Story of A Seamstress is hosting a Historical Inspiration Costume Festival. She has kindly invited doll costumers to participate – so I’m putting up a couple of of my ‘historically inspired’ outfits!
Introducing Lily:
![3/4 view of an american girl doll wearing a regency ballgown](https://www.sewwhathappens.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/DSC_9143.jpg)
This regency ballgown was sewn for Felicity during a rather necessary distraction from reality during my final fortnight of grad school presentations. Unsurprisingly, is a impressive mess of bad construction decisions (and no lining under that crepe silk bodice? Really?!)
I love it anyway.
This gown was inspired by this c.1815 color plate of a lavender ballgown decorated with large clusters of flowers:
![1815 Fashion plate showing a lavender regency ballgown with a white underpetticoat](https://www.sewwhathappens.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/regency-dress1.jpg)
The pattern for this ball gown was based on Josefina’s Christmas dress from Pleasant Company, with some tweaking to the sleeves. The underskirt and under-sleeves are sewn from white silk charmeuse, and the overdress of lavender silk crepe and i did something rather foolish with both fabrics. The lavender silk crepe bodice i did NOT line, but the white silk charmeuse i did. With the petticoat, the intention was a reasonable one – i wanted to create a solid base for attaching the flowers. Unfortunately, the iron-on interfacing that I had in my stash was a terrible match for the weight of the charmeuse silk, and the finished skirt became stiff and then began to buckle.
I have absolutely no explanation for why i didn’t line the bodice!
![Front View of an American Girl Doll wearing a lavender silk regency ball gown](https://www.sewwhathappens.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/IMG_2247.jpg)
The three-dimensional flower bouquets are the one part of the gown that i did right – they’re made from wired silk ribbons in various widths and colors, stitched into clusters on millinery buckram and tacked to the white skirt:
![Side View of an American Girl Doll wearing a lavender silk regency ball gown](https://www.sewwhathappens.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/IMG_2252.jpg)
A view of the wired silk ribbon bouquets on the white silk underskirt:
![Close-up view of wired ribbon flowers on the skirt of an american girl doll regency ballgown](https://www.sewwhathappens.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/DSC_9139.jpg)
The back of the gown:
![Back View of an American Girl Doll wearing a lavender silk regency ball gown](https://www.sewwhathappens.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/IMG_2254.jpg)
The back detail is composed of a sprig of wired silk ribbons and a fall of 7mm silk ribbons in purple, lavender and white:
![Close-up view of wired ribbon flowers at the back waist of an American Girl doll regency ballgown](https://www.sewwhathappens.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/DSC_9152.jpg)
Thank you for inviting me to join the Historical Inspiration Festival!
I love this! The beautiful lavendar color. and the delicate flowers!
Don't forget to link parts 1 and 2 to my blog as well! :^)