Caftan the Buffet Slayer

This past weekend I experienced the exciting combo of having my birthday and a good friend's wedding occurring on the same day, so I decided to treat myself by making a new outfit to wear for the occasion. I already had a stash of dressmaking patterns and fabric, so I chose one pattern that I had wanted to make for a while and a corresponding length of fabric and whipped something up!

Regular readers will know that I am a lover of all things vintage, especially vintage fashion so I was really pleased to find that I had a vintage fabric that suited the dress that I wanted to make, which was Simplicity 8505A - a reproduction vintage 1970s caftan:

The fabric was gifted to me from a friend and I'm not entirely sure when it dates from but my best guess (from the colour pallet) would be 1980s / 1990s... but other people have said 1960s / 1970s so who knows:

Vintage fabric from an unknown era
If you'd like to vote for which decade this fabric comes from then please leave a comment below! It's slippery, sheeny synthetic fabric (polyester? not easy to cut or sew) and luckily I had about 6 metres of it; enough to make the belted caftan from my pattern. 

Anyway without further ado, here is the finished caftan (just in case it's not really obvious - I am attempting the pose from the illustration on the pattern)!

Me!

I've been watching a lot of 'The Golden Girls' lately and I felt like I was not-so-subconsciously inspired by their fashion on the show:

Blanche Devereaux

And the fabric just happens to have that great tropical / Miami / jungle pattern, which fits so well with that style! I really like how the caftan turned out; it's got a really great drapey feel and is super comfortable but also has a bit of shape to it - so even though it's not something that I will have the occasion to wear very often I will look forward to finding excuses to wear it! Like any kind of event with a buffet or bottomless brunch. Plus since I had all the materials I needed to hand already it cost me no additional money for a whole new outfit :) 

Thank you for being a friend! 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Frogday the Thirteenth

Image
I made this little starry eyed frog guy for my friend Rhonwen's birthday! It was tough to let him go... I used some strange green woven patterned cotton for his back with brown corduroy for his belly. All made from scraps of leftover fabric and lovingly hand sewn! Then I filled his guts in with polyester stuffing. A cheapy, quicky project with the hardest part being the darting. Boy am I making myself sound like a big time cheapskate today! Here's a not-so-great picture of his belly to get you back on my side: Awwwww! I don't know why that's cute, but it is. Unfortunately [again] I can't take too much credit for this project as I got the instructions and pattern from here ; I just simplified it very slightly. I would like to take credit for having extremely relevant bed sheets though. This froggy was born with the aid (or not) of a broken heart! Know what else aside from crafting cures a broken heart? New shoes . Oh yes. It's true.
Read more

Repair Cafés at the Green and Thrifty Fortnight!

Image
In February, I had the immense pleasure of being part of the Hampshire Libraries Green and Thrifty Fortnight as a touring Fabric Repair Café. This was an exciting challenge, as although I have been repairing mine and other people's clothes for years (with varying results), in this case anyone and anything could have turned up! The idea was that I was to teach the people who came along how to mend the items themselves with drop in sessions and specific workshops; patching, darning and adjusting children's clothes. Many of the attendees already had some ideas about what they wanted to do so we workshopped those and I taught a few stitches, tips and tricks. I visited Basingstoke, Andover, Waterlooville, Bridgemary and Eastleigh libraries and we had some fantastic results at each one. Here are just a few of my favourite outcomes: And of course I spent some of my down time wisely, by darning one of my own socks: With 45 minutes for each workshop, it was more like speed repairing, bu...
Read more

Space Age Reindeer Galactic Future Creature

Image
As Christmas is officially over, it seems like a good time to belatedly tell you all about the various crafty thingys I made for the festive period! First I started off with simpleish embroidered fabric decorations: [And a few paper ones...] These were inspired by classic retro shapes and designs and for the more complex embroideries I took inspiration from Constance Howard's book 'Inspiration for Embroidery'. Most of the fabric, paper and ribbon was salvaged / upcycled. Next I made cards in a similar retro theme: Photo by  LunarApple These featured an Intergalactic Space Reindeer with antennae so that he doesn't miss out on all his important Christmas telly [e.g. James Bond]. I also made cards with Christmas trees on but these seem to have eluded all photography. However, I did manage to knock up a quick reindeer gift bag too:  Here's a bonus picture of my marvellous cat looking splendid under our tree: That's it! Until next time!
Read more