A Fashion Planner: The Little Black Dress Project

This week I am working on a fashion competition garment for The Little Black Dress Project sponsored by The Neal Hamil Agency in collaboration with the Fashion Group International of Houston. A little fun fact from my fashion history class is that the little black dress was introduced to us by none other than Coco Chanel in the 1920s . Ever since, the little black dress has become every women's staple item in her closet. It can be dressed up for cocktails or evening occasions, or dressed down for day wear and lunch outings.
This competition challenge designers to to once again reinvent and create their own version of the little black dress.

I thought it would be fun to show my lovely readers my process of creating this design, from the original sketch to the finished garment.

I was inspired by the artist Carlo Zinelli from the Art Brut Movement. This art movement stems from the the idea of mental institutions. The subject matters are usually dark, illustrated by rough and rugged scribbles, doodles, and writings.

This is my favorite painting from Zinelli that I found during my research, which I used as my sole inspiration behind my little black dress design.

I created a series of thumbnails sketches with a variety of silhouettes and techniques before I decided to go with this design. This fashion illustration is a water color painting on paper, combined with some finishing touches of pen and ink.

My design features a classic 20's silhouettes with a contemporary cut out square back. I used black cotton fabric with a genuine leather neck line. The design utilize ruffles sewn together to create the poof skirt, topped off with intricate hand beading and hand sewn yarns and fibers to create contrasting textures on the the bodice.

The 1st step in designing this garment is draping and patterning the garment. Then a muslin is created to check the fit and construction issues before it is made with the final fabric.

After any problems with the pattern are corrected, the final fabric was cut and sewn together to create the front and back bodice.

Next is the fun - but tedious part - cutting out the ruffles. Each ruffle is cut from a circle to create a wave as it falls from the skirt hemline. I believe several hundreds of ruffles was cut... I have lost count...

All the ruffles are then arranged to fit to the hemline, and then sewn together.

Last but not least, beading, beading, beading...
I went and dug through my basket of trims and pulled out everything black, gray, and silver that can be used to bead and create textures. I also went to buy some additional glass beads from Joann Fabrics and Crafts store.