Sewing Dare: Complete

You may remember that waaaaaaay back in February I signed up for a #sewingdare. The dare I received was:

"Make something to wear under a dress"

Of course, I have since made (and blogged) something to wear under a dress; my crinoline. However as I'd already decided to make the crinoline prior to being issued the dare (and at that point had a date/time scheduled to make it), I declared that the crinoline wouldn't count.

I am pleased to now announce that I have completed my sewing dare by sewing some undies! I have infact sewn two pairs of undies, that can be worn under all sorts of things, including a dress. (Actually I completed them a while ago, I just suck at promptly posting about things at the moment).

The first pair that I made was a fairly boring pair of black undies, using some left over jersey I'd used to make a t-shirt. To make the pattern I cut up an old pair of RTW undies that should long earlier have been thrown in the bin to trace around and get a basic pattern.

I then cut out my fabric, adding lingerie elastic to the top of the undies (above), and stretch lace around the leg holes (below), both stitched on with a zig-zag stitch.

Now, there was a GINORMOUS flaw in my plan, and I am telling you this because I want you to learn from my mistake; I didn't take into account that the undies I traced had 4-way stretch, and the fabric I used only had 2-way stretch. I'm sure you can see where this is going... the undies fit perfectly horizontally, but vertically they were, ummm, a bit lacking! So, I went back to my pattern pieces and added some length to the centre front and centre back (from memory it was about 1" to the front and 2.5" to the back).

Then I whipped up a second pair, and this time they were great! Hurrah!!! Pair of undies number 1 = complete!

Now, onto the second pair... for a while now I've wanted to try making some woven undies. I mean, how awesome would it be to have undies made from the fabric left-over from making pretty dresses! (I'm not joking!)

However, I'd never even worn woven undies to know if they'd be comfortable or not, so when I was in a bind and needed to buy some over Christmas I got the above pictured woven ones. It turned out that they're actually quite comfortable, so I proceeded with having a go at making some.

First I had to make a pattern. Now I didn't want to cut up this pair as I enjoy wearing them, so I used a cork board to stretch them out to trace out the pattern (shown mid-process above). I then added a little extra height in the centre back so as to more comfortably cover my derrière, and cut a pair out of some left over fabric from my Portrait Dress.

I did similar finishes to the bought pair, using various notions I've gathered or had in my stash. Top at the front has some lace trim stitched to it, through which I weaved some elastic:

The top of the back has lingerie elastic stitched to it with a zig-zag:

And the leg holes were finished with a narrow zig-zag over the edge of the fabric (this needs more work) and some elastic stitched about 1cm in from the edge of the fabric (again with a narrow zig-zag).

Overall I'm very happy with the outcome, and hope to make a stack more (including some Liberty ones to match a very special dress).