Slippery Fabric Cheat

I actually hand-basted this panel and it came out nicely except for one thing: I lost 1/4 to both top and bottom as the feed dog pulled the fabric through.

 Tomorrow I'm reworking it with some Stitch Witchery or Heat n' Bond, which ever works best, tucking it into the seams and pressing it before I stitch.  In a garment, 1/4 inch is too much to waste.  Things won't sit right or play nice together unless they match up and I'd spent a lot of time aiming for an accurate cut.

First Mock-up for 1918

Yes, the extra panel was a good idea.  The main part of this corset girdle covers my largest asset quite completely, but what I hadn’t bargained on was the “mini skirt” effect of the garment.  Yuck. Not flattering!  I’ll pin the bottom in closer to my body where it flares out to conform it to my upper thighs better.

And yes, that's a boned, flat-felled seam on the right hand side of the picture and an unfortunate mistake on the left hand side of the picture.  That's what I get for talking while cutting.  See ya' seam allowances!

In terms of fit and flattery, I found Edwardian Promenade that addresses period diet and even a whole show in the UK devoted to Victorian/Edwardian reducing.  Wow!  Chew thoroughly and slowly!  Drink your water!  Take a daily constitutional!  Put your corset on!  Exercise!  Sweat!  (Funny, nothing new, here.)  However, I'm really glad I don't have to spit half my food out into a cup.  I wonder if cool showers would help for weight reduction?  They seem to be helping on The Diets that Time Forgot.

Yes, an Extra Panel, alas

I was initially tempted to just add an extra panel, but decided that was too lazy, and that I’d extend each piece by an inch or three.  But when I held each piece up to my body, the need for an extra panel become even more apparent.  I have large hips. Seriously large.  Denying it will only make this pattern look stupid on me, so I’m going to own up to it and add an extra side panel.  That will make a total of 2 front panels and 2 back panels for each side.  My only concern is that the number will change this beautiful pattern from its present strong-yet-dainty look into something ugly.  I hope not.  The front side bone will stay in place, the back side bone will also stay where it is, the only difference will be an additional bone or two running down the added side seam.  I can live with that.  When I make this pattern again, I’ll try adding the inches to each panel.

The Mock-Up Commences (or does it?)

Here is the start of the mock-up with a pair of my DH’s old pants:

They are cotton twill, a great, inexpensive (free!) stand-in for coutil.  However, what a waste of 100% cotton! I can do a sloppy, fast job and toss them OR I can treat this toile as important from the start, and in the end, have a well-worn, soft twill steampunk edition of this corset. I don’t foresee needing to cut them apart, which is what the toile is for – fitting, marking, dismantling, then creating an entirely new, trued pattern. I guess I’ll just have to wait and see how it comes out.
Here’s today’s conundrum: See the ending place in the Waugh diagram for the elastic placement on the front? [The top piece in the picture.]  Where the heck does that end?  In this drawing, it just stops.  That makes no sense, because I’d have to fold my elastic under to finish it creating a huge lump near the center front of the garment’s waist, or it slips in-between two layers of corset material - the fashion fabric and the strength layer.  Now, that sounds like a reasonable option until I consider there won’t be anything for it to slide into.  I plan on flat-lining coutil to fashion fabric, treating the two fabrics as one piece, one layer.  There will be no seam to speak of to tuck it into.  I have two options.  One is to lay an additional bone casing in up against the busk, thus covering the elastic; the other option is to ignore the drawing and carry the elastic over to the busk and bury it in there someplace.  I like the first option much better.  It strengthens the over-all garment, and leaves no lump.

Elastic & Boning Issue

This corset has elastic around the top. This is troublesome to me, at first, because the (very 1980’s) elastic I have is finished on the edges (I think, I’ll have to locate it.)  So, if it’s finished and the bone casings allow the bones to go up into the elastic areas, then what?  How do I finish them off?
Locating this picture from ebay:

showed me that there is indeed binding around both the fabric and the elastic, not just the fabric. The boning channels are set up into the elastic, so what happens is the fabric is cut off just below the waist, then the elastic goes in at the waist to create one slab of fabric.  Also, the transition of the elastic into the boning channels is really smooth, very pretty.
This 1918 era corset, then, represents the direct opposite of a Victorian corset, where the control was at the waist and the hips were padded and petticoated to extreme extension.  Here, the hips are under control while the waist floats free for the first time since the First Empire.  (I’m missing the 1860’s already…)
I also located the lone piece of elastic I purchased a million years ago for something.  The edges are smooth, ready to slip into seam allowances and/or boning channels.  It’s going to work out fine.

My Edwardian Corset Girdle (circa 1918)

Technically, this corset, dated in C & C as c. 1918, is 8 years after King Edward VII had passed on.  In my head, I guess the fun Edwardian era ends with the advent of World War I, in July of 1914.  I doubt there was all that much “fun” to be had during that time period for much of anyone, and corsets are just beginning to cease production during this time.  I do like to include the corset girdles in this time-frame because they are still interesting.  They still have a center busk and older women are clinging to them in some respects, which is sort of symbolic, for me.  (Think Chekhov’s Cherry Orchard, and all that - Ah! the past!) 
What I mean to say is that I’ll define my own very loose, emotional terms for “Edwardian”:   I’d like to include the Fin de Siecle (I couldn’t cut myself off from all of that!) that is, 1890 thru until Armistice Day, November, 1918.  And then, my friends, it’s really, clearly over.  For real.
This is going to be so much fun!