#60: Angelic Red Lace Dress

Hey everyone. Welcome to today's post. Let's get straight to it.

I picked up this red lace dress at a thrift store a few months ago, and I finally made time to transform it.

Before: Red Lace Dress

Before: From Behind

Maybe it was a bridesmaid dress, or maybe a choir dress. I don't know, but it certainly had me feeling angelic ;)

Angelic

 I love lace, but this dress was no longer in style. I found a backless lace dress at the store that I wanted to model this after to make it more modern.

The inspiration dress

My first move was to remove the sleeves and take it in on the sides.

Sleeves gone, cutting off some width.

I wasn't liking the shape of the neckline, so I next took a seam ripper and separated the shiny under layer from the lacy outer shell at the neck and shoulders.

Separating the layers

I took the outer lace and re-shaped the neckline to a simple scooped neck.

Reshaping the neckline

After sewing the new neckline and arm holes and cutting the excess, I then re-shaped the inner layer to allow for a detached sweetheart neckline underneath the lace.

Pinning a new under layer neckline

Once I had sewn and cut the new neckline, I made a more dipped effect at the bust by hand-stitching a straight stitch at the center of the shiny layer a few inches down, then pulled the thread taut to create a small ruching effect.

Simple ruching to make a bigger dip in the sweetheart neckline

After the front was done, I began working on the back. Like in the inspiration picture, I like the backless look with only the lace covering the back. However, as a woman with substantial bust-age, I have to wear a bra, and I don't like the tacky look of the bra through the lace, so I decided to add a panel across where my bra would go.

To do this, I separated the shiny under layer from the zipper, and marked out where I would cut out the scooped back, leaving the bra-covering strip in tact.  Then I cut and sewed around the new openings.

Cutting and pinning a peek-a-boo back

Once I had re-sewn the zipper in place with the back the way I wanted, I cut some length from the bottom of the dress.

Making it shorter

I attempted to shape it in a way that's longer in back than in front, but turned out funky, so I ended up making it shorter than I originally intended. Oh well.

Finally, after a few more size adjustments and darts at the bust to reduce gaping, the dress was done.

I added some red rose accessories and a matching ribbon at the waist, and I had an outfit I got to wear to my friends' baby shower over the weekend!


Here again is the original dress:

Before: Angelic Red Lace Dress

Before: From Behind

And here's the new look:

After: Red Lace Party Dress

After: From behind

I'm not yet fully happy with the fit, with how I look in the dress, or with the lighting of the pictures, but I never claimed to be perfect and I felt confident as I wore it. Most of all, I had fun!

I hope each of you takes with you this week that you are perfect just as you are, flaws and all.

Standing perfectly-imperfect with you, let's enjoy the day.

Until next time, blessings.