I begin this new blog from my Franciscan site, Fioretta to spcifically discuss needlework projects of every kind, as well as modest dress.
This is from Fioretta:
My daughter St. Brigid's prom dress is finished (a lovely 1950s cocktail dress of black chantilly lace over sapphire blue dupioni silk), likewise the theatre project, so what did I do with my first day off in weeks? Went fabric shopping! JoAnn's was having a sale on calico, so I got enough stuff for some work skirts, a blouse, and a day dress. This was needful for several reasons: my one good black skirt has become too ratty to wear to work; I need a day dress in something besides wool; I have one longsleeved blouse. Also, I am at the stage in life where age is beginning to catch up with me, in terms of a changing figure. Nothing in the shops fits all my requirements for modesty, fabric, and price. Nothing fits at all - it's either all size 2 or 22, made for stick figures or the, er, Zaftig. I fall somewhere in the middle, with a British figure that American clothes have never fit (greater hip to waist ratio.) Because of this, I have always made my own clothes, or worn vintage things, but I have had nothing new in a long while.
A couple of years ago, I was dismayed in looking at present sizes in shops. HOW did I become a size 4? I haven't been a size 4 since I was 14 years old. Now, according to the standard sizing, I am a 12, but in the shops it's an 8 or 10. I'm confused! I notice, in looking at vintage dressingmaking site (see title links) that the sizes were much more reasonable, and not everybody was a size 0. The smalled waist was a (corsetted) 22 in 1917, the largest a (corsetted) 40, with the hip measures being 36 and 58 respectively. Real people! As one sees in all those vintage photographs.
In the event, I have made up one of my favourite Edwardian skirts in a nice charcoal grey, in what might be described as 'low calf length'. I'm looking forward to the rest, all in acceptably earthy colours.
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