Wednesday 29 August 2018

A very simple chemisette

My new roundgown has a very deep neckline. It's very flattering to the bust, but not really suitable for daydress. I decided to make a chemisette to cover the bare skin. For the chemisette I looked at the chemisettes in Arnold and in the American Duchess guide, but I mostly improvised on my own. It's not my most beautiful work, but it's ok.

It's made of a very thin cotton voile. The front is made of two pieces, wider at the top and tapering down. Now for a nice early chemisette I shouldn't have tapered the front so much, the originals were more square. The sides have, not very even, rolled hems.

The back is just one piece, and not very tapered.

The bottom hems of the fronts and back are wide enough to thread a cotton tape through to keep the chemisette in place. From the side it's very obvious that the whole chemisette is pretty loose, but it will stay in place under the gown.

The collar was a cheat. Instead of making several layers, I cut one fairly wide piece of fabric and folded it in not quite half, to offset the edges a bit. The collar was sewn to a cotton tape and then sewn onto the main chemisette.

I am thinking about trying to starch the collar to make it stand up a bit more, now it's quite flappy.

The chemisette is handsewn, mostly because it's been nice to do something while talking to people or watching TV.

No comments:

Post a Comment