Faded Magdalena Maggie Dress | sewing notes
Ok so I got the below swatch to pretty much exact using the methods described previously about faded fabric. Normally I get things pretty close, but this time the colours are almost exact.
The changes I have started implementing are:
- Knots all on the outside - but tails hidden between the layers. I figure you can't really see knots after the fabric starts curling after the first wash. I am just not a fan of adding textured feel to the inside of the fabric. I saw on my first fitted skirt (knots and tails outside) that it's alright feeling all that heavy duty thread that punctuates the fabric. But I still fail to see why the parent company does not line their garments with lightweight jersey after all the embroidery is done, especially when prices are so high and so much effort is put into them. The lining layer is just another good finishing touch to make the garment feel like what everyone buys the eternally selling t-shirts for. Women don't even like wearing bras at home.
- The stitching on the wrong side actually looks beautiful, as you can see from their promo photo of the classic long skirt. The AC company obviously chose to hide their tails. But the contrast of the black running stitch, and the magdalena pattern looks really pretty. This could be a double sided garment. I have not followed the simple running stitch technique where you knot off for every polygon. Oh no no no. Man that would take too long and slow me down too much for the small bits. I have found that I can just cross over the adjacent polygons in many cases, where they are very close to each other (say 8mm or less). The Maggie Dress garment is pretty much OSFM and doesn't need to utilise the stretch much anyway. I would consider this technique on Magdalena for future garments because there are so many points of the stencil where you can really jump polygons using running stitch because they are very close in many, many sections. Especially those flowers made of a dozen tiny bits. You can be very creative and needle your way around them. Instead of knotting off, what I do is do a backstitch every so often, and that can act has a knot. It won't act exactly as knot, but it really does the job well enough.
On an irrelevant note. The AC fur pencil skirt is being marketed at the same price as the long fitted skirt in faded Magdalena (USD$698). Yes, whether you choose one or the other it's $698. I can't believe that the price is the same. Having experienced both projects, I only need two huge t-shirts and 70 skeins embroidery floss (which they import, not manufacture in house) and no stencil to make the fur pencil skirt (you can do spirals by winging the spiral locations, which their makers apparently do anyway). The long skirt requires way more fabric, manually painting the stencil, and dyeing the faded fabric by hand + poly cotton thread. I have no idea why they are marketing the pencil skirt at the same price. If you go and buy organic jersey yourself + cotton floss you'd be around $100, or well under if you are a good bargain hunter. (Embroidery floss is also sold in cones by DMC). It's the labour hours that really drive up the price of this garment, not the raw materials... or even the labour to create the initial kit. Anyway, marketing can be a bit like that can't it? Throw out a price and see who buys.
