Quarterly Journal Dress

This post is also visible at the "8 That Create" blog.


I love create collages out of vintage papers.
I usually add paint and molding paste on top of them, almost covering them up...but I still love to add them for texture and the occasional peek of text.
After completing one of my larger pieces for the Old Forge show, I decided to make a sculptural type collage.
Seeing three "dresses" in the show, I decided that, even though my slant on the fashion theme was nature's fashion, I would create a dress.
A tiny dress.
Out of paper and vintage lace.

I actually made two dresses (I was having too much fun to stop!) when it was all said and done but will only send one of them.
For the first one, I used pages from a women's magazine ("Demorest's Monthly Magazine" 1878), vintage sheet music, dress pattern pieces, antique book pages and a few scraps of handmade paper.
I glued these torn pieces of paper onto a scrim type fabric with an acrylic medium.
(let that dry of course)
I used a doll dress pattern that my grandmother used (when I was a young lass) to make doll clothes out of.
It is veryyyy old...
And then I stitched the paper dress up on my sewing machine.
I added a sash at the waist with vintage netting as well as antique lace around the sleeves and bottom.

Framing was going to be a problem since it is a 3D piece.
I decided on a deep shadowbox frame. This worked great but was a bear to photograph.
Here's a shot out of the frame.

I'll add a couple of detail shots so you can see the fashion references on the dress.
I had a lot of fun making this tiny dress (overall length is about 7 inches)