Tien Chiu

  • Home
  • About Tien
    • Honors, Awards, and Publications
  • Online Teaching
  • Gallery
  • Essays
  • Travels
  • Book
  • Blog
  • Dye samples
You are here: Home / All blog posts / Excitement and changes!
Previous post: The whole nine yards
Next post: Foundations

July 11, 2009 by Tien Chiu

Excitement and changes!

So, I met with Mily (the seamstress) yesterday, and she’s exactly what I’d been looking for!  She works for a couture house in San Francisco, and is expert in pattern drafting as  well as sewing.  She and I talked over my planned dress, and we decided to make some changes:

Instead of having the two-piece, long-sleeved  dress with overskirt, we’re going with a one-piece, scoop-neck, short-sleeved dress.  (It remains off-the-shoulder.)  The princess seams will start at the shoulder (instead of the underarm) and sweep down the length of the dress.  The lace scallops would be used to trim the neckline and possibly the sleeves, with some of  the lace motifs on the center of the bodice (down to the waist) and additional ones on the skirt.  (Mily suggests placing them asymmetrically at the hip and towards the bottom of the garment, but I’m not sure how I feel about that yet.)

Also, instead of a fuller garment, Mily suggested making the dress an A-line.

Finally, she suggested a more prominent closure for the coat, but I don’t know how I feel about that – it would provide a visual focus, but would also interrupt the fall of the collar/opening, and possibly clash with the double-happiness ribbon that also goes along the edge.

The sketch:

Sketches of new dress designs
Sketches of new dress designs

And, the reasoning behind the changes:

  • The long sleeves on the dress would be very hard to fit under the coat without wrinkling.  We can make the sleeves just long enough to camouflage the tan lines.
  • The two piece dress would make me look shorter than a single dress with no waistline seam; the princess lines would fall straight from the shoulder to the floor.
  • Poofy/full skirts would make me look shorter than an A-line dress.  (Which, gentle reader, you may recall from the coat muslins.  And I should have remembered that too.)

Mily also suggested a sweetheart neckline, but I vetoed it on the grounds that the little point at the bottom of the sweetheart neckline would look strange under the coat, if it got the least bit off-center.

Overall I like this design a lot better than the one I was using before – I think she’s got it dead on.  The only thing I’m not sure about is the lace edging at the bodice – from a pure dress design standpoint I think it’s great, but it might interfere with the look under the coat.  But I figure that’s easily tested once I have the dress and coat almost done.

Mily was very interested in my Bridal Couture book, and said she could teach me out of the book once she’d read it, so I left it with her.  Tomorrow I’m going back up there, patterns in hand, and she’s going to help me modify/adjust them to fit.  But I need  to get some pattern paper first, which I’ll do in the city today.

She also said she could teach me flat pattern drafting, but that will have to wait until I’m employed again.

I’m really excited!  This is a priceless opportunity to study with someone who knows couture.

Share this post!

  • Tweet
  • More
  • Reddit
  • Email
  • Share on Tumblr
  • Print

Filed Under: All blog posts, sewing, textiles Tagged With: wedding dress

Previous post: The whole nine yards
Next post: Foundations

Comments

  1. Laura says

    July 11, 2009 at 9:12 am

    When the student is ready the teacher will appear. 😀

    Cheers,

    Laura

  2. Sharon says

    July 11, 2009 at 9:17 am

    Tien, the new dress design is perfect, in my opinion. It echoes the lines of the coat, will be flattering (making you look taller and slimmer–my wish, too) and is just beautiful. I like the simplicity of it very much. The oveerskirt wasn’t helping…
    Sharon

  3. Katie Lacewell says

    July 16, 2009 at 11:24 am

    Tien, I think this design is perfect! And good for you for opening your mind and heart to a fairly major change. Sometimes when I get it in my head how something is going to look, it’s really hard to get it out.

    Katie

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Archives

Tags

aids lifecycle outfits autumn splendor book cashmere coat cats celtic braid coat color study cross dyeing design design class devore doubleweave doubleweave shawls drawing dye samples dye study group gradient colors house infinite warp jacquard loom katazome knitted blanks kodachrome jacket ma's memorial mohair coat network drafted jacket/shawl project network drafting painted warp phoenix rising phoenix rising dress phoenix rising kimono phoenix rising reloaded pre-weavolution project sea turtles taquete tie-dye tied weaves tomatoes velvet weaving drafts web design website redesign wedding wedding dress woven shibori

Categories

  • Africa
  • aids lifecycle
  • All blog posts
  • All travel posts
  • Asia
  • Bangkok
  • Belize
  • Cambodia
  • Central America
  • Chai Ya (Wat Suon Mok)
  • Chiang Mai
  • Chiang Rai (Akha)
  • China
  • chocolate
  • computer stuff
  • creating craft
  • Creative works
  • cycling
  • Delhi
  • Dharamsala
  • drawing
  • dyeing
  • Fiber Arts
  • finished
  • food
  • garden
  • Ghana
  • Guatemala
  • Hanoi
  • Ho Chi Minh City
  • Hoi An
  • India
  • Khao Lak
  • Knitting
  • knitting
  • Ko Chang
  • Laos
  • Luang Namtha
  • Luang Prabang
  • markleeville death ride
  • meditations on craft
  • mental illness
  • musings
  • Phnom Penh
  • powerlifting
  • Rewalsar (Tso Pema)
  • sewing
  • Siem Reap (Angkor Wat)
  • Southeast Asia
  • surface design
  • textiles
  • Thailand
  • travel
  • Vangvieng
  • Vientiane
  • Vietnam
  • Warp & Weave
  • Weaving
  • weaving
  • weavolution
  • writing

© Copyright 2025 Tien Chiu · All Rights Reserved ·

 

Loading Comments...