I made this costume back in 2018. (See the gallery of the final product.) I absolutely love this historical era, the decade leading up to turn of the 20th century (1890s/1900). Women’s fashion was so intense, you could basically tell what each year in the decade was by the crazy sleeve shapes they had. 😅
I actually won “Best Individual Documentation” at Costume-Con 2018 for the build book I made for this costume. I printed it and put it in a weathered yellow file sleeve for effect (I do not have a picture, alas.) The below writeup is basically a tldr; of the build book.
In the film “Crimson Peak”, Edith Cushing wears many beautiful dresses with huge sleeves. I chose to make her yellow dress because of the striking color and the velvet flower appliqués – and not to mention the amazing black bow in the back.
I started by making a standard corset of the time period from black coutil and silk dupioni with structural piping and yellow flossing (my first time ever doing it). I drafted the pattern from “Corsets and Crinolines.” I had to be very thorough with the construction because it was actually cinching me quite a bit.
For the gown I used my ever faithful “The Cut of Women’s Clothes” to draft the starting pattern, which I also tweaked by draping the pleats on my dressform. The mustard yellow fabric is a gorgeous poly duchess satin from Mood (seriously the quality is amazing for non-silk, you wouldn’t be able to tell without a burn test). The sleeves have custom supports I made from boning and cotton, to make sure they wouldn’t cave in on themselves.
I made the flowers by a combination of bleaching and dying yellow cotton velvet. The stems are babysilk. I hand sewed/beaded it all onto tulle, then transferred to the gown.
I got a gorgeous vintage roll of wide moire silk ribbon for the black bow. I wore my ivory Tavistocks as well. I also re-wore Dolores’s chemise and petticoat with this outfit.
