing a scene from Jasper's book in the film would also be a great way to homage the time period of the original book.

Naturally that meant making period costumes!  Unfortunately, our budget did not include buying an authentic pattern.  Our Art Director, Carol decided to make the skirt and underskirt, so I could concentrate on the more visible in the film blouse.  First thing to do was go through my supplies.  I had this really pretty wide lace that I found right off and really wanted to use.  I also found some other narrow laces, but those didn't end up working out.  Carol found me some white calico at Joann.

Next was to come up with a style.  These were my inspiration images found searching Pinterest.

I really liked the lines of this first one, and tried to replicate them as close as a could with the base pattern I had on hand.  And the second one below gave me the idea of what to do with the lace.  And also that the sleeves didn't have to be super full.

And here's the pattern I used for the bodice and neckband.  I raised the neckband two inches, and put a single line of gathering at the waist in the front and center back similar to the first inspiration image.  For the sleeves, I used Sense & Sensibility's Regency dress sleeves with the extra fullness option. Before sewing the sleeves to the bodice I pulled up the gathering stitches, tied them in place, then based the lace over them.  I was trying to give the sleeves the appearance of being fuller than they really were.  But it didn't really work.

So I bet you're ready to see my finished product now right?  Well, let me warn you that it is by no means an authentic representation.  Sorry to burst your bubble.  Zack says that any historical discrepancies can be attributed to Jasper's lack of research into the time period.  I can go with that!  Also, I did not do the final ironing of the blouse.  If I had, there would not have been creases on the sleeves.

Rachel Winslow (Laura Seabrook) & Jasper Chase (Samuel Carr). Photo by Mary Roe.

This first picture is the only full length picture I have of the actors.  And they had already changed out of their period shoes!  All well.

Photo by Mary Roe.

This one shows the gathering on the front of the bodice the best.  Since these pictures were not taken to show the work of the clothing, I didn't get any of the back.

Photo by Mary Roe

Our lovely actress, Laura Seabrook.

Photo by Mary Roe

I hope you enjoyed this!  Please let me know what you think of it.  And be sure to check out the movie's website too! www.inhisstepsmovie.com

Cowgirl Maternity Blouse

My newest maternity creation, a cowgirl blouse! This was made by modifying Simplicity 4499, a now out of print pattern.
Several months ago I came across an online set of classes called "Make Maternity Clothes," one of the classes being "Converting Store bought patterns into Maternity Patterns." It is amazing! You can literally turn any pattern you own into a maternity pattern! And it's not just one cut and dry method, there are 5 or 6 different variations you can use for blouses. Plus directions for pants, skirts, dresses, and even formals. I would highly recommend this class to any expectant mother. Because the information in the class is copyrighted, I'm not going to go into detail on the changes I made to the pattern.

What project can get properly started without the help of a cat?

I first bought this pattern about 6 or 7 years ago for 4-H sewing. Back then, I was a size 8, now my pre-pregnancy size is a 10. Thankfully I had made the short sleeve view, so the yolk pieces had not been cut out. That made it really easy to layer them on top of the blouse pieces then estimate how much to add everywhere else.

The pattern called for piping around the yolk, but unfortunately, I only had some in a real pale pink color. And there was no way that was going to work. So I thought, Wal-Mart ought to have some piping... :-( Nope. (Our Wal-Mart has recently majorly downsized their fabric department) They didn't even have that much of a selection of biased tape. I knew I had to put something on the yolk, else it wouldn't be visible in the print, so I bought the only blue colored biased tape they had.

I suppose I can blame pregnancy hormones on this next part, but I really didn't feel like going the extra mile to make the tape look like piping, so I just edged the yolk with it instead.

But even then I wasn't altogether happy with it. It just looked too much like it was home made! So I finally decided to try using one of my machine's fancy stitches to dress it up a bit. My husband really liked the results! It took a while, but they finally grew on me too.


I didn't notice until I was ready to start on the collar that I had accidentally cut out the size 8. After making an extensive search to find the size 10, I realized why I hadn't noticed. It wasn't there! For whatever very strange reason, I had thrown away all the other collar sizes except the size 6. Explain that one to me?

The only way I could think of to fix this problem was to put the size 6 on top of the size 8 and measure the difference, then add that difference in the selvages,


It actually worked! The collar fit perfectly into the blouse!!! I can't tell you how relieved I was.

Here's my sewing companion trying to help me sew on the buttons. How helpful she is. ;-)

Well, I hoped you've enjoyed this post, and it didn't bore you at all. Please let me know what you think!