Drape a CUSTOM FIT Victorian Bodice Block ft.

Hello everyone, you're probably wondering why Lilia Husmo is in my house, well she's actually visiting at the moment so I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to show you all something really interesting. Today we're going to be doing a basic bodice block for Victorian dressmaking and we're going to make it perfectly fitted to Vasi and we're going to show you how you can do it too. Yep, so that way all you're going to need is some basic supplies and a little bit of beginner sewing knowledge and then Lilia's amazing instructions and then you can make your own and of course you do need a friend as well. So to make this bodice block you will need scissors, something to mark with, a pen, pencil, pins and fabric and you will need a friend, which is Lilia in this case, not me. Depending on who you want to make it for. Yeah, exactly, because you can also make this on someone else for their own custom size too. You have to be wearing your historical underwear. That's why I'm in my underwear. Yes, how embarrassing. Whatever silhouette you decide on or whatever era you want to have the inner garments because imagine if this is going to be a bodice on top of that, you want to make sure that everything will be to the right measurements. Lilia, do you want to tell them firstly what a bodice block is? Oh yeah, that might actually be it. A bodice block is a pattern created specifically to your body. So we will be using Vasi's exact shape to create a pattern that she can then take and use to create loads of bodices. We will be making one specifically for the 1860s. Yeah, sort of mid-Victorian, 1840s, 1860s, when the sleeve is basically still dropped. Yeah, so we will be basically having a look at this lady here as a reference and look at where the shoulder seams, side seams and such is so that we get the 1860s look. And so that we can have the right style lines as well. So this 1860s bodice is one that I made off a commercial pattern and it's built up of two primary pieces on the back. It's the centre back piece, which is cut on the fold. So we're going to stop it here at the centre. And then it's these side pieces. So we're going to now create the centre piece and the side piece as well. So that way it's custom fit to my own measurements. First off, fabric. Take a bit of fabric and just like, bend that down, do a little snip. Was that fun? It was. Did it help you get some like, feelings out? Yes! Take a pin. Very careful not to pin your friend here, because that would be very not fun. I'm going to lean this up here, in the middle. See where the neckline is there, on that one. You want the neckline to be about here? Yep, that's perfect. The other thing that the underwear helps with is it creates a layer to pin everything onto. Yes. Which is great. Yeah, because you can't really do this without something to pin to, otherwise you don't want to be stabbing your body with pins. But yeah, so I'm just laying the straight line here, it's the waistline. Now, you want to be working from the waistline, up and then down again. So basically, this one sits flat here, like that, and then you'll find where you want the shoulder to be. Here's the shoulder seam, you can see it go kind of more towards the back than you would on a modern blouse, usually a modern bodice would be here, but we want it to be slightly further back. So here is your natural, and we want it to be about there, maybe. Then we'll just mark from, and you can clean up these lines later, but you just want to mark where the seam line is supposed to be. And then the shoulder line, right, where do you want the... You're like right about here. About here? Yeah. Alrighty, I'm going to cut off this fabric here, you want to make sure that this is like as flat as you want it, and if you, you're supposed to get a pleat here, that is common because usually this measure is bigger than this measure, so just let that one be there for now. About there, we'll go from about there. And if you make a mistake and like cut anything off that you shouldn't have, you can just add more fabric and just like pin it on and then deal with that later on in. This is just a rough guide to help start to get the shapes. You can see the side seam here, that's what we're going for. So we want that to go under there. You can see here, I kind of want a little bit more there. So I take some fabric, just under your arm there, and then we can draw the arm's eye. I know English, I promise. The arm's eye. The arm's eye, yes. Then we can draw the arm's eye. Oh, sorry, did I slap you there? No. I can't feel it because of the corset. Smart. Yeah. That's another reason why it's good to wear your underwear under this. Yes, be careful not to stab your friend with pins. That one you just said went through to my shift layer, I could feel it. Now, you'll see a little bulk here, so I'm going to basically make that one fit onto the other paper. Fabric, like that. And then here is then where we will create this princess seam line. Basically treating these two pieces of fabric as one piece of fabric for now. Dee dee. I'm trying really hard not to stab you. There we go. We want it to be. We're not going to add seam allowances until after the pattern is on. We'll deal with seam allowances later. I'm just doing little cuts here, because obviously, so that we can get a flat surface to work with. Just do little snips, it just really helps to relieve the tension. Same with curved seams, you can just do little notches, help just release all that tension for you to be able to sew it easier. Now we've here pinned a little princess seam that goes from the back at the waist here up to the sleeve here. So now we're going to draw on both sides of the little tuck, so that we're sure we don't lose the lines when we take this off the body later. Also, you only need to do one half of the body. Yes, because the other half will be symmetrical. So you only need to do one side, and then you copy that for the other side. Add a couple more pins in the back here so it stays. And then we've got seam number one. Now we're going to continue the sleeve here towards the side seam. Now the side seam is here, quite sideways at the side of the bodice, and we're going to copy that for this one. We already drew this bit, so we're going to draw it. It's better to make the sleeve hole a little bit tight than too big, because it's easier to just carve more out than it is to add. The closer your sleeve is as well to your armpit, the more arm movement you get. It's counterintuitive, but it's actually what happens. So it's better if they're tighter. Yeah, you want them to be nice and close. All right, and then we've drawn the side seam here. I'm just going to do a little snip there so it lies nicely at the bottom. All right, now we have the back, and then we're going to move on to the front. I'm just going to trim the fabric that's extra here, just so it's not in the way. All right, so we need to give ourselves enough at the top so that it can overlap in the back here. So it's going to feel a little bit too high for this. Yeah, it'll feel like it's a very high neckline. Yeah, but we'll take that down. It won't be like this forever. I'm just going to fasten it up here so that that is holding it. I should pick another one. It's like a pretty dress. It's a very bent pin. Really bent. It's because I was shoving it into this giant piece of wool, and it just bent the entire pin. Fair. Center front here. Minus seam allowances. Yeah, just lay it exactly on the center front. It's getting a bit like the thing you see wearing with the easy buttons as approximations of center front. Good point. Another reason why you should wear your underwear. Yeah, again, just nice and flat. It needs to be nice and smooth. Yes, smooth bodice. We're going to take the one we just fastened up here out again, just because now we have a better line to go from, because we fastened it at the front. I'm still going to just be at the front here. Now, you can tell it's pulling here, and we're going to snip into that and release the tension there and create the neckline. It's also, I think, better to draft it higher, because then if you want a lower neckline, it's much easier to change that style line. Yeah, definitely. Then I'm just going to... It's a weird feeling. I've never had someone draw my neck before. Yeah, and we're going to just snip along there. I really trust you. Sorry, I've got my fingers between either way, so it won't get a little bit too much on that side. But that's fine, because we can just... Hit you in the face there. So that goes there. I'll pin that without pinning you. All right, there. And then I'm going to fasten it up at your neckline. And then you're just wanting to make sure that this is all smooth. Otherwise, you're going to get bulks in your final thing. This is a really challenging thing with fitting commercial patterns, too, is the neckline area is really hard on mid-Victorian. So this is where this type of technique really has a major benefit. And this is how dresses were originally made during that era. It is true. It is very historical. Yeah, they weren't flat patterned, generally. I'm just taking off a little bit of length so it's not in the way. Here's going to be the other seam. So we're just going to lean that over the line we drew earlier. And pin it down so that it stays in place. So we're wanting the sleeve to go kind of across here. It's better to make it a little bit big and then you can take it in when you're cutting afterwards. It's just so that you can move it. Pop that one. It's supposed to be flat from here and to here. So this is the most important place to get smooth now. And then we'll pin that for now. And then we'll go back and do it more properly afterwards. The fine-tuning. Yes, the fine-tuning later. You just released a little tension there. Yeah, just so that that doesn't pull as much. Now we can draw what we want. The sleeve seems to be exactly... I would say this is probably one of the harder historical garments to drape as well. Yeah, I think the shoulder seam being so low makes it a little bit more difficult. But it's easier if the shoulder seam is... Is here. Yes. Like in the late Victorian era. Wanting the sleeve to be here. All right, so I'm going to do a little tuck here. We're going to take that out of the pattern later when we're transferring it onto a paper pattern. Take that now. Here we've got obviously a little bit of bulk. But that's going to... If you raise your arm a bit. Just going to snip off the excess here. Basically just snip and release the tension where it wants to release. That's very helpful. But you might actually understand what I'm saying when you're doing it. You can kind of see where the tension is. And it's good to do small cuts at a time. And just like work your way to more. To taking out more and more. See now the tension here is... We're looking pretty identical. Yeah. Getting there. I always have a bit of billowing here. Because I'm so narrow backed. That's also quite common. And you can avoid that by adding padding here. Yeah. Victorians did that sometimes. Yeah, I pad out most of my chest area for pretty much all of my mid-Victorian garments. Yeah, because no one really naturally has that perfectly even side to notice it. Oh really? I thought my bosom was all the way up here. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is that all right movement you have there? Yeah, it's perfect. Do you want me to take in a little bit here? Or do you think that's... Yeah, maybe if we can just pleat it. Maybe like to there. Cool, I'll take in a bit more. Yeah. We'll take that out of the pattern when we're transferring. And that's the great thing is you can really customize it depending on what you want. Because neither option is right or wrong. It's just depending on your preference. Yeah. Just making it look like what your reference or what your want looks like. Now we're going to do the dart. Can you explain why you would choose one or two darts? It really depends on the style you want. Usually, if you're having quite a mid-Victorian corset, that sometimes creates more of a coney shape rather than slightly later where it's more hourglass. Yeah. And just different styles create different tensions in different places. So let's say if we do one pleat like that, that's going to be quite a steep traction there. But that is a look that sometimes is used. But if we do two, the pleat will end lower down. So it won't go as high up. Yeah, it'll be softer. Yeah, it'll be smaller, softer pleats. I've seen bodices as well from the era with three darts. Yeah. Which is quite interesting. That's probably also from someone who has a high chest to waist ratio. Right, of course. Because the more difference, the more you have to take it in. I think we're trying to place them about here, just right under the bust. And stop them before the apex of the bust, I guess. So what I do usually, I just basically just cinch in, squeeze there, hold one, and pin the other. I can hold one. The good thing about having two people is you can have one person do one thing. I'm pinning just outwards. I'm just pinning the bottom first, and then I'll pin the other one. I'm just making sure that it doesn't pull too much from this side. Yeah, that makes sense. And then I'll do some snips to relieve some tension. Because we're not going to use this bit. If we were, we would have also snipped, but made sure that there's a gore there. And then we're just going to pin the pleats. Basically do that. And just pin where it wants to form. Where the pleat will naturally kind of taper. Like that. You can see that this creates the sort of two lovely little pleats that come from the waist and upwards. And just basically pin until you can't pin. So it ends about there. Yeah, it usually ends just below the apex. And then that is now. It feels really good to have good arm movement. Everyone thinks you can't move your arms in Victorian bodices, but that's not true. And then we're going to draw this seam. I'm just going to find the line that I drew earlier. Where is that? That's underneath. Oh, actually kind of see-through. That's nice. And we can do that. Yeah, if you use slightly see-through twill fabric, then you can see your other lines, which is really helpful. Yeah, when you're overlaying things. And then we've got the waist here. We'll move the waist. Draw it all the way around. Where would you like it to end? On the front, just like here? Yeah, that's good. I'm so short-waisted. And then we're going to draw the pleats that we did, just the same as the princess seam on the back. Draw on each side of it, so that if we drop any pins, all the markings will still be there. Trim a bit here, so we can make sure that when there's less tension, that everything lies where it should be. All right. Around here, I'm going to trim a bit on the back too. And again, this is no seam allowances, which is why it seems so short. Yes, when you transfer it onto paper later, you will have to add seam allowances, because it's not included. This is literally tight to your body, like a second skin. I might take this princess seam just a little bit in from where it was, just because now we've relieved some tension. It's just moved a little. There we go. Then we're going to do the sleeve. It's the part that no one ever shows. It's the difficult bit, that's why. So I'm taking an old sock, and I'm just going to cut the head of it. The toe, sorry, not the head. Chop its head off. You can do this with tights as well, just the sock is what I had. It's also like if you have a tight top, like a normal modern top, it's just so that we can pin to it. And this is so that you basically become a dress form. This looks so funny on my arm. Different sleeves obviously have different style lines. So for this era, there was a few options. There were bishop sleeves, goda sleeves, there was the coat sleeve like this one. But I'm going to go for a pagoda sleeve, because it's not gathered at the wrist, so it's a little bit easier. But it is close fit here at the top. If you wanted to make a bishop sleeve, it would be gathered at the top and the bottom. If you want to make a coat sleeve, it's neither gathered at the bottom nor the top. So I think we should start with the bottom. I'm just going to keep right at my armpit. Because we're going to cut that off later. And I'm going to pin, fasten it here at the back, so it can hang there. And then at the front as well. And that's just so that we can see where it needs to be cut basically. Then if you hold your hand straight out, do a little snip up to relieve the tension there. That one goes up there. And that one as well gets pinned. Up here, just to hold it while we create the armscye. And I'm just going to go in and do little snips. So we're just going to basically snip it until it fits the armscye that we made earlier. And snip it in a lot of different little pieces. It's easier to manage a little bit less. Let me know if you get tired holding your arm up. It's good for my muscles. Strength exercise. Yeah. Plus the sock on my arm kind of feels nice. It's sort of compression-y. Like a little hug. Yeah, a little hug on my arm. You can kind of see the one we made here. And this again is the seam line, not the including seam allowance. I'm going to cheekily pin this basically on the seam line here. Not trim it all the way down yet. And then that's just pinned on the seam line there. Now this will be the undersleeve. So we need to decide where we want the sleeve seam to be. So this is going to be a two-piece sleeve. Because otherwise we wouldn't have enough fabric. Right. You can make it one later. You just would connect the pieces basically. If you have enough fabric you might want to do it just in one. Now I'm going to hold this here. It could turn a little bit that way. Since this is fitted. So now it's pinned under here. And you can kind of see through where we placed the sleeve. Now let's say we put the seam kind of here. And then on the front we do the opposite. Hold that. Feels like I have elves in sleeves right now with how long they are and they're split. Yeah, they're now going to not be longer anymore. Then we're going to take our top piece of the sleeve. And since it's fitted we're going to give myself a little bit of space. Because the sleeve head might be a little bit bigger. Pop that there. And how large are these pieces you're cutting? However large they need to be. Okay. Basically this wide and as long as the arm. You kind of just have to see. Just hold the fabric up towards the arm and see how much fabric would I need to create a sleeve. Lean that one along here. And pin it to the sleeve head we made earlier. The sleeve head, no, the arm side. Top of arm side. It's a sleeve head. Yeah. Technically. Yeah, just the other side of the sleeve head. What the sleeve head connects to. I'm going to trim off a little bit here so I can see what I'm doing. Just where the... A little bit further out than the line I did. And then it goes there. Alright. Get that in. Now we've got a sleeve head and under the sleeve bottom. Sleeve toes. This is a pretty sleeve. It's kind of like fancy. Then I'm going to draw the sleeve head here. And it's just matching up right with the arm side. Yes, just right on that line. Pin together here those guys. Then the two sleeve pieces so that they meet. And ease some tension here so that doesn't... Now you want it to be quite fitted at the top and then go into a wide. Exactly. We do a similar thing that we do with the darts. Just pinch that until it's closer to the skin. You hold there and pin it. Now the first side is going to be a little bit like... Because it doesn't have anything to pull against on the other side. That's fine. We can go back and redo it once we've done the other side too. So I'm just going to do that. And in a nice straight little line there. Just where the sleeve wants to fall. In there. Alright. Then we do the front of the sleeve. I'm going to go on that side so I can see what we're doing. I'm going to tuck this guy to the outside. Just so that the seam line there. And then we can start kind of pulling a bit. Seeing where do we want it to sit. Down here. Wait, no, that's the sock. Where's your elbow? It was right here. Okay, there. That's my elbow. Okay, I'm going to pin that to mark it. Just to the sock so that it keeps there. We're going to create that kind of nice... Pagoda bell. And it normally stops about here on the wrist. Yeah, so you would mark where you want it to go to. About there. Yeah, because you wear an undersleeve generally. You might notice I've changed my outfit. And that's not part of the tutorial. That's because I spelled soup on myself. So scratch that out to your notes. You don't have to have an outfit change. Basically, I'm going to cut this off so I can see a bit more. But I don't want to cut off too much. So I'm just popping it together here. I'm going to cut off this extra piece that's in the way. In the way. Also, cutting off the excess I've seen really helps to reduce some of that tension as well. Yeah. Just because it's less fabric that has to be pulled. And then I'm going to cut some excess on the back too. Just, you know, give it... Satisfying. And then it looks a bit more sleevy. Sleevy. That's not... It looks sleevy. Yeah, maybe like... Like that? Yeah. Cool. The thing is, it probably would have just been up to whoever was wearing it as well. Some people would have probably liked more of a bell and other people probably less. Yeah. You can suit these very much to your taste. Alright, you can kind of start to see the shape. I'm going to cut off here so we can see your wrist a bit. Please don't cut my finger. Oh, worse. Things just got really dark on this channel. Yes. It's a good bonding experience, you know. If you want to get closer to your friends. It's like a trust fold. Yeah, yeah. But with scissors. That's starting to look quite nice. I'm going to give you a bit more space here so that you get more... More sleeve. Pretty. And then that one somewhere in the middle here. Like that. Alright. And then I'm just going to tidy up properly here. So that. See, and then the other side. Alright. And then we're going to draw the sleeve. Draw this guy here. I'm just going to mark this F and this B. Front and back. So that you have your fronts and backs. Yeah, because it's totally fun setting in the wrong sleeves. Yep. We all love doing that. It always happens. I actually did that on my blouse I was wearing earlier. I put the sleeves in backwards. To be fair, they were very, very even. So it doesn't really matter. So I'm not going to redo it. Yeah, no point. And remember, draw on both sides of the seam. Otherwise, you won't be able to see where... Where to meet the two. Yes, where to... Where they could join. When you actually get the pattern down on paper, you can make them bigger if you want. And you can shape them a little bit. Because then you have where your arm is. Then you can add a little bit if you want. You can see here we don't really have any fabric here. That's fine. We'll just add some fabric. So we do that. Humming I just have a lot of... There's a lot of noise in my brain. It needs to come out sometimes. I'm just nipping off any excess here because we only need a little bit. It's almost like getting your hair cut. Yeah. It's all going to the ground as well. We're going to draw on the line here where that one goes up this shoulder seam so that we have that. And then we can draw the neckline. So we'll start here where we want the corner to be. And where would you like it? Like here? Yeah, that's great. Along the collarbone. Here? Mm-hmm. And then end about here? Yep. Oops. I just drew on you. It's gone. I got it. So much of the mid-Victorian stuff doesn't have a collar so we're not going to do a collar? No. You could just use the neckline to create the collar and the block. Yeah. And the neckline. Be so nice and steady. And then I'm just going to split where I have the seam here, the collar, the non-collar. Just the piece here so that it's easier to trace it later on. We're going to take this off and then we're going to trace it. And basically, we're going to take out as little pins as we have to to get out of it, just to make sure that we have everything we need. And then we can afterwards take out all the pins. Whoa, there's my sock arm. Yay. Stunning. Didn't actually need to use it as much because it's not as fitted a sleeve. Good point. It's like a bell. A pagoda bell. Yes. The shape of it. Yeah, the shape of the curve. Pin here. And you can use this method for a dress form as well. It's just that most of the time, dress forms are not the right size for a person because they're not generally custom unless you get a custom one. So this kind of just makes it so that you don't need to go in and actually refit your pattern that you make off of a dress form. You want it to actually fit you. But if you have a custom dress form, this is a really good way to just do it the exact same way, but on your dress form. Got it. Don't know where it went, but I got it. There you go. Like that. And then we're just going to clean it up at the lines. And then we can transfer onto paper and add seam allowance. And then you've got a bodice block perfect fitted to you. Or your dress form. Or someone else. Now we're going to transfer our bodice block onto a pattern and clean up the lines and such. So first off, I'm going to take out the pins that are creating the darts. Now I've got a little guy here that's a little bit where we took in the width of the sleeve a bit. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to do that. Snip in a bit. I'm going to make that seam a rounded seam instead of a straight one. Like that. Now we're going to clean up stuff. So I'm going to snip here along the side seam that we drew. And along the waist here. And then I'm going to just cut open the dart here. That one up with the front. More rounded shoulder seam. And then we just trace around it. And if you have French curves and a ruler, that's actually better to follow these lines. But I'm just for showing. And here you can see it's a little bit awkward. But this will smooth it out and not go into like a little divot there. We'll ignore that and just make it nice and smooth. Up here. And then we repeat that for all the pieces. Cleaning up and tracing. And then you've got a bodice block.