Prom Dress Diary 3: construction

Prom was a couple of weeks ago now, but I haven't had much time to write about my dress since then so now, here is me making the main part of my dress!

Okay so to start as I didn't buy a dress pattern to make my dress from I used the black crop top that I bought as a guide for a shape to make the top of my prom dress. So I cut the pink cotton to the shape of the top and cut pink lace to make the back. I sewed the top together with double stitched seams so they were strong as I wanted to make sure the lace would stay in place. I sewed the edges of the neckline and armholes. I used hook and eyes as fastenings on one arm.
Next, I cut the pink cotton by eye to make a long skirt and sewed plain seams down the sides. I then sewed the glitter tulle netting round in a circled and placed it over the cotton with pleats to make it fit the cotton. As I wanted the skirt of the dress to have some shape to it, I gathered it at the top before sewing it onto the top of my dress. I cut the cotton and tulle netting to the correct length and hemmed the cotton.

After I had done all this, I actually decided that I didn't like the neckline of the dress as it was so high and with the long skirt it just looked a bit too much, so I decided to cut a sort of hourglass shape through the middle of the top and inserted lace in the cutout space.

This was basically how I put my dress together and I have one more post coming on how I decorated it <3

OOTD: "No money, No family, 16 in the middle of Miami!"

My outfit for today's "Outfit of the Day" is actually now my assigned job interview outfit, and a very affordable interview outfit too, costing £13 for this little blue dress from Primark. 

The title of this outfit of the day is actually some song lyrics I've had stuck in my head for like the last week: "Work" by Iggy, so I thought why not put it as the title of this post especially as the "no money" part is quite appropriate right now after buying way too many clothes and tickets for festivals. *I regret nothing* And if you also have no money like me, for one I feel for you and two this dress is so cheap and so suitable for so many things even the "poor" (like me at the moment) can afford it! 

I've also seen this dress in quite a bright pink which looks quite nice too, the length is slightly short on me but I am 5ft10 so that's just normal for me. As far as sizing goes I am usually a size 8 but when in the shop they only had it in size 6 or 14+ so I just bought the size 6 anyway and thank goodness because of the stretchyness of the material its fits (that's the problem with Primark if you don't get there on the morning of their stock delivery all the size 8/10 and 12's are usually gone).

I would suggest that everyone should go and buy this dress as its cheap, will suit all figures, stretchy so is quite slimming, a nice colour and length, good for all weathers and plus you save £7 if you buy this dress instead of the almost identical Topshop one.

Trend: Comic Book Print

POW~~~~BOOM~~~~ZAP

Comic book print has been really popular since the new year and all the high street shops like Topshop have had loads of stuff in this style

 

One of the pieces in this style is this bodycon skirt from Topshop with animated words on it

Then the other comic trend is like an actual cartoon strip like these leggings from Polyvore.com

Personally I love this style and was happy to find all these clothes in the last five or six months!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In June last year, I made this dress :) I had thought about a dress in a comic strip style for a really long time but then I found this AMAZEBALLS fabric on etsy.com (etsy has some pretty hawt stuff by the way!) And yeah I made a shift dress from the fabric which took me about an hour and a half in total

http://www.etsy.com/search?q=etsy&view_type=gallery&ship_to=GB&utm_source=google&utm_medium=sem&utm_term=etsy_e&utm_campaign=UK_Brand_ST_Exact_etsy&mkwid=sd679swUl&pcrid=20794984111&kword=etsy&match=e&gclid=CK7JrNmGvLYCFSzKtAodWF0AqA





I wore the dress to a party and for that night I wore red shoes and made some bows out of the fabric to stick on them! I also wore these earrings from punkypins.co.uk which have a popart style face on them. Yeah, so this is the dress and me wearing it, just a post to say comic book style is coooooool and my claim on the fact I did it before Topshop so MEH!





WHOA, it's sideways...



PARTAY!







A Dress a Day 4 ~ lace black dress

I think I missed a day, but back to the dress a day! This is my black lace dress, these were really in fashion a couple of years ago which is when I got this in New Look and it was on sale, it had some holes in the lace on the arms but they were easy to fix!

I am wearing it here with my ankle boot heels that are covered in a flowery, kind of lace black fabric as it goes so well with the lace on the dress! 

This is my other 'way to wear' in which I am wearing a black leather bomber jacket and black worker boots, the boots dont actually look that good but hey! A daytime way to wear the black lace dress!

A Dress a Day 3 ~ Pink Cutout Skater Dress (and owl satchel bag)

Day 3 and it's time for this cutout skater dress....which is probably my favourite dress I own! I really love it...it is quite a casual dress but I love wearing it during the day and just think everything about it is perfect...I love the colour, shape, length, fabric and cutout detail! Ok, I'll stop raving about it now....

OH! But also when I bought it in Topshop, the tag said £55 but when I took it to the till it was £15! So yeah I kinda lush it!

'Mr Fox'

Okaaay, so here is my evening version of the dress! I am wearing it with nude high heels and my hair in a high bun. The bag is one I got for Christmas and there is a picture of it here for you to decide what animal you actaully think it is! I think it looks like an owl...but apparantly it is called a "Mr Fox Bag" and I have had people call it a squirrel and even a chipmunk! So who knows...but it is a very cool bag! I really love it, it is so cute and becuase its plain colours it actually goes with a lot of outfits and is a fun twist on an otherwise plain satchel! I am wearing my brown owl ring with it too, because I think it looks like an owl!

My daytime alternative for this dress is one of my favourite outfits. I have put the dress my H&M brown leather jacket and plain brown satchel, also from H&M (it was £20 and is a really nice shape, and much cheaper than a Cambridge Satchel...although it scracthes easily, there are so many decent satchels in high street shops for under £40) I am also wearing brown brogues from 'Mr Shoes', I think they were £19.99 and I bought them in a lighter colour but used darker brown shoe polish to get them to the colour I wanted them in, which actually worked really well! The socks are from H&M and are pink and sooo similar to the dress fabric, they have striped, almost like ribbed fabric which is just what the dress fabric is like...I was so proud when I found these socks to match it so well! When wearing this I would have brown eyeshadow and light pink lip stick or gloss to stick to brown and pink colours. The picture above shows the cutout detail on the back of the dress which is LUSH, it has a heart cutout and little buttons before the skirt starts which really adds somehting interesting yet simple to the dress. Because of the heart shaped cutout, I often wear a necklace which has a small pink heart-shape pendant on it. <3

Sooooo it's pretty clear how much I love this dress and cutout dresses are so nice and can be really flattering in the right places, especially at the sides of the waist! Skater dresses are always good and I can't wait for warmer weather so I can start wearing this out again!

A Dress a Day 2 ~ Flamingo Dress

This is my second 'Dress a Day' post and today it is about my pink flamingo print dress! I don't actually love this dress but its alright and flamingo print is cool! Its just the shape I'm not sure about...sometimes it kinda looks frumpy! But I'm blogging about all my dresses so this one is going in there anyway!

So this is an idea of how to wear it during the day, I have put it with a pink bag from Next, it matches the dress which is from New Look, as it is also printed with flamingos (yes I have a flamingo print bag to match my flamingo print dress...lets just pretend that's normal...) I am also wearing brown heeled loafers...I brought brown in because of the brown bag straps, and white socks rolled at my ankles. The shoes are from New Look. If I was wearing this out I might wear a brown leather jacket with it.

Like any good Essex girl I have busted out the white stilletos *cringe*....so here I am wearing the dress with strappy white heels which adds formality to the outfit for the evening. As it matches so well I have kept the bag.

Also I would probably wear white pearly jewelery with this to match the white in the clothes!

Oh, and the shoes are from Parmars!

To be honest, I'm pretty proud that I remembered to do this post again today! Two days in and two dresses! OH YES!

A Dress a Day 1 ~ black midi

Because I seem to have quite a lot of dresses I thought I should blog about them all, so from today until I run out of dresses I will post a 'Dress a Day' blog showing a different dress each day (I probably won't remember everyday, but as often as I can!) with a possible way I would wear the dress in the day and in the evening.

I know taking pictures in mirrors is beyond
cringey but the timer on my camera
wasn't going too well!

So for my first post, it is this black midi dress which I got today as my mum got me a dress from New Look for my birthday but it was really similar to a dress I already had so I decided to return it today for one of these midi dresses which I have always liked!

The dress is black, midi length, has full length sleeves and a round neckline. It is really plain but its simplicity means it is a fun base to dress up!

Even though it is just made of a stretch cotton fabric and has a body con fit, I think the dress has a tailored look to it and is a flattering cut for most people! I thought it may end up a little too long on me as I am fairly short but it actually ended up being about right (I am around 5'4) The dress needs to fit well so make sure you get the right size!

So here is two ways I could wear it. The left shows an evening option of velvet black high heels with the dress and my hair down. If I was actually going out I would definitely have some accessories maybe gold jewellery and the black and gold Ted Baker bag which I blogged about previously!

The daytime alternative on the right is a possible way to wear the dress, in which I am wearing it with my hair in a high messy kind of ponytail and with a brown leather jacket and nude ankle boots which have a small heel (I doubt this dress would look good at all with flat shoes!) Again I would definitely have accessories on if I was going out, such as a brown satchel.

Sooooo thats my first Dress a Day blog with one dress, and two ways to wear it! I have a lot of dresses so there should be a lot of posts! :)

Prom Dress Diary 1: Planning

So prom is on 28th June and most people (well....girls) seem to be buying their dresses now, and for a long time I have been thinking about making my own dress but because of all the exams I have at the moment I have considered that i might not have enough spare time. But to be honest I spend most of my time sitting around, watching TV, on twitter and eating Milky Bars anyway so this can't hurt! I decided to stop moaning about it and just make my prom dress....or attempt to anyway! Im gunna go for it!

I have had a design for a dress for a very long time but lately my ideas keep changing. Although I considered a dark blue like navy or midnight blue, one thing that has generally been consistant is that my dress would be pale pink. So I dont have a definite design but I have a few different ones which I will probably combine as I go along to make it. As my year 7 design & technology teacher always said "if you fail to plan then you plan to fail" and I always though "screw that!" I have a general idea in my head of what the dress will look like, and these pictures show you a few general sketches I have done of some ideas but I know I will end up changing it as I go along, so we may as well all just wait and see how it turns out when its done! And lets hope its pretty decent or else I will have to try and buy a dress last minute....that or go to prom naked....awkward!

Louise gave me this idea and I thought it sounded pretty snazzy, so as I make it I will post my 'Prom Dress Diary' to update where I am and how I've done it....and whether or not I have had a mental breakdown yet!

At the moment I have only just started, which means that I sort of have a design! And today I bought some paper flowers in pink and white from a craft shop [total of £2], which I will probably use to make a wrist corsage along with some fabric flowers I will make later on. I also bought some Dylon fabric dye in 07-powder-pink [for £5.99] which you can use as a permanent pigment to colour clothes in your washing machine at home. I got this just in case i needed it. Right now I also have some beads because I searched through my room as I knew I had some beads somewhere and found these three tubes from ages ago, which just happened to be the perfect colours!

For now, the current total cost is £7.99! Im pretty sure that making my own dress will work out cheaper than buying one and as I go along I'll work out the cost to find out if I am right! But at the moment I reckon for anyone who can or wants to, making your own prom dress will be worthwhile for cost as well as individuality!

Hopefully my dress will end up alright and at least wearable! This should be an interesting 3-ish months!

~Erin~

Wish List - Topshop cream dress

 So many other people seem to be doing wishlists as it's coming up to Christmas, so here we go...

£50 cream crystal collar flip dress - Topshop - sizes UK 6-16

I first saw this dress in a magazine I recently read and immediately loved it, so it had to be my first wishlist post. This dress is a short cream dress with short sleeves, a cream lace waist band and a crystallised collar.

I really like the simplicity of the design of the dress with the hint of something more fun and sophisticated with the lace waist band and the collar with crystals on. I would wear this dress for a more formal/ dress up occasion rather than every day, and I would wear this dress more in summer than winter as it is quite short and light coloured.

The only negatives I can think of about this piece is the fact that it's white which can get dirty easily, however this could probably be avoided by the majority of people who are careful, also the price,  £50 is slightly too expensive for what I usually spend on a dress for no particular reason, however if there was an event or party coming up I would definitely consider buying this!

Louise