Vintage Vixen

Back in December I made a Christmas dress for Brooklyn from the scraps of another dress I had made for a competition. We couldn't show the dress at the time, but now that the contest is over it's fair game for the public to see- so I thought I'd share a couple pics of "Vintage Vixen".

The competition was the American Quilters Society (AQS) Hobbs/Bonded Fiber Competition & Fashion Show in Paducah, Kentucky. I flew there with my advisor and two other girls from the class who also had submitted dresses. The only catch for the competition is that you had to construct something that was quilted, but wearable. I chose to do a gown because that's the last thing I think of that would have batting in it and be quilted... but I wasn't the only competitor on that same mind track, there were quite a few dresses.

I didn't win anything, but I'm proud to have placed somewhere in the top nine of an international competition. One of the girls I went with got first place in the amateur division. I'm still really pleased with the entire result, it was a great experience and my last hoorah before graduation!

Vintage Vixen on Natalie (my model for the pictures and also the gal that got first with her own dress)

Detail of the godets in the skirt - I machine embroidered floral designs and stippled (the swirly stuff) with metallic thread

Detail of the bodice - I stippled the bodice with metallic thread then added 3-D flowers for dimension. I created each flower by a technique called Tsunami Kanzashi (much like oragami) where I had squares of my fabrics and folded tiny petals, then strung them together to create a flower

There's no way I'll ever fit into the dress- so this was my model at the competition! The dress was slightly too big on her and she had a hard time getting down stairs with four petticoats on, but otherwise she did a great job