The Ruffles of the Bustle-y Dragon Ball Gown

 Ruffles. So very many ruffles.

If I could go back in time, I'd choose a totally different skirt design for my Gryffindor Dragon Bustle Gown, because what in the world was I thinking when I fell in love with this fashion plate and decided to recreate it with all those ruffles.

Those ruffles would take forever to sew! Those ruffles did take forever to sew! And, they took a significant amount of pins as well. 

I'm getting quite ahead of myself. Let's start at the beginning with the plan, the pattern, and cutting all the ruffles.

The above fashion plate from 1874 was the plan, and I decided to use the Truly Victorian 1875 Parisian Trained Skirt Pattern as my starting point. My grandma gave me this pattern for Christmas nearly a decade ago when I started planning the Gryffindor Bustle Gown project.

With some changed to the trim pattern, adjustments to the front drapery, and the addition of lots of ruffles to the back panel it would work admirably!

I began by cutting out all of the lining or base skirt pieces from a stashed piece of red polished cotton. I basted this together as my mock-up and tried it on over my bustle and other 1870's under garments.

It fit! The silhouette was great! 

It just needed lots of ruffles!

Time to cut my silk!

The first piece of silk on the chopping block was a red striped thrifted curtain. I don't recall when or where I got this curtain, but it was a magnificent heavy silk. I disassembled it with my seam ripper.

The resulting fabric would be used to cover the flat lining of the skirt between all the ruffles on the back. I had disassembled my mock-up and would be using that for the flat lining of the skirt.

In the fashion plate, on the back of the skirt, there were five sets of ruffles. Each one consisted of one wide ruffle with a narrower ruffle attached to the bottom of it. On my skirt the wide ruffle would be red and the narrow ruffle would be gold. In the fashion plate there are definite gaps between the ruffles, and that is the space my curtain silk would fill, as I wasn't sure I'd have enough of my silk yardage to fill in there after all the ruffles were cut. Once I started calculating I realized those ruffles were going to be insane fabric hogs. . .

 

So, I figured out how wide my red and gold ruffles would be, and I cut strips of the curtain silk to mount said ruffles to and fill in the gaps. For the top part of the back of the skirt this was very straightforward and easy.

The bottom half was more complicated thanks to the curved hem, but I got it done. 

After those curved pieces of curtain silk, I was very happy to move on to cutting straight strips of my red and gold silk for the ruffles themselves - for the first few strips at least. Then it just got tedious. So. Many. Strips. Of. Silk. So Many!

And once all the pieces were cut out, the project got shelved for two years, because children. (More details in my previous post.) This spring the box of strips of silk was pulled out and opened up. I figured out which strips were meant for which ruffles and started pinning said ruffles together. For the top half of the back of the skirt each ruffle would consist of two full widths of red silk. For the bottom half each ruffle would be four widths. And for the gold ruffles that would attach to the red ruffles, I had a different plan.

 I was finally going to use the birthday gift my husband gave me the summer we got married! 

Antique fluting irons!

In preparation my husband and kids got the irons all cleaned up for me with a wire wheel attached to a drill. 

Look at the difference between the cleaned up top iron and the still waiting bottom iron!

I meanwhile sewed together and hemmed all my strips of gold silk - by machine, because there was way too much to even consider hand hemming. 

Once the miles and miles of gold silk was hemmed, it was fluting time. The Quintessential Clothes Pen's blog post about using her fluting iron was invaluable, and I used her method to great success.

I warmed the first fluting iron on the stove in my cast iron skillet. One it was hot enough to sizzle water I pulled it out to use and put the second iron in the skillet to warm.

 

I drenched a small section of the silk with vinegar water then slowly rocked the iron over it, and I was left with me most delightfully fluted bit of fabric! I continued until my iron got too cool then swapped out the iron I was using with the one that was warming in the skillet. On and on it went. I fluted a few feet of silk every time I had a mostly clear counter and some time to kill. Whenever I appeared to have a long enough section fluted, I would pin it to one of my red ruffles.

To keep the gold silk fluted and ruffly looking when it was sewn on to the red ruffles I had to pin in-between each and every ridge. This took a very long time, and an awful lot of pins.

Sooooo many pins in fact that I had to go to the store and buy more glass headed pins more than once, despite the fact I'd bought a couple new boxes of pins before even starting the project.

I tried out every brand of glass headed pins easily available, as I needed them in a hurry and had to get them locally. I now have very definite opinions on which glass headed pins are worth using and which aren't and could right up an entire comparison on all of them. 

There were over 600 pins used in each of the big lower ruffles on the back of the skirt. I took those ruffles everywhere to pin together. Basement, living room, bed, deck, waiting rooms, in the car in school pick-up lines. Pinning the gold ruffles may have been the single most labor intensive part of this project.

Finally, once each ruffle was pinned, I would carefully sew it on with the sewing machine - making sure not to run over any of my precious pins, because I would need them all again for the next ruffle.

These were my pin cushions before pinning a singe large ruffle.

And these were my pin cushions after pinning a single large ruffle.

After all that, actually attaching the red ruffles to the skirt was a piece of cake! First I used my surger to finish the seam allowance between the gold and red ruffles - not historically accurate, but who cares? It's what I had the time and mental compacity to do after fluting and pinning all those ruffles. Then I gathered up each red ruffle and pinned it and sewed it to the curved piece of curtain silk I described at the beginning of this post. Finally I sewed the curved pieces of curtain silk to my polished cotton skirt base.

And at 12:15 am the day before  day of the ball, my ruffled back skirt panel was done! Now all I had to do was finish assembling the skirt. . .

  And everything would be fantastic!

A Bustle-y, Ruffle-y, Dragon-y Ball Gown

 We decided to host a dragon themed ball, my friend and I. This of course left me with a burning question, what would a historical dragon ball gown look like??

Now, to be clear, the ball was pure fantasy. I just like to take any excuse to make, or wear, a historical gown so I wanted to add some history to my fantasy and make a fantastical historical dragon ball gown. But where to begin???

Red and Gold. Those seemed like good dragon-y colors. An excellent starting point! 

Especially considering I already had both red and gold silk on hand.

Now why Red and Gold you ask? Because I'm a Gryffindor of course!

About 10 years ago, give or take a couple years, there was a trend going around the historical sewing community of making bustle dresses to correspond with one's Hogwarts house. At that time, I began gathering silk to make my own Gryffindor bustle dress. A silk plaid drapery remnant of 3ish yards featuring some red and gold, a gold crinkled taffeta remnant of 3ish yards from Fabric Mart, and 7ish yards of a red silk from Fabric Guru. 

I gathered these silks slowly, one length every couple years as I came across good deals on the colors I had in mind. I paid less than $10 per yard for each piece. As I gathered my materials, I daydreamed about and a designed my 1870's Gryffindor Gown between other projects. Finally, in 2024, I had all my materials, I'd picked a fashion plate from 1874 I wanted to re-create, and the red and gold gown was at the top of my project list. Of course, by this point Hogwarts themed historical clothing had fallen out of favor online, but I'd spent so long dreaming of this gown I was going to make it!

I figured out my base patterns from the Truly Victorian patterns I'd been given over the years and began cutting strips of red and gold silk to make the magnificently ruffle-y skirt from my inspiration fashion plate. And then. . .

And then, in a single afternoon almost two years ago, my life drastically changed. One morning I went to visit my parents and sister with my rolls of silk for this project hanging out in the back seat, and that afternoon I came home with three children in the backseat instead and the rolls of silk had been unceremoniously booted to the very back. 

Two months after being licensed as foster parents we had our first kiddos to parent, and love, and provide a safe and stable home for, and sewing fancy historical dresses was quite literally taking the back seat. The very back seat. The trunk actually, seeing as my seats were suddenly full of living, breathing, very active human kids.

Ok, yes, this picture has nothing to do with the subject at hand, but my brother took it at the dragon ball, and the colors are perfect! Thus, here it is.

Soooo, fast forward a year and a half, and my red and gold silk is sitting stuffed in a box somewhere. Somehow, we have learned how to be parents, added an additional child to the mix, and I have occasionally found time to sew. Wild.

And I need a dragon ball gown. Preferably historical. After brainstorming a few ideas I thought of my red and gold silk bustle skirt I'd had pretty much cut out before the kids arrived and I shelved the project. Red and gold were good dragon-y colors. What if I pivoted on that project and instead of making a Gryffindor Quidditch robe inspired day bodice to go with that fantastically ruffled skirt, I made a dragon inspired evening bodice?

The gold and red ruffles down the back of the skirt that I'd intended to represent the Gryffindor Lion could just as easily represent a dragon's tail. I just needed to pick the right bodice design to go with it.

The diagonal folds on this 1874 evening bodice made me think of  the texture of a dragon's belly. That was it! I'd finish the skirt I'd started, and make a bodice inspired by this one to go with it. I might be over dressed for a 2026 dragon ball, but it was going to be fun!

I ordered some dragon buttons for the bodice off Etsy, and I got started!

At long last, it was time to actually sew this red and gold silk gown. It was going to be different than I originally planned, but my entire life is different than originally planned, so that seems to be fitting.

  

There's Nothing More Natural Than a Horse Hair Bustle, Right?

 I was getting carried away with my plans for the pink and burgundy 1882 gown. I was ready to mock-up the bodice and make some real progress on this thing! Then I had to halt and do a pivot.

I needed the correct under things to go under this new gown and give it the right shape. And it would really be best to make those things before going through the hassle of mocking up the bodice to ensure a good fit on the finished product. 

Thus, the bodice patterns I was contemplating got set aside for another day, and I fell down the rabbit hole of horse hair bustles.

1882, the year of my fashion plate, was at the tail end of what we call the "Natural Form Era." "Natural" as in the fashionable shape resembled natural women's shape slightly more than the fashionable shape of the years preceding and following this era - but it certainly wasn't entirely natural. Corsets, of course, were still worn, as were petticoats, and bustles. Yes, bustles. But not the large lobster tail bustles of the mid 1870's and 1880's. No, the bustles of this 1878-1882 era were much smaller and more natural looking - just a bit of extra "oomph" added to the back of the silhouette, rather than an extensive wire contraption. 

The book Victorian Fashions & Costumes From Harper's Bazar, 1867-1898, edited by Stella Blum, features a drawing of an 1881 "hair cloth bustle" on page 135 - this became my primary inspiration for my own horse hair bustle. Then I took to the internet to see if there were any of these bustles in museums that I could find pictures of - and that yielded rich results!

LACMA, Woman's Bustle

Turns out there's a wide variety of extant horsehair bustles which have found their way online. The above bustle from LACMA was particularly intriguing to me and looked relatively easy to make.
In my internet search I also came across the Modern Mantua Maker's blog post about her natural form underthings - and the pictures she shared of her horse hair bustle (especially the inside of it) gave me a good idea of how to construct one.

Armed with my inspiration pictures, I ventured down to the basement to locate suitable materials in my fabric stash - hair canvas (bought in 2020 for a men's tailoring project I never did get around to) and a blue striped cotton (obtained from a church basement that was being empties out probably around 2018ish) for the base. Originally I was just going to use plain unbleached muslin for the base fabric, but the stripes called to me and I couldn't resist them!

  

I used the back and side back upper skirt pattern pieces from McCall's 8191 (The pattern I used for my sister's natural form gown) as the starting point for the bustle base - they looked like they would give me a similar shape to the bustle in the book I was using as inspiration. I cut 2 side back pieces, with the front edge straightened out, to use as the "wings" on my bustle. For the center back, I folded some width out of the middle of the pattern piece since I wouldn't be needing to gather the top edge the way you do for a skirt. Then I cut out two sets of center back pieces - one set slightly wider than the other.

I would use the wider back panel to mount my horse hair ruffles on, then I would pleat the upper edge of that panel to match the width of the narrower panel, essentially using the narrower panel as a stay to help the wider panel on top maintain a bit of extra "oomph" once all the ruffles were sewn on and the bustle was assembled.

Speaking of assembly,

 

I began by binding the the front and bottom edges of the side panels with linen tape to finish them. Then I sewed up the center back seams of both the top/wider "ruffle" panel and the bottom/narrower "stay" panel, and bound the bottom edges of each of those with linen tape as well.

After that I measured and marked ruffle placement on the top panel, and proceeded to hem all the horsehair ruffles.

The very top ruffle then had gathering stitches run along the top and through the middle. It would be gathered up and sewn on as a "poof" to match my inspiration images. 

I pinned on the ruffle according to the marks on my striped panel, then gathered it to fit.

Gathering horse hair canvas is no joke.

I regretted this decision almost as soon as I started.

Pleating this ruffle would have been wayyyyyyy easier than gathering.

Eventually it was done - but never again!

Once that first ruffle was all gathered and pinned on, I pleated the next ruffle.

Wayyyyyyy quicker and easier.

I did the same thing with the third ruffle.

Then I took the ruffly-puffly thing down to the sewing machine.

I sewed on the ruffles.

Then covered the upper raw edge of the two pleated ruffles with linen tape.

With that, the ruffe panel was done and the bustle was ready for final assembly.

I pinned the non-ruffled stay panel to the side/wing pieces, right sides together.

Then, right sides together again so the wing panels were sandwiched between the two back panels, I pinned the stay panel to the ruffle panel along the side seams.

 I sewed up those side seams, pinked them to keep them from unraveling, then turned the bustle right side out.

I slightly pleated the top edge of the ruffle panel to fit the top edge of the stay panel, then sewed the bustle onto the waistband I'd already made.

And with that - my Natural Form bustle was done!

It only took about 3 hours to make (One morning when I was home due to an ice storm), and the results are incredibly satisfactory!

And, it first the HSM theme "Colors of Nature", which feels fitting for something from the "Natural Form" era.

What the item is: Hair Cloth Bustle

The Challenge: Colours of Nature: Make something using undyed material, or material coloured with natural dyes. The horse hair cloth and linen tape are both undyed. The striped cotton base fabric does obviously have some dyed sections, but the shades of blue are all shades than can be achieved with indigo - a natural dye (Though as I received this fabric either second or third hand I have no idea what it was actually dyed with.)

Material: Horse hair canvas, and plain weave striped cotton

Pattern: I used some pieces from McCall's 8191 to get the base, then altered those and added ruffles.

Year: This is based on an image from 1881, but would be appropriate for about 1878 -1882 looks.

Notions: Linen tape and thread

How historically accurate is it? My hair canvas is modern, with some synthetic in it, so that's not accurate, but the striped cotton is good. My construction method is just what made sense to me without a lot of research, so I can't 100% vouch for it. The finished garment looks correct though when compared to similar pieces from the era, and it serves it's purpose well, so atleast 60% I'd say.

Hours to complete: 3

First worn: February 2024, but only for pictures and mock-up fittings so far.

Total cost: The hair cloth was about $8 a yard, and I think I used a yard and a half, so $12 there, everything else was stash, most of it obtained for free.