ANH Princess Leia progress

When I went to the store for more fabric, they only had a little over a yard. At first I was going to go to another store and purchase the three and a half yards I needed but I decided to get what they had and piece the lining. I realized that the fabrics were actually slightly different (even though I bought the same fabric as before) but figure that doesn't matter too much as the new fabric will only be used as lining.

I sewed the new fabric to the old along both raw edges, giving me enough fabric at the waist seam to insert elastic. The elastic waist is recommended by a lot of costumers because the dress is too heavy to stay bloused by the belt alone. And the actual dress worn by Carrie Fisher had an elasticized waist.

Once I had the two pieces sewn together, they were folded and the pattern cut out. Then the side seams were sew just like on the first dress. The next step was to put the dresses together inside out and sew at the neck and wrists.

Big mistake.

I was unable to turn the dress. So all the stitching had to be ripped out. Originally I left one sleeve alone but then noticed that the lining was about an inch and a half longer than the outer dress. So that stitching came out as well. Both lining sleeves were trimmed.

Now for the tricky part - sewing the outer dress and the lining together without having any visible seams. I sewed one sleeve with the right sides of both dresses together. Then I turn it right side out and pinned the other sleeve where it needed to be stitched together. Next I pulled the sleeve between the two layers of the dress through the neckhole, pinned and stitched them together. I pulled it back out and thankfully it looked just like I wanted. *sigh of relief* I started on the slits next, working on them mainly from the bottom. One turned out fine, the other I somehow sewed wrong, so that had to be torn out.

My next steps are to (1) do the second slit correctly (2) do the keyhole from the bottom (3) add elastic to the waist and (4) hem it. My plan for the hem is to stitch the two layers together then treat it as one piece of fabric and hemmed it just like I would anything else. Well not quite because after turning the hem up twice I'll hand stitch it to the lining fabric, making sure not to catch any of the outer dress. This method is backed by other Leia costumers and by photos of the exhibit dress. Oh and I need to stitch the two together at the neck, then add the hood which is already hemmed and gathered, ready for attachment. The final step with be the collar and a couple hooks and eyes and the dress itself will be done. Then comes finding the boots, making the belt and figuring out how to do the hair.

A beintot!

Miss Leah J Wilde