Pic Heavy Post of a Spectacular 1960's Cocktail Dress

This 1960's cocktail dress belonged to my grandmother.  It's made of a slightly heavy satin and lace.

The lace has large flowers which have iridescent sequins sewn into the middle of each.

Ruched midriff section.  Gorgeous!

The skirt has a pleated overlay with a fabric bow sewn onto it.  I think the vertical pleats contrast nicely with all the horizontal ruching.  There are two small pleats on the right side of the overlay (left in the photo).  The skirt underneath has two darts on either side.

The side seam looks curvy because I had some trouble getting this dress on my dress form.  You can see the overlay is sewn into the side seam.

The back.  It actually looks better than this --like I said, I had trouble getting it on my dress form and it shows in this shot and the next one.

Close up of the back.  It has a lapped zipper with hooks and thread eyes on it to keep the zipper covered.  (I couldn't get the top one hooked.)  Now some construction details:

The front overlay is lined with pink fabric.

It's tacked down in two spots lower down on the skirt to keep it from flopping when walking or gaping when sitting.  It's sewn into both side seams --it doesn't extend around the back at all.

The lace sleeves. 

The lace is sewn to the bodice in the V but the sleeves can be pulled aside to show the dress has two small straps under the lace.  Without the lace and the overlay this is a very basic dress.

The insides.  Here you can see the pink lining and the midriff facing.  The skirt is unlined.

This is the side seam with the ruching.  (Ignore the camera strap.)  Notice none of the seams have any finishing.

The darts are sewn and hand tied at their tips.

Here on the back you can see those straps were made long and grandmother has adjusted them.

At this point I was beginning to wonder if Grandmother had made this dress herself --it shows every sign of being homemade --when I spotted this union label.  It's the only tag in this dress.

Here's the pinked side seams of the skirt where the tag is.  You can also see the hem tape --and that the hem was taken up.  By this time I also noticed this dress is in great need of a dry cleaning!

It's a bit of a stiff dress with all these details, but I've tried it on and it feels fabulous --it's hard to describe why, but this is a dress that isn't going to let you down.  This style with the ruched middle and pleated overlay looks great on nearly every figure.  The only problem I have with it is that the oyster color is horrible on me -- I think it would be wonderful in navy.