Grace Kelly Alert

I found this gem of a dress at a little thrift shop in Oregon. It was not in a good condition though, the top ripped six ways since Sunday. Minor things like that never stops an aspiring seamstress, especially not when encountering vintage clothings. Everything can be fixed or redesigned.
I paid the all of £15 for the dress and carefully brought it home. It hanged on my wall a whole year before I dared begin the mending process. I was afraid to mess it up, another challenge was that I needed matching fabric to replace the torn bits with.

In the end I "borrowed" fabric from the skirt and used that to fix the top. Operation "Save the Prettiest Vintage Dress Ever" took me an entire weekend, but when I was done I was the happy owner of a proper Grace Kelly dress.

It was the obvious outfit for when my husband and some friends went out dining at the historical Criterium. A fellow diner came over to our table and said "Excuse me, I couldn't help but notice your dress? Is it a proper vintage?" I confirmed it was indeed the case. "I have to say, you looked just like Grace Kelly when you entered the room."
More champagne please.

So basically I brought out the sharpest tool in the sewing box, Mr Seamripper, and began with separating the skirt from the top. Then I cut out as much fabric as I needed to mend the tears. The skirt on this particular dress is really full, so you can't tell that almost 10 inches is missing. I then carefully cut away all the ripped bits from the top, and placed the new and flawless fabric over it. The fabric is covered in pastel embroideries, and I have embroidery settings on my machine, so I pieced the fabrics together with embroidery stitches. It's all about making it look like no one has ever touched the thing, like it was made that way to begin with. When that delicate process was over, I sewed the top and skirt back together again.

This dress has no labels, it was clearly made by a proper seamstress or tailor. I wonder who it was for, what the occasion was. What a lucky girl to have owned such a dress, and lucky me for finding it in a little store in a little town in Oregon.