I have added a few new dresses to my Etsy account! You can check it out here

The first is my muslin Regency dress that I made last year for the Pride and Prejudice ball. This dress has a pleated front panel and puffed sleeves, with a red ribbon at the waist. You can read my post about making this dress here

The second dress that I posted is my Green Marie Antoinette dress that I made last year and took photos of in Banff Springs Hotel. This dress has a boned bodice and skirt with cartridge pleats. It also comes with a modesty panel for the back, and laces up the back with ribbon.

This dress does not come with the panniers (the undergarments that create the wide hip shape). You can see my post about this dress here

~K

Update: The Marie Antoinette inspired green dress has been sold! Stay tuned for more gowns to go into my Etsy account!

I have been thinking about opening an Etsy account for some of my costumes and embroidery for a long time now, and it is now open! I am starting smaller, with a few of the costumes that I made just for photos and a few embroideries that I have made. Check it out here

All of these pieces are currently up on my Etsy account! Stay tuned, and I will be adding more as well. Each piece is custom done, and completely one of a kind.

~K

This year was a really huge one for me, especially when it comes to my sewing. I started this blog just a little over a year ago with my Special Project in school, and it has grown very quickly with all of the projects that I have been working on. I also started a makeup and skincare part of the blog (and an instagram here) after I started working at a beauty counter to share about some of the things I have learned through training sessions. When it comes to my sewing, I have grown quite a bit in the past year! I started the year with finishing my Special Project, which took me a semester to make. Not long after that, I started working with MakeFashion. I started out just helping, and ended up making a dress with the help of an engineer! It was hectic and crazy and I loved every minute of it. I also got to go to Mexico with my family this year, celebrated a one year anniversary with my boyfriend, graduated from high school, got accepted into Olds College Fashion Program, got a job, made a dress for a televison pilot, and finished 16 projects (some of which I haven't blogged about yet). I would say that was a pretty successful year! Here is my year in photos:

And a quick sneak peak of a project that I haven't posted about yet:

Heres to another great and productive year! I can't wait to see whats in store for me

​~K

I finally took a few photos of my finished Regency stays! They are three layers of cotton with very minimal cording at the front. The entire garment is hand sewn. 

This was a bit of a stash-busting project, so everything except for the bias binding was from my stash. The stays were also drafted by me, based off of a few Pinterest photos of original stays from the 1810s.

The middle and lining fabrics are a brown cotton that is from worn out sheets, so it is tough fabric. The front white fabric is a white cotton that I have had for ages. I decided to bind the stays in turquoise for fun, since binding is such a long and sometimes tedious job. 

Next up in my Regency wardrobe I need to make a petticoat. This will be another stash-busting project, since I have the perfect materials for it already. I would also like to make a summer spencer (basically a short coat) out of a light blue linen that I have, and I also would like to make a few changes to my dress that I posted about here.

~K

There are a few things that I would like to change on this dress, such as adjusting the fit (it is slightly too big, something I can fix pretty easily), as well as adding another band about 2/3 of the way down the sleeve to make the sleeve have a double puff. Other than that, I am pretty pleased with how it turned out!

The front of the dress features a box-pleated panel, and I added a red ribbon along with a brooch.

~K

My mom and I went to the Regency at the Fairmont Palliser a few weekends ago, and it was beautiful.
The hotel is old and is stunning inside, and I loved seeing all of the costumes that people were wearing. 
I made dresses for my mom and I, and I have to admit that I cut a bit close to the deadline when it came to making them... I ended up finishing my dress just a few hours before we had to leave. Fortunately, I did not have to finish it in the car on the way there, which I have heard of happening in the costuming world!

I used the pattern on the left for my dress, and the one on the right for my moms. Everything that I used for this project was stash, so it didn't cost me anything.

This first one was made out of a sheet. It is gathered at the sleeves, waist, and neckline with twine, which can be tightened or loosened so that different people could wear it. We accented it with a white ribbon at the waist. In some of the pictures you can see the twine at the sleeves. The twine is hidden when the dress is worn.

I will do another post about the dress that I wore, along with some photos from the evening at the Palliser.
~Katherine

I have just started on the project that I mentioned in earlier posts- the Regency era dresses. I will be making two dresses: one will be a simple round gown in a blue cotton sateen, and the other will (hopefully) be a bib-front dress in cream muslin. Yesterday I cut out the pieces for the first dress out of a Burda pattern, one that I talked about in this post. 

I will be pretty busy sewing-wise in the next few weeks. Along with this project, I will also be changing my grad dress, and this weekend I am picking up fabric and supplies for my next few projects. 

~K

One era that has fascinated me for years is the early 1800s. I have always loved Jane Austen, so when the opportunity arose to go to a Jane Austen ball, I was thrilled. It will be in May at the Palliser. You can rent costumes, but I thought that this would be a great excuse to make my first ever regency era costumes. 

If everything goes to plan, I will be making two dresses for the event- one for me, and one for my mom. I was recently lent about 12 historical patterns to copy, and there are two regency ones. I have already started on making myself a pair of regency stays, which are very similar to modern day bras. 

I was hoping to be able to use the chemise that I made for my 18th century costume, however if I make short sleeves, then I will have to make a new one. 

Other things that I am planning to make is a few petticoats and the two dresses. Here is some of my inspiration for them.

~K