Tangerine Silk Dress

When I was in India two summers ago for my brother’s wedding, I bought a bunch of gorgeous raw silk for about $7/yard. This particular silk looks orange in one light and pink in others. The fabrics in India are AMAZING!

That summer, I was living in Vienna, and decided to sew this dress: (ignore crazy face I am making. This is the only decent photo I have of me wearing this dress that shows the whole thing):

The red-eye fix makes me look a little weird in this pic, but the real point is so you can see this dress.

I didn’t have a pattern, so I sort of made one up, based on some free patterns I found online. BTW, Burdastyle.com is a great online sewing resource. I also did not have a sewing machine, therefore every stitch in this dress is done by hand. This dress even has an INVISIBLE ZIPPER! Excuse me for a moment while I pat myself on the back some more.

OK. So clearly I need to take more BETTER pictures of this dress, but you get the idea. I am amazing and hand-sewed this gorgeous raw silk dress without a pattern and have actually worn it to two different events.

Have you ever sewn a dress?

Love,

Rachel

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Steel Magnolias Clutch

I made this clutch two summers ago, before I started blogging. Thus, I don’t have any pictures of the process. But I love how this thing turned out. It was a birthday present for my old roommate.

It’s all hand-sewn, as are most of my sewing projects, because I didn’t have a sewing machine that summer. Also, for small, intricate projects like this, I prefer hand-sewing because I feel more in control. I may or may not be a little scared of sewing machines.

Pretty purple liner.

I bought the fabric from the remnant section of a great fabric store in Vienna, on Mariahilfestrasse. I recently discovered I will be going back to Vienna this summer. I cannot wait to go antiquing in Vienna. I mean, Vienna practically invented the antique.  But I digress.

The two types of flowers I think make this bag really special. I used the yo-yo flower for this picture frame. The other flower was from my own pattern. Maybe someday I will get my act together enough to teach you how I made the flowers. And how I made the whole clutch.  It wasn’t hard, but is was time-consuming because I had to sew each flower petal separately.

Hope you enjoy!

Love,

Rachel