Constructing a Floof Worthy of Doom
Doesn’t look like much now, does it? This is the beginning of the Great Floofening! This is 8 yards of very light-weight pale pink-peach silk taffeta that is cut into panels and hung up to keep it safe from my cat Minimew.
The joining of the inner layer panels was all done by machine. The joins are selvedge to selvedge so there was no seam finishing other than pressing them open and top stitching them by machine. The joining of the outer layer was all done by hand. The edges were double-folded and hemstitched and then the panels were whip-stitched together. Note the front panels are 2 inches shorter than the back panels because the back is designed to by longer and fuller to support the train of the Doom Gown that will be be worn over it.
I began adding layers of synthetic horsehair around the bottom hem, lightly quilting as I added each one. The very bottom row has three layers of 2-inch wide horsehair braid. Then I pulled it off the machine and checked the stiffness. It was no where near stiff enough; so, I knew I needed to add more. I then added a second row above the first consisting of two layers of 2-inch wide horsehair braid with light quilting. Then I put it on to see if the quilting was sufficient. The picture on the right shows how it caved-in at the back.
I added yet another row of the synthetic horsehair braid. This row was only one layer of the 2-inch wide horsehair braid. I quilted that row much lighter than the two previous rows. I also added yet more quilting to the bottom two rows of horsehair. There are 25 rows of machine quilting in total.
The start and stop ends of the horsehair were very scratchy. I did not want it to damage my camica; so, I cut strips of off-white wool felt, pinked the edges, and hand-stitched it over the entirety of the assembly on the inside.
Now the back stands out correctly without any caving.
I decided to hem the outer layer of the skirt all at once by using 2 rows of metallic silver soutache and an inch-wide bias tape in ivory. I simply turned up the raw edge of the skirt, covered it with the bias tape, and stitched the soutache on using the same running stitch that the bias tape was stitched on with. I then repeated this on the other edge of the bias tape using a second row of soutache.
I pleated the inner layer down to 40 inches and hand-basted the pleats in place. This gave me a flat surface to attach the outer layer to. The outer layer had a 6:1 pleating ratio. For maximum fullness and softness of line, I decided to gather the top layer down to 40 and then hand-baste it down. This was done instead of pleating so it did not flatten as pleats would have.
For the waistband, I used the same ivory bias I used for the hem facing. I blind machine stitched it to the inside of the waistband using a triple zig-zag stitch. I hope I never have to do that again, as it was exhausting keeping that amount of floof moving through the machine at an even pace and in the correct direction. The outside was handsewn with one stitch per gather.
The front opening edges of both layers are whip stitched together by hand with extra stitching at the point where they join. Rather than trying to make eyelets or use hooks and eyes, I made half-circle buttonhole bars, which I thread a piece of lace through for a tie