Ninth Sewing Project: My Audrey Dress

There is a hoarder in every one of us. My list is numerous and one of them (cultivated last year) is downloading dress patterns. I'd downloaded the Audrey Dress last year from here (Selfish Seamstress). Always wanted to attempt it but never had the time or enough motivation to start on the project.

So when my company's annual dinner theme was announced - "Movie Stars" - I decided to dress as Holly Golightly (Audrey Hepburn) in Breakfast at Tiffany's.

Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany's (photo taken from Google Image search)

It was the perfect gameplan - easy, recognisable and the dress can be used again! So it was time to dig up the dusty (in virtual world) PDF dress pattern and print it out. I shopped for the fabric at Nagoya Textile Store, Carrefour Subang with practically no idea of what I should be looking for. I'd found this black fabric that seemed thick enough and not easily crumpled (probably some sort of suiting material), and they had 20% discount! And since not much was left, they gave me everything - which was more than the 1.5m that I purchased! (Ok, although that was a steal, I still have more than half the fabric left untouched and waiting for me to start on a new project)

I was the diligent little "wannabe-dressmaker" for the weekend and managed to finish 90% of the dress in two days. Again, my phobia of sewing in the hidden zipper and hem made me seek the help of my mum's friend. And so the dress was done!

My Audrey dress!

However when I tried it on, mum said that I looked like I was going to work - not really the epitome of the LBD (little black dress). This was probably due to the fabric that I had chosen. So for my annual dinner, I had to resort to my old LBD from many many years ago, accessorised with borrowed gloves, my home-made pearl necklace and plastic bling crown (cost RM5 only!). For the pearl necklace, I'd strung together three strings of medium large faux pearls on fishing line and punctuated the ends with one of mum's defective brooch (which size and rhinestones happened to be similar to that of Ms Holly Golightly's).

I'm proud to say that my costume (including the Audrey dress that I made but did not wear; and my hairdo) definitely cost less than RM100. I'd put a photo here but this is public domain... so it is better that I don't. One grouse would be that not many people recognised my costume, only those from the Baby Boomers Generation did - such as Puan Sri (wife of our Tan Sri Chairman), my boss and one of the VPs. Quite sad actually. Perhaps I'm too stuck in the old-fashioned days!