Botching Update

Thank goodness for ribbons and fabric stashes!

Tuesday's disaster of a clothing tutorial is in the process of being rescued, thanks to some lovely broderie anglaise fabric and some stashed cotton lace and the time-honoured technique of botching it better.  I already had the broderie anglaise as I am in the process of making myself a shirred dress with it, which I intend to embroider with some shisha work and bright, silk thread.  Watch this space for that particular beauty!

Since the original top had only one seam, I simply split that back open, measured out the extra fabric I needed to make up size, shirred that and sewed it in to make a contrasting front panel.







A little lace to break up the border between the two and some coordinating straps, and things are going well.  I still need to add lace to the other side, and a little lace along the neckline to finish it and keep the dress fitting as I want it.

I also need to trim the rough edges, play around with strap length at the back and hem the bottom.  Next week I'll show you the steps I took to fix the top when it all went wrong, including showing you what to do when the stitching holding the shirring elastic pops!

With any luck, I'll have a lovely, well-fitting top to show off, too.