Well, I've been at it again, because I just can't sit and do nothing for long stretches of time; I have to have a project. It doesn't have to be hard, although it usually is, but I have to be busy at something. It's often exhausting, but it's never dull and if forced to choose between busyness or boredom, I choose busyness every single time.
So, ever since I first saw the Venus print at Selkie last year, I've been wishing they would put it on a dress that I could wear to work or date night, but all I saw were three gorgeously impractical dresses: The Ritz, the Moonlight, and the Dream Girl.
This decision was followed by a months of searching and waiting before I managed to snag a Dream Girl dress on a resale site for a huge bargain. For over $100 off the retail price, I felt comfortable cutting into and possibly ruining this dress. Fortunately I didn't ruin it as you can see from the following pic:
The Dream Girl dress runs quite large and the combination floppy/puffy sleeves make layering impossible. So, my goal was to take in the dress to have a fitted bodice and waist and to change out the sleeves for something a little less bouffant.
In order to adjust the fit, I took in two inches under each arm and two inches on either side of the zipper for a total of eight inches off the width of the dress. I could probably have taken off two more, but I didn't want to press my luck.
As much as I hoped I could install a pre-made corset back to this dress, it was simply too big for that to be feasible although I do hope to put it on my Ritz dress instead since I ordered one that perfectly matches the color of the dress.
The sleeves of this dress were cut off my Moonlight dupe and sewn on by hand. While I can tell that the fabric is slightly darker than the original and one sleeve has a wavy pattern to it that may or may not come out with a good steam, overall, I love the look and I can finally put a sweater over it.
Beyond that, check out this waist, would ya?! Mostly check out the fact that this dress now has one! I bought this dress on resale as XS, I could have gone down to XXS and it still would have been quite baggy because that's the style of the dress, but I could hardly believe that 8" had to come off and I love the fit so much better now.
My clothes need a defined waist. Baggy clothes make your body do all the work, which is fine if you've got the body for it. I disappear in baggy clothes because I just don't have the top curves to bring balance to my shape which means my clothes need to do all the work for me.
Before, my shape was falling hopelessly short in this dress and I hated the way it looked on my. Now I love it, I love the fit and the colors and everything about it, all because of a few small changes that made this Dream Girl dress into just my dream dress.
It's not perfect by any means, I'm not a professional seamstress, though if I keep doing projects like this (I also just finished altering four corsets by hand) I'll certainly keep leveling up. And, although I spend most of my time cursing my own ambition to keep doing projects like this, by the end, I'm so happy with results that I can't help but do it all over again when the creativity calls.
Shopping Info: Selkie Venus Dream Girl Dress-$249, belt from Shein, Rekayla Flats from Amazon, XXI Cardi from ThredUp
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