Monday 10 March 2014

Georgia dress FBA

When it was released last year, the By Hand London girls very kindly sent me a copy of the Georgia dress to try out. Although I LOVED the bombshell look of the dress, my initial reaction was one of panic. It was so fitted, so party girl, so slinky - when would I ever have an occasion to wear a dress like this? I soon talked myself into making it though, how could I not when it has such a lovely va-va voom shape?! The very fitted bodice meant that I'd have to do quite a bit of fiddling to get it to fit. So a practice muslin AND a full bust adjustment were both essential - no fudging this one.


Following discussions with my almost-size-twin, Roisin (sadly for me she's lost weight recently, which means I can't just automatically copy the pattern size she uses!) I cut a UK size 10. This is one size down from my measurements because of the stretchiness of the fabric I chose. The fabric is a lovely navy floral pique, from the same family of fabrics as my grey rose fabric used here. It does have quite a bit more stretch to it than woven calico, so I made sure I bought enough fabric to make the bodice muslin in my actual shell fabric.

After scrutinising the Georgia sew along posts, it turned out that I needed a one inch FBA. This was super simple to do as you're only actually adjusting two pattern pieces - the bodice side front and the  bodice centre front. Here are the original pattern pieces…


All I did was make a hinge in each one.

The red pen shows the adjustments made
My first muslin fitted perfectly in the cups and across the back, but rode up too high at the centre of the bust. I remedied this by adding a ⅝" wedge starting at the bottom of the bodice centre front piece and tapering out to the cup seam, so that the fit of the cup wasn't compromised. You can see this adjustment at the bottom of pattern piece A above.

It worked!! I did take photos of me actually wearing the bodice muslin but believe me, so much white/blue flesh on display was NOT a pretty sight… You'll have to make do with Angie who's padded out to resemble me.



That's the only major adjustment I made to the pattern and it really wasn't as bad as I thought. I'm curious to know if a FBA on a plain darted bodice will be just as straight forward? I guess there's only one way to find out! Next up: the finished dress. x



13 comments:

  1. can't wait to see the final dress!

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  2. oooh! How exiting! Cant wait to see the rest!

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  3. Lovely fabric and the finish on the bodice cup is immaculate, Looking forward to seeing your finished little black (summer) dress.

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  4. Can't wait to see the finished dress as I'm waaay too scared to make this. Don't think it can handle my 32G's! *blush* Looks like it's going to be a beauty, love the texture of the fabric.

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  5. Good luck with the georgia dress can't wait to see it finished.

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  6. The bodice looks great. Pardon my ignorance, what is a FBA ?

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    1. Sorry, it's a Full Bust Adjustment. I referred to by its full name in the first paragraph and then went straight to abbreviations! It's a way of adding extra room to the front bodice for those with a larger bust, without adding to the back bodice. So you're only adjusting the 'bust' bits of the pattern! Hope that helps. x

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    2. Glad you asked this question ;-)

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  7. That's looks great! I did four musliins to figure out my georgia bodice. Even after that, my cup seams never looked as smooth as yours!

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  8. I just ordered this pattern today and I know I will need to do a FBA...so you didn't need to add a dart? It looks like you just added extra space to the pattern piece. Is that right?

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  9. Yes that's right. The two pieces are joined together at the curve to make a bodice cup piece, with the curved seam providing the shaping. I think a bodice with darts is more complicated but I'll post about it when I get round to doing one! Here's the full bust and small bust adjustment link from the By Hand sewalong which might be helpful. x
    http://byhandlondon.com/blogs/sew-alongs/12031569-georgia-dress-sewalong-3-full-small-bust-adjustments-fba-sba

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  10. Thanks again for posting this - i've pinned it now for when I go to make mine :) I've done a ton of FBA's on regular bodices, but it's a whole different alteration on a different kind of pattern, isn't it? :) I had to fudge my way through drafting whole new pieces when I did the bombshell dress, and I was kind of afraid the Georgia would be the same so it's comforting to know it's a bit more straightforward than that one LOL ^__^

    Your dress looks great so far, and i love the fabric! :D

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