Make a 1930s evening dress in 2 days

I recently made a 1930s style evening dress by drastically altering something that is fairly easy to find in most thrift shops - a 1970s maxi-dress.

Below is a full account of the transformation from '70s to '30s, and step-by-step instructions of how I did it in two days using fairly basic home sewing techniques.

First, the backstory

About a year ago I bought a 1970s maxi-dress at a thrift store (for a whopping $30 - more than I normally spend!) mainly because I liked the pretty blue floral fabric and the floaty cape around the neckline, and I figured I could 'do something with it' at some stage.

Oh the 1970s... this is pretty much what
my original dress looked like. Except blue.

No fairy godmother - I'll have to make it myself!

Fast-forward to a few days ago when I was hunting around for something dressy to wear to a vintage formal ball, and I found the forgotton maxi-dress in the back of my closet.

I decided to quickly alter the dress to make it less 1970s and more swing era style. I didn't want to spend a lot of time on it, so I figured I would nip the dress in at the waist (it was a bit loose on me, probably 1-2 sizes too big) and hem it just below the knee. Easy-peasy. Except I screwed it up.

The nipping in at the waist went fine - I took in the side seams and when that wasn't quite enough I chucked a couple of darts in the back on either side of the zipper. Then on to the hemming.

The dress is lined so first I chopped the lining off around knee-length and hemmed that so it was above the knee and wouldn't show below the dress hem. Then I measured the chopped off the dress fabric - allowing extra so that when I turned it up and hemmed it, the final hemline would sit just below the knee.

But somehow I managed to totally screw up my measurements and after I chopped the dress and tried it on again, to my horror the unhemmed length was already sitting above my knee.

Crap.

[Sidebar: I abhore dresses that sit above the knee - the only exception being authentic styled mid-twenties flapper dresses that are only jusssssst above the knee. I have a whole post to write on the subject of hemlines but that will have to wait for another day.]

My original plan was to leave the skirt quite full with just-below-the-knee hemline to create a 1940s look, but now I was in a pickle because I had cut the dress too short and was going to end up with a 1960s 'mod' dress instead.

I needed to sew my way out of this mess, so I started flipping through some vintage fashion reference books for inspiration, and came across these illustrations from "Fashions of the Thirties" by Carol Belanger Grafton, which gave me a novel idea on how I could salvage my sewing project and end up with something elegant and wearable.

1930s evening gown illustrations -
note the decorative 'flounces' along the bottom

I decided with a bit of creative alterations I could opt for a longer, narrower 1930s gown, using the extra material I had just chopped off the lining and dress to create a frilly flounce to add back the length I needed. Perfect! I wanted to be able to dance easily in the dress, so I opted for the classic 1930s mid-calf hem length rather than a sweeping floor-length gown.

Classic 1930s mid-calf hemline length - my new target

Now I just needed to figure out how exactly to execute my plan. It involved a lot of knitting of brows, fiddling of fabric and more than one cup of tea. But I made it in the end, and was really pleased with the results (considering my sewing skills are not what you'd call advanced).

Below is a step-by-step account of what I did. Apologies that there are no photos of the process - I wasn't sure if any of it was going to work out and didn't think to take photos along the way. I've included some simple diagrams and anyone with average home sewing skills and a little creativity should be able to give it a whirl.


Instructions for sewing your own 1930s style 'flounce' dress

1. Get hold of a maxi-dress from a thrift store. Choose one of a suitable fabric colour and pattern that doesn't scream '1970s'. Look for soft, muted colours and/or dainty floral patterns. Think ultra feminine and elegant. Chiffony-floaty fabric is good, not anything too heavy or coarse.

The top part of my dress was fine as is, with a nice 1930s style cape effect, so I didn't make any changes to the top. Look for a dress that is fine in the top area but just needs altering from the waist down. Also make sure it is easily take-in-able along the seams. My dress had 4 seams - 2 side, one front and one back - running the entire length of the dress.

2. Take the dress in at the waist if need be. You want it fitted throughout the waist and hips. I did this by taking in the side seams first, and when that wasn't enough I pinched and sewed a couple of vertical darts from the shoulder blade to the top of the hip, placed either side of the back zip. This nipped it in enough in the mid-section to have a nicely defined waist.

3. Cut the dress to length. I cut mine so the new unfinished hemline was sitting just above my kneecap. My ultimate goal was to end up with a classic 1930s mid-calf length dress (rather than floor length) because it would be easier to dance in. However, if you want to go for a more formal floor-length number, follow the same instructions but cut the dress a little lower. Bear in mind the lower you cut the dress, the shorter your decorative frill bit will be (unless you do it in a different fabric and don't rely on only using fabric from the original dress itself).


4. Hem the lining, if there is one, and the dress itself to finish the raw edge and stop fraying. I did a standard hem on the lining - turn it up a couple of centimetres, press, turn it up again and sew. Then I did a narrow rolled him on the dress material, leaving as much length as I could.

5. Now you've got a dress that's fitted through the waist/hips and hemmed around knee-height.

6. Take in the extra girth of the full skirt to create a narrow skirt style. To get the 1930s fishtail look from the flounce, you need the circumference of the flounce to be much greater than the circumference of the hem you're attaching it to, so you need to take as much from the current dress as possible, which also gives it a nice narrow 1930s silhouette.

My dress had 4 vertical seams, so I started by taking in the side seams from the hips down - I probably took in around 7-8 cm per side - it was quite a lot. I then took a little (2-3cm perhaps) out of the centre back seam, starting just below the buttocks, as this also has the effect of pulling the back of the dress in and making it more figure-hugging. I then took in a small amount of the front seam as well.
Now you should have a hemmed, knee-length (or thereabouts) dress with a narrow, figure-hugging style. Now we need to attach the flounce to the bottom to create a longer dress with a cool fishtail look.

7. If the dress was lined and you have the extra lining cut off in step 3, you can opt to add an extra detail to the top of the flounce. This step is optional. If you like you can just skip to step 8.

I found it a bit fiddly but I like the look it gave at the end. Essentially what I did was sew a strip of the ruffled lining back onto the dress at the hemline, then sewed the main flounce overtop, leaving 2cm of the lining material sticking out at the top.

So - first cut a strip of the lining (or other) material to about 8-10 cm and, double it over and press it. Pin the strip to the bottom of the dress so it sticks up about 2 cm from there the final flounce will eventually be attached. The strip of lining/material should be larger in circumference than the dress hem. Pin it at the sides and front/back so it is evenly distributed around the hemline. I then worked on a quarter section at a time to gather the material into ruffles and sew it in place, but if you're keen you could do it all in one go.

Using a needle and thread I ran a length of long stiches along each section and then used the ends of the thread to pull in the material and form even gathers (as you would for gathered sleeves, etc.) Once I had nice even gathers I put a few pins in to hold them in place and ran over them with the sewing machine to sew them in place.

Close-up of flounce with pleats and 'ribbon' detailing
made from the extra lining material. Click image for larger view.

(Note a bit of puckering on the vertical rear seam -
probably due to my less-than-steller sewing technique.)

8. Attaching the 'flounce'. You'll use the bit you cut off the bottom of the dress and stick it back on as a decorative flounce. First, do a rolled hem on the raw cut edge of the fabric to give it a nice finish, as this edge will be visible.

Next, pin the flounce to the dress at the front center, back center and side seams. Once again, because you've drastically taken in the original dress, the circumference of the flounce should now be greater than the dress hem and it should be 'too big' to pin on flat, i.e. when pinned at the front, sides and back the rest of the material should droop down because it's too big to fit around neatly.

The idea is to take up the extra circumference when you sew the flounce on. I did this by making pleats (but you could do ruffles like we just did for the decorative lining bit in the previous step).

How many pleats and where you put them is up to you. I put three in the front and three in the back, at the front and back centre seams and in-between the front/back centre seams and the side seams.

I did reverse pleats, but really you can do whatever you like. The idea is to just nicely gather the excess baggage along the current hemline so that the flounce fishtails out from a small circle to a large circle when you're done.

I pinned the flounce in place (including pinning the pleats where I wanted them), then topstitched all the way around, just below the rolled hem.

et voila! A very cute 1930s style frock, ready to wear to the ball!

The finished dress, front and back.
It was highly dance-able at the ball and
got lots of compliments - mission accomplished!

If anyone else out there is inspired enough to have a go, has suggestions and/or has their own alteration techniques to share, do drop me a line at sharonblance@gmail.com. Send photos!