This week we were asked to design a cocktail dress or evening gown to fit in with the new Project Runway collection at Lord + Taylor.
The dress had to be appropriate for the sophisticated Lord + Taylor customer, but also relatively easy to manufacture.
I started by picking out my fabric before designing my dress. I wanted something other than black, but nothing really spoke to me. I thought this textured, stretch black with shots of silver at least had a little something special to it. The fabric seemed to call out for a gown.
I tried to keep simplicity of design in mind for my dress. (Let’s face it Dimitri had a beautiful dress this week, but the amount of work it would take to manufacture it probably kept it out of the top.) So, I stuck to a rather simple shape, but added some ruching to the waist.
The ruching gives some definition at the waist and can also hide a little tummy that might keep someone from wearing this type of dress. I paired the dress with basic black peep-toes because no one is really going to see them. The evening bag calls back to the silver in the dress. I felt the amount of open neckline called for a statement necklace.
Since the judges were going ga-ga for a simple black dress with an asymmetrical hem on the show, I hope my ruching will throw them for a loop. Really, I thought the judging was quite uneven this week and the designs not that great. Maybe I’m just tired of the make a pretty dress challenges. Hopefully, we’ll get something a little more interesting soon.
© 2005 – 2012 Kathy Lewinski & Susan Cornish
I like it–the ruching is eye catching and makes the dress more special. (That’s the first time I’ve ever typed out “ruching!”) (Probably even *said* ruching, haha!) But it looks very pretty, and I like the silver thread running through, as well.
Looking forward to tonight’s challenge!
Love the dress. It is cracking me up that JoAnna Cole would come into the work room and ask the all-star designers “how could a woman wear a bra with that”
But both you and I, more than once, have offered dresses for “real” women, and have looked a ‘tummy flattery’ as an issue.
I think we are more on the mark. You could ALWAYS find some crazy feat of engineering called a “bra” that would work with a dress. But no crazy engineering is going to hide a muffin top. The dress just needs to be well cut. And you have done just that. Bravo!