Red dress - muslin fitting #1

I had my first fitting, ya'll! I want to share the experience of having a dress custom made to order. Last time, Barbara took the 18 or so measurements to make a muslin. Actually she made two, she made a muslin for the bodice and one for the skirt. 

I apologize for not having any pictures. When I say muslin, it's just a mock up of the dress made with a cotton fabric. There's nothing fancy, it's just to make sure the fit is correct before cutting the real fabric. Here is an example of a muslin top:

Source

Mine basically looked like that with no sleeves and a much tighter neckline. We started by having me put on the bodice. A muslin is traditionally made bigger so that the dressmaker can pin it correctly to one's body. This bodice fit, not quite like a glove, but pretty darn close. Barbara pinned the back closed (that's where the zipper is going to go) and pinned the back darts and the sides seams just a touch. She also had me sit, breath deeply, and move my arms around to make sure it wasn't too tight and still looked right. And here's another cool thing, she had me do the slouch test. Slouch in it and see how it fits.

Next up, I put the skirt on. She made it a full circle skirt and much too long, just so that we could play with it. Just imagine a skirt from teh 50's (without all the poofyness underneath). When the measurements were taken, I was guessing that I wanted the skirt to start at the top of my hips. But after playing around with it some, we decided it would be best to have it start about belly button level. That way my torso was in proportion to my legs. Just so you know, the higher up the waistband, the shorter the torso (but give the illusion of longer legs). And the lower the waistband, the longer the torso, but the shorter you look. We also decided that it would hit just below my knees.

And now for the cool part. Barbara and Charles, her assistant, drew on me, with a pencil! The bodice of my dress looks kind of like a vest, but it is all one piece. To get the right shape and coverage, they drew directly onto the muslin. Armed with a pencil, Charles started putting in where the the collar started and where the modesty panel would go.

I wish I had taken pictures, maybe next time I'll set up my new camera on a tripod to do it's thing.

Generally, there's only one muslin fitting, but due to the complexity of my dress, I'll go back after Christmas for a second.